Inclusive Gender Language – What Still Needs Fixing

US culture today is finally shifting away from language that assumes maleness as the norm, but in some places it isn’t shifting enough, and in some places I believe it is shifting in ways that continues to denigrate both the feminine and non-human animals.

 

Where It Isn’t Shifting Enough

A common convention outside progressive circles is to write “he or she” or “his/hers” when talking about a single person of any gender. This doesn’t go far enough because it still puts the male first, and it does not acknowledge non-binary people. This male primacy has been so ingrained that when I worked as a textbook editor over a decade ago, the companies whose job it was simply to reprint pages with my edits incorporated actually disobeyed my instructions and consistently printed “he or she” when I wrote “she or he.” I couldn’t make even that small change from inside the system – let alone add nonbinary people – even when technically I should have had the power to do so.

 

An Argument in Favor of They

When I was younger, my first reaction to they as a singular was that it was too grammatically awkward, since it goes with plural verbs, and I wished that ze or something like it had become popular instead. I was converted when I found out the history, however. Originally, they was either singular or plural, like you, which also uses plural verbs even when singular. They was historically used for a single person of indeterminate gender until the 1950s, when grammar rules were changed to speak of any indeterminate individual as male. By using they now when talking about a person of indeterminate or unknown gender, we are just going back to its historical use, and it makes sense from there to also use it for a person who does not identify as either a woman or a man… and when writing both, as I just did, I believe it is best to rebalance the scales by putting the feminine first.

 

An Argument Against It

A convention I passionately dislike is using it to describe non-human animals whose sex is unknown… or even whose sex is known. Even if we do not know an animal’s sex, we know for sure that the animal is a living being, not an object. Calling animals it supports the objectification and abuse of nature, whereas speaking of them as living beings like ourselves helps shift culture toward also treating them that way. If you don’t know an animal’s sex, I would encourage you to call the animal they – or she. I believe after such a long time of assuming maleness and all the damage it has done, assuming femaleness can be both refreshing and healing to individuals and to our culture. It helps rebalance the scales. And it is far better to mistake the sex of another animal than to treat her like an object.

 

Let’s Not Throw Away the Feminine Again

I am all in favor of trans inclusivity … I am concerned when it is done in a way that throws out the feminine. For example, I have seen people working with incarcerated pregnant women and mothers and not wanting to use feminine words, even though the actual individuals in question all identified as women and felt that the carceral system was taking away their womanhood and motherhood, which they valued. Yes, it is always possible that some do not fully identify as women and do not feel safe saying so in jail, but that does not mean we should throw away feminine words. If we jump right from treating the masculine as superior to throwing away all gendered language, we are throwing away the feminine for two different reasons. For many people femininity is positive, and for many it is negative only because their definition of it stems from patriarchy’s warped, denigrated versions of the feminine and masculine. I believe our language needs to honor the full spectrum, especially what has been denigrated – both the feminine and trans or nonbinary. An example is to describe a population as “trans and cisgender women and nonbinary people.” For inclusivity that honors all, we must continue to include both feminine and trans/nonbinary language, and I believe this is far more important than avoiding the grammatical awkwardness of lengthy terms.