Telling My Friend My Pronouns

[Forest Cat]

Another issue is a similarity to language and the age of a person. It's a scientific fact that younger people are able to learn new languages much easier than older people due to a difference in brain development and "plasticity". After a certain age, learning a new language can be so difficult for a person that it can be in the realm of being learning disabled. It would be ageist for a young person who learns language easily to expect that a person in their sixties for example should learn as easily or even at all depending on the person's difficulty.

But it's not a new language, it's English, I'm very familiar with English. The problem is that the sentences do not make sense, I don't know what it means, that's all.

 

[Judge]

But it's not a new language, it's English, I'm very familiar with English. The problem is that the sentences do not make sense, I don't know what it means, that's all.

Compared to so many other languages, English is a bastardized mess. But then that's literally what it is. Especially when you consider the perspective of others speaking languages that have been in existence far longer than has modern English.

Native English speakers like myself take a great deal of this for granted...but foreigners, not so much and for good reason.

Still though, I have already pointed out that our grammar does address this issue. However it's just not popularly used- or accepted.

 

[Ban]

It's certainly possible that someone could say that but I wouldn't let that stop you telling your friend how you want to be referred to. If your friend doesn't want to then you can't make them but at that point its on them. I would do yourself the service of letting it be known how you want to be reffered to and what they then do with that information is up to them after that. If you don't get the reaction you were hoping for you can then cross whatever bridge comes up when you come to it.

 

[Aneka]

Some of us are visual thinkers and can have problems with some non-specific words like 'It'. It would therefore be helpful if you want to be called an 'It' to look like an 'It'.

View attachment 77767

Where is this meme from? A movie?

I also believe that people who are visual thinkers like me tend to have a more casual approach to language. To, me words are no more than whispers in the wind. Anyone could say anything- but they don't have to mean it.

 

[Tom]

Where is this meme from? A movie?

I also believe that people who are visual thinkers like me tend to have a more casual approach to language. To, me words are no more than whispers in the wind. Anyone could say anything- but they don't have to mean it.

'Cousin It' was an occasional character on the classic weird 60's TV show 'The Addams Family' It was remade as a movie or two years later as well.

 

[fern_77]

I just want to give you some feedback, what you said there is very, very confusing. Many people will not understand it, I don't understand it. So it's probably smart to be prepared for some confusion, or confused people.

Perhaps it is very confusing to non-English speakers, or people who are from different generations, but many English speakers in my generation and some in my parent's generation, from what I have seen, understand how to use multiple pronouns for someone. Also, this specific situation is about a friend of mine who is only a little under a year older than me and who I know would be able to understand.

 

[tree]

if you were talking about me you could say something like:
"Fern told me they had thai food for dinner last night. I hope it enjoyed its meal."


I am a native speaker of English and this is difficult for me to follow.
Would be more coherent to consistently use one or the other of the
pronoun pairs, not switch mid-communication.

Example:
Fern told me they had thai food for dinner last night. I hope they enjoyed their meal.

 

[fern_77]

I can remember the names of my friends. I would be able to do the following without having to literally refer to a written list of pronouns for each friend which is what I'd have to do as a guide in normal conversation otherwise: "Fern told me that Fern had Thai food for dinner last night. I hope Fern enjoyed the meal."

If I was your friend and you asked me to use the four different pronouns I would tell you, "Fern, I can't do that. I'm not saying I won't do that because I don't want to, I'm saying that I actually wouldn't be able to do that if I tried." Communication in general is difficult for me for a host of reasons. It would not work for me to add an additional layer of "in the moment" computation to determine when and how to use the four different pronouns in addition to my general communication difficulties.

I see. Being unable to remember multiple pronouns for someone because of cognitive difficulties is perfectly understandable. I know that I would not complain about that, personally. That would be rude of me. I hope my giving an explanation as to how using multiple pronouns works didn't make you believe that I don't consider cognitive issues a reason to only use one set of pronouns for a person.

 

[fern_77]

if you were talking about me you could say something like:
"Fern told me they had thai food for dinner last night. I hope it enjoyed its meal."


I am a native speaker of English and this is difficult for me to follow.
Would be more coherent to consistently use one or the other of the
pronoun pairs, not switch mid-communication.

Example:
Fern told me they had thai food for dinner last night. I hope they enjoyed their meal.

If you think that's hard to follow, you would definitely not appreciate the people who use multiple different pronouns for someone in the span of one sentence. I don't do that because it sounds too clunky and confusing lol

 

[tree]

If you think that's hard to follow, you would definitely not appreciate the people who use multiple different pronouns for someone in the span of one sentence. I don't do that because it sounds too clunky and confusing lol

You are correct.

I would find that extremely jarring.

 

[Bolletje]

If you think that's hard to follow, you would definitely not appreciate the people who use multiple different pronouns for someone in the span of one sentence. I don't do that because it sounds too clunky and confusing lol

I don’t have trouble using the correct pronouns in written language (provided I know someone’s preference) but I find that I sometimes slip up in conversation and I feel so bad about it. I always just hope they see that I am trying and it’s a slip of the tongue, rather than intentionally misgendering.

 

[Luca]

I don’t really care what pronouns people use for me. Lol

 

[Thinx]

I guess the anxiety one may feel in this type of situation is partly because hearing the pronouns that feel right for us feels like acceptance and recognition of who we are. I identify as nonbinary, but this is an identity that is almost never 'seen' about me by others. So, for someone who identifies as male, this would be like, almost never being recognised as male, people tending to say, she or they about him, almost invariably. Then it may be hard for him to feel he is accepted, or he may feel distressed, and unrecognised. As if his maleness isn't real.

I tend to ask people to use my name, rather than any gender labels.

 

[Fino]

I've never heard of someone wanting to be referred to as an object! Each generation is more interesting than the last.

 

[Thinx]

I've never heard of someone wanting to be referred to as an object! Each generation is more interesting than the last.

I don't think the person is asking to be referred to as an object. As @Judge said, there is only the neuter pronoun to use in English, other than gendered pronouns, and although the article he refered to expressed that 'they' is used, whereas 'it's' / 'it' hasn't been used for a person in English, this usage is changing that. Language develops, and is not static.

 

[Callistemon]

I think the problem is that when you call yourself "they", it sounds like you are talking about several people. So how are people supposed to know what you are talking about. I'ts impossible to know what you mean. Your friend might understand, just be aware that the world will not understand what you are talking about if you do that.

I take your point, but English already contains so many ambiguities like that, which need to be figured out according to the context. Like you in English can be singular or plural, so you don't know, when someone says you, whether they mean one person or multiple people, and when you're writing you sometimes have to go out of your way to make it unambiguous by using another term (name/s) or supplementary information to show which one you mean.

(And I could have written the above sentence as, "Like you in English can be singular or plural, so one doesn't know, when someone says you, whether they mean one person or multiple people, and when one is writing one sometimes has to go out of one's way to make it unambiguous by using another term (name/s) or supplementary information to show which one one means." ...but I think that sounds more confusing, less friendly, and a bit snooty than how I've said it, by using "you" like "one unspecified person." At the end of the day I think we use language to express those individual preferences, as well, and it shows people something about who we are and what's important to us.)

As a teenager getting used to English, I spontaneously adopted they instead of him/her or he/she when writing general sentences about people, because I found putting it as him/her or he/she more awkward, and didn't like the custom at the time of referring to unspecified people as he, because it left out a whole gender - like the old terms chairman, charwoman etc, which also were used to transmit gender biases. I needed a neutral pronoun that wasn't loaded with objectification connotations, and this worked for me. I still write like this, "A person may think ABC because they've experienced XYZ."

Oh English - the language where you have to surreptitiously skip ahead when reading out loud when words like bow are in a sentence, so you can glean from the context if it's talking about a means of shooting arrows, the front bit of a boat, or someone bending to someone else in greeting or respect, and can then choose the correct way to pronounce that word on the hop!

Phonetic languages don't present us with these problems, but English is also a lot of fun, and can be milked for comedy value because of these things - like other languages for their idiosyncrasies, such as the ability to make up any compound noun at wish in German...

I give you the old Donaudampferschiffahrtsgesellschaftskapitänsmützenstern: The star on the hat of a captain of the Danube steamship company - apparently with three fs since 1996, Schifffahrtsgesellschaft etc.

And we can make that word longer still, if anyone wants to.

Language is such fun.

 

[Aneka]

In German, nouns get gendered randomnly lol:
Der Baum (tree) - male
Der Tisch (table) - male
Das Schwein (pig) - neuter
Das Eichhörnchen (squirrel) - neuter
Das Mädchen (girl) - neuter
Die Vase (vase) - female
Die Banane (banana) - female
...

But many languages are like that. French is even worse. As I recall, they have different genders for plural endings. But better ask a French person than me about it.
Language doesn't have to make sense though- but people don't make much sense either.

 

[Bolletje]

I've never heard of someone wanting to be referred to as an object! Each generation is more interesting than the last.

I think this is exactly the kind of response OP is worried about getting. Asking to be referred to with non-gendered pronouns isn’t the same as wanting to be referred to as an object.

 

[Callistemon]

I think this is exactly the kind of response OP is worried about getting. Asking to be referred to with non-gendered pronouns isn’t the same as wanting to be referred to as an object.

This is true, but "it" did have a lot of objectification baggage attached to it when I was growing up. It was frequently used as a way to insult or dehumanise someone. Calling someone an "it" was a really below-the-belt insult, and depending on where you live, those connotations may still be there.

One ee cummings poem made use of that by describing a salesman as "an it that stinks excuse" - for example. It wasn't complimentary, and at least our generation was very much aware of that. We were often told by teachers etc, "Don't call the baby an it, the baby is a person!"

So it seems the subsequent generations are reclaiming the "it" more neutrally.

 

[Slim Jim]

I don’t really care what pronouns people use for me. Lol

Personal identity and the fragile egg shell mind.