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[Iris]

Huh. I thought Swedish was one of those languages where masculine and feminine gender merged into common gender? Although a quick search shows that isn't the case for pronouns, which I guess is egg on my face.

I'd be more enthusiastic about them if I saw a set I wanted to pronounce rather than ones which break the drivebelt in my brain when my eyes run over them. A nice "they" is a lot more pleasing to my inner voice. Maybe a nice loanword would feel better to me?

There are various constructed languages (Ido is one iirc) that have a lot more pronouns than English ever will - including both neuter and pangender ones.

[scriver]

Just for clarification for the english folks: In swedish, the equivalent of "they/them" is "den/denna" and "de/dem", the only difference being that we have singular and plural versions of it. You can see the cognate-ness by looking at the plural ones (they/them -> "de(y)/dem").

I dislike that Sweden's media has really latched on to our version of "xe/xir", which sees basically no use in the general populace (I'm not even sure they're used in the LGBTQ community, but that just might be that I'm not enough in it) while the neutral pronouns we have, including both the direct cognate of they/them and other possible choices, barely sees any use at all just because they're not "hip" enough.

And while I acknowledge I'm selection biased by being Swedish and limited in my interactions with English, but I'm pretty sure our they/them equivalent was more currently used than the English tongue's was too.

But you know me I get too emotional over language and semantics

I haven't heard of the "they/them" equivalent ("de/dem/dom") being used, though admittedly I know few Swedish enbies. It seems odd to me in Swedish since we usually are strict with the singular/plural (unlike English, which does it all the time with "you"), though I suppose it might both a positive and negative that it doesn't conflict with an "singular person, unknown gender" pronoun like "they" does in English (and the "xe/xir" "hen does).
 
Granted, I view "hen" mostly as a literal construct; really practical to avoid the "han eller hon"-s ("he or she"-s) of formal text, but impractical when spoken.

That's the thing though, "den/denne" (the singular variant of "de/dem") is already used that way, and completely smoothly so, because "han" och "hon" are genderised variants and developments if "den". Common phrases you would have heard used would be for example the Arthurian "den som drager detta svärd skola bli kung över hela England" ("they who draw this sword shall be crowned king of the whole of England" for the English speaker), or the very common child/play sayings like "den som sa det han va det" ("they who said it he was it" - "I am rubber you are glue") and "den som nämnde't han klämde't" ("they who mentioned it he squeezed it" -- it's our version of "smelt it dealt it"). In the two latter you can see the "den" pronoun slipping over into the gendered pronouns at the end usage. In both cases it could just as easily use the gender neutral at the second line and nothing would change, it runs just as smoothly in full gender neutral mode. I also always think of the tv-serien "Den som dräper" ("They who kills" from... 2000's sometime? You don't have to look far to see a host of it being used like this still around.

This is partially because it doesn't mesh well with dialectically omitting half of the "h"-es at the start of the pronouns. If "han" becomes "an", and "hon" "on", then "hen" collides with the "en" I overuse to avoid "man"¹. I find it's usually not to difficult to either call the person by name, shuffle around the word order, or use some lazy construction like "männskan" instead.

¹"Man/en" is a pronoun pair referring to a general person, used in cases where "one" or "you" would be used in English. "Man" is literally... "man" in English, so avoiding it is a speech quirk found among feminists. It's far from universal but not personal either.

Help me reclaim "man" into the old gender neutral instead! It's usage as a gender neutral pronoun is literally one of the ways the old, gender neutral "man as synonymous with human" still exists in our language (that and the suffix "-man" as a "somebody who does a thing-word"). The feminists are wrong, it is the usage of "man" as masculine and denying women grammatical humanhood which is the patriarchal construct.

Disclaimer: I don't really try to do this in my daily speak because I am self-concious enough as it is and afraid of sounding weird. But you and me together voliol we will be the start of something bigger, I know it!

Huh. I thought Swedish was one of those languages where masculine and feminine gender merged into common gender? Although a quick search shows that isn't the case for pronouns, which I guess is egg on my face.

Yes, pretty much. Grammatical gender is gone, having grown into the two gender-irrelevant "-en" and "-et" groups, often called "genus" because of Latin influence on the language of grammar. These two groups also have their own pronouns, "den/denna" och "det/detta". These are both used for basically everything, male- or female-related, people, animals, plants, things, you can find examples of all within both.

However, when it comes to pronouns, the "-en" words den split (in relatively modern Swedish, iirc) into additional gendered versions, "han/honom" och "hon/henne". These are grammatically speaking part of the "den/denna" pronoun, and is basically only used for people and personifications, and in modern times also animals. Because there's no grammatical difference between the three, you can easily use the gender neutral original instead of a gendered pronoun at any time without it sounding strange or forced. So we have this perfectly grammatically correct word with both singular and plural variants so it doesn't carry the metaphorical squeaky-floor-noise-itude the english "they" sometimes result in, and which is already used for people all the time with no issues or controversies. But it just wasn't good enough for the hipster.

[Rolan7]

Help me reclaim "man" into the old gender neutral instead! It's usage as a gender neutral pronoun is literally one of the ways the old, gender neutral "man as synonymous with human" still exists in our language (that and the suffix "-man" as a "somebody who does a thing-word"). The feminists are wrong, it is the usage of "man" as masculine and denying women grammatical humanhood which is the patriarchal construct.

Disclaimer: I don't really try to do this in my daily speak because I am self-concious enough as it is and afraid of sounding weird. But you and me together voliol we will be the start of something bigger, I know it!

I kinda dig this in theory?  We'd need a male equivalent to woman, of course.  Apparently "werman" was not actually a thing, but I don't see why it couldn't be!

So we could be mankind, with women and wermen and neither and all other sorts of men.  Cool- again, in theory   It sounds unrealistic but that's precisely because we were taught to expect man/werman as the default in so many roles.  There is no easy route.
Neopronouns and genders are cool.  Anything that disrupts (innovates) the gender binary, frankly.  I still associate most with having no gender (agender) followed by being a gender-non-conforming woman, but I think it's great that people today are constructing new genders.  We humans (mankind? ) have done that in many cultures in the past!  The only thing stopping us from doing it again is social conservativism trying to push "traditional" gender roles (from a very specific and unfair tradition).

You might think I'd be interested in fae-gender or something, and I am, just not for me.  I love how creative people are

[scriver]

Apparently "werman" was not actually a thing, but I don't see why it couldn't be!

Wait, it wasn't? But I've built me entire gender grammar philosphy on it D:

[Rolan7]

Apparently "werman" was not actually a thing, but I don't see why it couldn't be!

Wait, it wasn't? But I've built me entire gender grammar philosphy on it D:

You know what, I don't know XD
All this actual linguistics is beyond me, I just did a Google and believed the first result I saw: https://www.reddit.com/r/linguistics/comments/f4h0as/the_old_english_ghost_word_werman_where_did_this/

[voliol]

That's the thing though, "den/denne" (the singular variant of "de/dem") is already used that way, and completely smoothly so, because "han" och "hon" are genderised variants and developments if "den". Common phrases you would have heard used would be for example the Arthurian "den som drager detta svärd skola bli kung över hela England" ("they who draw this sword shall be crowned king of the whole of England" for the English speaker), or the very common child/play sayings like "den som sa det han va det" ("they who said it he was it" - "I am rubber you are glue") and "den som nämnde't han klämde't" ("they who mentioned it he squeezed it" -- it's our version of "smelt it dealt it"). In the two latter you can see the "den" pronoun slipping over into the gendered pronouns at the end usage. In both cases it could just as easily use the gender neutral at the second line and nothing would change, it runs just as smoothly in full gender neutral mode. I also always think of the tv-serien "Den som dräper" ("They who kills" from... 2000's sometime? You don't have to look far to see a host of it being used like this still around.

I'd argue that "den" in the example cases above is performing a slightly different purpose than the usual personal pronoun, as a definite article to an omitted noun (something like "the who kills"). Still, you have me convinced. Drawing a line between word classes like pronouns and particles is linguistic prescription to begin with, so why shouldn't we consider "den" as a pronoun in phrases where it functionally is?
And normally "den" is a personal pronoun. It just normally is used for non-person, which carries with it the same awkwardness as "it" in English. And here you come with examples where it is used for persons. I feel I understand it more now, thanks!


Re: the wereman stuff, I am also surprised by its supposed lack of existence. How should this be understood? That at the time "man" entered predominant use (over were?) it was patriarchy all the way down, as humans were considered men? I feel like even speculating about it might lead to the spread of more disinformation, if none of us have an actual grasp of etymology, and then by accident remember our shared speculation as any kind of knowledge...

[Iris]

Honestly, when it comes to pronouns and grammatical gender, I've always found the way that earlier forms of Proto Indo-European dealt with it to be pleasing - two grammatical genders, one animate and one inanimate. No gendered pronouns. No fussing about whether a chair is male or female. No weird circumlocatuons to avoid implying gender.

[alway]

Regarding pronouns, a few things for cis folks to keep in mind:
1. It isn't about what you think about grammar rules and how they should be, it's about whether you respect those around you more than you respect made up rules. If you fundamentally respect others less than made up categories based on a partial understanding of language, that's A Problem! You should probably do some self-examination there!
2. Likewise, understand that you are not an expert on this subject matter. Most cis people have a lot of learning to do on the basics of gender as applied to living in real life. If something seems weird and bizarre, it is most likely because you're the equivalent of a 3rd grader reading about calculus. You lack the context to make sense of it, rather than the thing itself being absurd and worthy of ridicule.
3. Until the former 2 points are understood and demonstrated, you will simply be relegated to the Baby's First Genders Talk because nobody trusts you enough to not be weird about it if they go into more depth. If xe/xer is too intense for you, who would bother even telling you about the meanings behind multiple sets of pronouns, auxiliary pronouns, it/its pronouns, plural folks, and so on?

[Iris]

Is that addressed at anyone in this thread?

[alway]

More that it's something that has come up several times now.

[voliol]

This might be directed partially at me, so I'd like to explain myself. I'd think it goes without stating that people matter more than the beauty (and ugliness!) of grammar, but maybe that has been understated.

As for scriver and I talking about Swedish grammar and how it does with xe/xir and it/it types of pronouns, I kind of see the issue in that neither of us use those. But I don't think that goes for anyone else in this thread, either? Forgive me if I'm wrong about that. Yeah, I don't think I'll get some real knowledge about normally inanimate pronouns from people from grammar, but I don't see a wrong with trying to get hints casually from where I am (i.e. in this thread), as long as I know to discard them if they end up as bull. Which is likely really.
The idea of hurting other people by being stupid and inconsiderate sucks, and I do believe that's something I've done. I'm sorry for that. But the idea of always being expected to only say smart things, or otherwise be assumed to always be on a child's level also does. I dunno, maybe it's very likely I'm more exparated than I should be and should just go to sleep, and I know of the plato/toddler meme image about talking about gender with cis/trans people. Still, I'd hope that doesn't need to be always the case. It's not like I don't have gender, and most trans people shouldn't run the whole gamut either. At some point everyone needs to learn about other people, or give up trying to learn the parts they can't intrinsically understand, as long as they accept others for what they are.

But yeah, grammatical gender is maybe off-topic for this thread?

[Strongpoint]

2. Likewise, understand that you are not an expert on this subject matter. Most cis people have a lot of learning to do on the basics of gender as applied to living in real life. If something seems weird and bizarre, it is most likely because you're the equivalent of a 3rd grader reading about calculus. You lack the context to make sense of it, rather than the thing itself being absurd and worthy of ridicule.

Here comes a simple problem. We don't even have a unified definition of the word "gender"

I regularly encounter variations of 4 major definitions.

1) Gender is exactly the same thing as sex but when talking about humans. It is binary. Can be either male or female.

2) Gender is a biochemically determined behavioral pattern that usually matches sex but not always. It is also a spectrum. Can be male, female, both(or neither).

3) Gender is (quoting WHO) characteristics of women, men, girls and boys that are socially constructed.  This includes norms, behaviors and roles associated with being a woman, man, girl or boy, as well as relationships with each other.

4) Gender is an internal feeling of being X. Usually it is male or female but can be both, neither, fluid, and more.

My problem is... those 4 are absolutely incompatible. Words stop functioning when different people assign different meanings to them. I am at the point where if someone will ask me what gender is, I'll shrug, this word is becoming meaningless (and when answering a stranger whatever answer I may choose, someone WILL be insulted and call me a bigot, narrow-minded, satanist, pervert, leftists, etc.)

[TD1]

I'd additionally posit that it's this fluidity of definition which fuels much transphobia, or even simple ignorance. Terms for sex and gender are interwoven. A female claiming to be a man appears to be making a biological statement, but (as per the WHO) they are actually making a deeper claim concerning societal constructs and their interaction therewith.

There is a distinction between a biological female and a socially-intervening female, but language imposes such vagueness on the issue that claiming 'I am a woman' is met with 'emmmm.... no you're not.'

The closest are the created 'transx' categories, which certainly acknowledge the differences between physical and social interactions with the concept of femininity/masculinity, but this very specificity seems counter to what many 'transx' individuals desire -  - - - - acceptance, socially, as someone of a different and well-defined sex which is not 'trans'.

I suppose in part the fluidity and uncertainty of the language aids this ambition; a factor likely contributing to the continued (and I'd argue in many cases mutual) misunderstanding.

1. Whether you respect those around you
2. You lack the context to make sense of it, rather than the thing itself being absurd and worthy of ridicule.
3. Otherwise, nobody trusts you enough to not be weird about it if they go into more depth.

I agree wholeheartedly with point one. Points two and three strike me as.... condescending and gatekeeping, I suppose? Is the onus of proof on the believer, or the sceptic?

[Strongpoint]

Points two and three strike me as.... condescending and gatekeeping, I suppose? Is the onus of proof on the believer, or the sceptic?

I heard variations of that calculus analogy so many times from... religious people. "You are a child in spiritual matters and try discussing things you can't possibly understand."

[TD1]

Onus probandi incumbit ei qui dicit, non ei qui negat   

I do love me a bit of religious/philosophical wrangling. The 'you're too ignorant to engage in this debate' claim is disturbingly common in religious circles.