RE: Gender neutral - any new developments in your neck of the woods?

Subject: RE: Gender neutral - any new developments in your neck of the woods?
From: "Downing, David" <DavidDowning -at- users -dot- com>
To: "TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com>
Date: Tue, 4 Mar 2003 09:01:47 -0500


Well, I vote for casting the material in the second person wherever possible, because it kills two birds with one stone. It avoid the gender problem and addresses the user directly, thus getting rid of that snooty academic third-person thing.

-----Original Message-----
From: Hart, Geoff [mailto:Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA]
Sent: Monday, March 03, 2003 8:27 AM
Subject: Gender neutral - any new developments in your neck of the woods?

Dan Glovier wonders: <<Is anyone a fan of using "they" as the gender neutral
singular pronoun of choice?>>

It's certainly grammatically valid, but I try to write around it wherever
possible. For example:

<<"The first time a user accesses their account, they will have to enter
their e-mail address and give praise to tech writers everywhere.">>

"The first time you... you will have to enter your..." or "The first time
users access their account, they must enter..."

<<I guess my real question is whether or not the usage above has gained any
momentum in the past year or so or is this still a sticky subject that has
several solutions?>>

Still a sticky subject. Not everyone likes the singular "they", and for that
reason, you're better to avoid it via of any of several simple solutions.

--Geoff Hart, geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
Forest Engineering Research Institute of Canada
580 boul. St-Jean
Pointe-Claire, Que., H9R 3J9 Canada

Vah! Denuone Latine loquebar? Me ineptum. Interdum modo elabitur. (Oh! Was I
speaking Latin again? Silly me. Sometimes it just sort of slips
out.)--Anonymous

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