Talk:Spivak pronoun

"Supporters Claim"

Edited "Supporters of the singular they claim, truly or falsely, that the form has been in use for centuries, and thus it is hypothetically hardly a recent corruption of proper speech" to read "Supporters of the singular they argue that the form has been in use for centuries and thus is hardly a recent corruption of proper speech."

It is objectively true (as in, readily documented in texts the historical quality of which cannot be disputed by any sane person) that the singular they has been in use for centuries. Any way of framing this issue that calls the objective quality of this into question--"claim," "truly or falsely," "hypothetically"--is grossly misleading. And a departure from the real issue: whether historical usage should determine the appropriateness of contemporary usage.

Published books

Would it be appropriate to list here published books that use the Spivak pronouns? I first found out about them myself from some books on legal philosophy, for example.

Upper case

Under Spivak (alternative), is the use of mid-phrase upper-casing (Ey shaves Eirself and I am Eirs) deliberate or a tyop? –Hajor

I believe I've seen it capitalized elsewhere, but I can't find that anything now. -Mairi 03:26, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I reckon it's a tyop, all right. Never saw it thus. Nor, seemingly, has anyone else. eritain 21:48, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Huh?

Has anyone ever actually used these anywhere and had anyone understand them? Other than the creator. Incidentally they don't seem to imply no gender to mu they just sound like a really bad accent. Dalf | Talk

Well, I've used the Spivak pronouns, as mood strikes me. Only online however. I believe others understood, I haven't seen any "Huh?? Ey? Em?! Eir?!" --AshyRaccoon 08:55, Jun 24, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, they have been used, yes, they have been understood. Maybe not by people, though, who already have a lousy accent when they write. -- AlexR 08:38, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

Well they don't really sound different enough to me to differentiate themselves and achieve gender neutrality. I mean when you say it doe Er really sound that different from Her? Especially in a sentence? Doe E sound different form He. I would just assume the person had a horrible accent or did not know English. Dalf | Talk 10:16, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

Nice try, correcting your old comment now [1] ... Anyway, "er" isn't even a Spivak pronoun, and for "e" there is the newer alternative, which has been coined however not because of hearing problems, but to bring it in line with the forms of "they" from which they derive. I would assume that if you are as hard of hearing (as you state) as you are of writing and reading (as you demonstrate), anybody talking to you might already have adaped to the fact that maybe you need a bit more explanation then usual.

However, all the gender neutral pronouns will need some explanations when they are used with people who have never heard of that particular concept, or that particular set. Except for the old "e" form none of them could be confused with any other pronoun, though, unless somebody is a very sloppy speaker, and in writing they are even more obviously different. -- AlexR 17:09, 10 May 2005 (UTC)

I was actually asking an honest question. Your insults are uncalled for. As for my sloppy spelling in my original post I only corrected them because I though they actually bothered you and not that you were taking delight in them as a means of insulting someone who finds the concept strange and unnecessary. I have some other thoughts on the issue but I suppose this is not the right place for discussing them. Dalf | Talk 02:54, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

I actually asked a few people for their opinion on what they thought of your edits, and the results were not overy optimistic, either. If your edits were made in good faith, which seems likely when one sees what other edits you did tonight, then I must appologise - nevertheless, you have to be carefull, too. Anything related to sex/gender, religion and politics attracts so many trolls and idiots that sloppy questions like yours will most likely to be understood to be either the one or the other. And since the people who work on or watch such articles most likely had too many encounters with both sorts, the responses will be accordingly, too. We're all just human. -- AlexR 10:23, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

After reading your user page and the areas of wikipedia that you edit I somewhat assumed that if you were prematurely hostile there was a good explanation. I admit that in all honesty the tone of my original question was probably too derisive (I was operating on about 10 hours of sleep for the three previous days combined). All other things being equal I DO usually take a view of attempts to artificially modify any language as silly—this includes the whole of the French academy—especially in cases where the communication power of the language is restricted, damaged, or reduced for purely semantic or politically correct reasons. So, I had that affecting the tone of my original post and also the fact that I am not sure that these specific choices of pronouns sound that genderless. E especially sounds almost identical to He in a number of English accents (or speeds) the same goes for emself and himself. In any event you are correct I should have checked the tone of my original post, and I still wonder about the practicality of using these (or any other gender-neutral pronouns) in context of real life examples. Dalf | Talk 03:48, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

Well, real life does not only occur on speech, but also in writing, and there is much less room for misunderstanding there. Also, I think the "ey" is better to use (and more used, or at least more recently more used) than the "e" anyway, if only because it brings the form into line with the rest of the "they"-derived forms. I also must confess that I was initially rather sceptical, too; especially since German is my native tounge, where the need for gender-neutral pronouns is less pronounced, since it retaines a grammatical gender. Then again, there are people who just do not like to be called either "he" or "she", and plain politeness demands than one does not give offense where it can be avoided. Besides, there is some debate over whether the sigular "they" can be used when speaking about a particular person of unknown gender. (As in "The IP that edited that article right now ...") I have not used them in speech, simply because I get rather less opportunity to speak English these days, but in writing, even in IRC or similar direct communication, I must say that there seem to be few problems understanding them. I also had a good look at the alternatives, and I simply prefered the Spivak pronouns because they sound less outlandish than the others and are derived from an already existing set of words, making them easier to understand. But I would agree that changing language for political reasons can, and on occasions is simply overdone. -- AlexR 09:11, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I started using the Spivak pronouns in most if not all of my schoolwork starting in my second year of university or so, and plan to continue using them. I usually put an explanatory footnote on the first use, otherwise it might look like a typographical error. The response from my professors was usually positive, although one or two reacted with distaste. For myself, I first came across them in Peter Suber's book (also academic writing). Notwithstanding the sexist-usage debate, (a few) people do use them. Try them out sometime. Jeeves 09:52, 12 May 2005 (UTC)

I came across them in games of Nomic (not surprising, given the close connection to Peter Suber). And yes, I understood both their meaning and their motivation almost at once, purely from context. If generic "he" is to be displaced from favor, the Spivak set is IMO just about the only serious contender for its seat out of all the synthetic pronouns. My money is on the eventual victory of indefinite, a.k.a. singular, "they", but that's another argument. And I do believe that conscious decisions about usage, based on local pressures, are in fact a major force in the evolution of a language (howbeit never by fiat, and never in the 'once and for all' sense, doubtless a disappointment to national language academies and hard-line Esperanto campaigners); but that's another argument too. eritain 06:27, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

Now that I think about it I had a chance at one time to make actual use of such a thing as this in real speech though no one I was around at the time did. I was part of a group of friends that was very diverse and there was one person in the group who went by the name Crow. I had been hanging out with this group of people for about 3 months when I realized that I was not sure what Crow's gender was. Few people ever used pronouns, preferring to simply use the nickname Crow. Crow did not dress in an especially gender identifying way usually jeans and baggy t-shirts with a modest amount make up which would not be noticed as makeup by anyone not looking closely. When pronouns were used he and she were used in about the same frequency. I finally did discover Crow's gender from a parking ticket that had Eir full name on it which was Christopher. He, said he did not mind being called he or she and did not identify as transgender but as sort of androgenyous and indifferent to gender. Dalf | Talk 05:32, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

I'm in the "Huh?" catagory but I'll try to keep an open mind. Being an encyclopedia and reflecting commonly held opinion, I don't think Spivak should be presented in a way that makes it seem accepted or established. This should probably be associated more closely with Peter Suber's page, maybe even moved entirely to it. I really do not think Spivak should be on the regular grammer pages at all, except maybe as a link to invented words. Markspace 06:46, 23 June 2006 (UTC)

Face vs. Faces

Regarding the most recent revert on the page [2] I am wondering a few things. First why is the change wrong? In the case of they and Eir meaning plural they shouldn't it be faces since a group of people do not share the same face. Second seeing as I am confused by this it was probably an honest edit and so not vandalism (even if it was wrong which, it may be though I am still curious as to why). Dalf | Talk 05:36, 24 May 2005 (UTC)

Spivak pronouns are singular, not plural, so "eir face" refers to one person's face. The singular they similarly refers to a single person. Factitious 19:48, 12 October 2005 (UTC)

Orion's Arm

Spivak pronouns are widely used in Orion's Arm. As such they are probably going to becomeincreasingly common in other science fiction too. Orion's Arm seems to use the shorter e form. I have myself used e form many times in short stories (not publicly available yet). Since I'm Finnish I'm used to gender-neutral pronouns and often forget that English has gender-specific ones - usually resulting in embarrassment on my part. Khokkanen 13:51, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Chinese is also a language without any pronouns with genders. Thus, I have heard Chinese speakers of English as a Second Language say things like, "I picked up Mary's coat and handed him to it," or "I picked up Mary's coat and handed him to her." Finnish is supposed to be related to some Asian languages, rather than to European ones. I wonder about this "gender-free pronouns" issue in Estonian, which is supposed to be related to Finnish.

72.146.52.193 (talk) 22:27, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Possessive pronoun implying ownership of a person

Why is this phrased as "I am <whoever's>"? Can't it be "This is <whoever's>"? I don't like the implication of the person making the statement (on the assumption that a being with sentience is producing said sentance) being owned.

In English, it is common to say something like "I am Dr. Johnson's patient," or "I am Professor Schmidt's student." There is no implication of ownership here. Far from it. Likewise, "Dr. Johnson is my doctor does not imply the ownership of another person."

72.146.52.193 (talk) 22:30, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

Splat

Is the use of this term meant to lead to Asterisk?

Yes - see the 'Games' section of that page. Splat as a gender looks like *e,h*,h*,h*s,h*self,*E,H*,H*,H*s,H*self. --Stevage 22:48, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

compared to other solutions

The remark "very rare compared to other solutions" is contained in all or most articles about alternative pronouns, and as such not very helpful. Could whoever wrote this please specify what ey means by "other solutions"? Common Man 22:50, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

No reply, so I'll just delete it. It was unsourced, anyway. Common Man 22:25, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Calculus on Manifolds

Are we sure they were used in "Calculus on Manifolds"? I haven't read the entire book lately, but I can't find any third-person personal pronouns at all, except for a few instances of "he" and "his" to refer to male mathematicians.

I don't think they are used in Calculus on Manifolds, for the reason you state. That was also one of Spivak's earliest books, so he may not have adopted the system at that time. I don't remember them in the Differential Geometry series either. They are almost definitely in the Joy of TeX (I only say "almost" because I don't have a copy to check, but I remember them pretty clearly). Phr (talk) 04:06, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Criticism

"The real problem is the arbitrary acceptance of completely untenable prescriptive grammar" -- how is that NPOV? --Mr. A. 12:40, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

I cleaned it up a little. Criticisms are by their nature not very NPOV, and this whole article needs cites anyway, but it offers the opinions with a more reasoned voice. 64.121.2.59 22:09, 15 December 2006 (UTC)

another criticism from lysdexia

Besides the fact that "singular they" is absurd because there was/is then no plural of "they"—their paradigms liv in two alternate universes—there are already fair solutions to the third-person singular pronouns so that no one needs Spivak pronouns: one and who. As these are rarere pronouns, one would need to fill out their declensions:

• It imself is im, has itses, and does its. Ça çoi-même est çoi, a çiens, et fait çen.
• One omeself is ome, has onese, and does one's. On eun-même est eun, a oiens, et fait œn
• Who whomself is whom, has whoses, and does whose. Qui quoi-même est quoi, a quiens, et fait quen.

Then again there are reasons why some word-forms died out. (dumb people!) -lysdexia 03:05, 20 September 2006 (UTC)

And of course there are reasons why perfectly acceptable shifts in English pronoun usage (like the semantically singular they) are continually condemned and ridiculous alternatives proposed. (The answer is, again, dumb people!) Strad 21:20, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

What are the perfectly acceptable shifts? -lysdexia 05:24, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

How about (th)em?

Question to those "in the Huh? category": I always shied away from using Spivak pronouns, because I want to be understood by as many readers as possible. If we wrote "they", "their", and "them" — or "(th)ey", "(th)eir", and "(th)em", would you understand this? Since people tend to recognize what they know, everybody would see their preferred pronoun. — Sebastian (talk) 19:51, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I created a template to do just that. {{genderneutral|ey}}, {{genderneutral|eirs}}, ... will yield they, theirs, ... . Please feel free to use in talk pages. Try also hovering with the mouse over the word! — Sebastian 06:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Trivia

Granted it's mostly used in cryptic crossword clues nowadays, but doesn't U count as a one-letter word? - Mikes42 2006-11-26

No more than "Nite", and I especially don't see the relevance of the linked article. --Belg4mit 00:51, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Not U as in lazy spelling of "you" but as in "upper-class" - see the link. Relevance is the "Trivia" section of the article, hence the section title. --Mikes42 23:54, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

U[he] is the interjection one makes when frisky, misspellen as "ooh". -lysdexia 22:49, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Precedence

Is it just me, or are these basically the stereotypical pronounciations of pronouns by the UK's citizenry? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Belg4mit (talk • contribs) 05:53, 25 January 2007 (UTC).

Intro could be misleading?

To me, the intro to this article gives the impression that these pronouns are in general everyday use by "some people", and that "some" is not a vanishingly small number. Is that really true? Matt 01:09, 23 July 2007 (UTC).

I use them :) and have seen them used in wikipedia - but yes, I think you could be right with the vanishingly small - sbandrews (t) 05:10, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

I changed the intro to make it clear that they are not in widespread use. Matt 13:17, 29 July 2007 (UTC).

Popularized?

These pronouns are obscure as hell, used by only an activist clique. To say they've been "popularized" is preposterous - they've never been popular (regarded with favor, approval, or affection by people in general). The Dissident Aggressor 20:41, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

They Love themself

In the entry for singular they in the table of pronouns shouldn't the reflexive be 'They love themself'? Rykalski (talk) 18:11, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

No; this is a grammar singular, not a count of persons singular. For a single person, it would be "E loves eirself" or "Ey loves emself", here we have multiple people in the "they" -- although it acts like a singular (there's one group called "they") -- hence "They love themselves". Or so I'm told. htom (talk) 18:27, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the singular they is better described by it's (possessive) other moniker, indefinite they. Since the gender of the person being referenced is unknown or unclear (in binary terms), 'they' concludes (a point for criticism) the identity of the person is not defined, is indefinite, is hazy or shifty or somehow multiple. Hence the pluralization, but I think it would be "themself", as it does actually refer to one person (except when it does not, another point for criticism), and the generality is already covered by the 'they' part. But I have no sources for any of this, just experience, so it could not be currently incorporated in either the Spivak or singular they articles. Arlo Barnes (talk) 21:25, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

The point is that it is saying it's multiple people; Robin and Charlie love themselves, together, refered to together as one, they love themself; vs. Robin loving himself, Charlie loving herself. So they love themself, like E loves eirself. I'm going to go try to become unconfused myself now. htom (talk) 22:30, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Name of professor

[The following comment has been moved from the article to here.]

Professor of Linguistics at UCLA circa 1975 proposed use of "e" rather than he or she as a gender neutral pronoun to replace he or she. His name was Mc** Can someone remember his full name? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.129.128.20 (talk) 13:43, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

According to The Epicene Pronouns - A Chronology of the Word that Failed by Dennis Barron, psychologist Donald G. MacKay of UCLA proposed E, E's, Em circa 1977. This seems a likely candidate for Spivak's source, given his capitalization of the pronouns in The Joy of TeX. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 06:17, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

MacKay, Donald G. (1980). "Psychology, Prescriptive Grammar, and the Pronoun Problem" (PDF). American Psychologist. 35 (5). {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help) ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 06:23, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

No history of the "new" form

The article differentiates between new and old forms, but never says when the new form arose or who was behind it. —Pengo 09:38, 7 April 2010 (UTC)

Ironically, the "new" form predates the "old" form. I updated the article to address this. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 06:08, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Suber's "The Paradox of Self-Amendment" seems not to use Spivak pronouns

I verified that Spivak's "The Joy of TeX" (1986 edition) and Shapiro's "Doom Patrols" do use Spivak pronouns, but when I checked Suber's online edition of "The Paradox of Self-Amendment", the "Preface to the Print Edition" reproduced there says:

I would like to use sex-neutral language. But I find "she or he" and "his/her" to be barbaric constructions, and I cannot always arrange to use plurals and hide behind "they" and "them". My solution is to use "she" and "her" as generic pronouns; this is not sex-neutral, but it is compensatory. If we do this for a few centuries, then we can switch back. Or perhaps by then English will have acquired an elegant set of neutral personal pronouns.

So, an online edition of this book does not use Spivak pronouns, and according to this preface, neither does the 1990 print edition. Can someone verify whether an edition of this book exists with Spivak pronouns? ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 17:24, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Michael Spivak quote sourced to a Wikipedia edit

We've got the article quoting Spivak saying how "the original pronoun set was not created by me", but the only source for this is an edit to Wikipedia in 2006 by User:Michaelspivak, who never made another edit, nor confirmed his identity. This obviously isn't a reliable source, so it'd be good to replace this with something more reputable, if we could. --McGeddon (talk) 10:18, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Another source would be ideal. Unfortunately, since Michael died earlier this year, he's no longer around to authenticate that post, or tell us if Professor MacKay was his source. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 02:42, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Elverson Or Everson?

The use of Elverson or Everson is inconsistent. I can't seem to find a reputable source to confirm which is correct. Could someone please research this and make the name consistent at Spivak pronoun?

--Secarrie (talk) 21:12, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Corrected the one "Everson" typo. ~ Robin Lionheart (talk) 23:43, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Spivak Pronouns and Gender

As a friendly comment, I think you need to add more explanations and some examples that can support your sentence, "This contact with genderless pronouns in virtual communities is sometimes a person's first experience and experimentation with genderqueer or trans presentation." Besides, if you don't mind, please give us brief definitions of "genderqueen" and "trans presentation". Thanks and great job! =) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.188.46.130 (talk) 07:36, 9 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback! "Genderqueer" has an article on Wikipedia and will be linked to it. "Trans presentation" can also be linked to a relevant article for clarification. (Flyingcat21 (talk) 18:04, 9 August 2014 (UTC))

(copied from a user page comment) "Good job with the information you added. However, I think that you should either call your edit The Online Use of Spivak Pronouns because you only speak about people that use it when surfing the net or maintain the title but add some more details about the Spivak Pronouns in general.

Antzela (talk) 03:27, 10 August 2014 (UTC)"

Thanks for that feedback! I hadn't even noticed the online bias, so that is really helpful. I'll be sure to change that. FrancesChapman (talk) 17:30, 11 August 2014 (UTC)

A table including 1st person, 2nd person, and 3rd person, singular and plural would be nice

I came here to Wikipedia looking for the 2nd person, singular and plural forms. I'll bet I'm not the only one. Now I have to look somewhere else. The least that an article on Spivak pronouns can include is a complete table of the pronouns in question. That's probably the main reason why folks navigate to this Wikipedia article, to find out what the pronouns are and what their proper usage is. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.97.43.192 (talk) 12:00, 18 March 2016 (UTC)

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“has been argued” …

> The original ey has been argued to be preferable to e, because the latter would be pronounced the same as he in those contexts where he, him, his loses its h sound.

The citation here is to one person’s opinion (https://web.archive.org/web/20140202215940/http://www.aetherlumina.com/gnp/technical.html#declensiongnp). Does that qualify as any kind of authoritative source? I was expecting a more substantial discussion or argument at the link. I could write my opinion on a chalk board, take a photo of it, put it online and then link to it a source in Wikipedia, too. Would that qualify for a citation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.215.226.107 (talk) 22:43, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

"Neopronoun" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Neopronoun. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 July 21#Neopronoun until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. —Naddruf (talk ~ contribs) 00:04, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

Article scope

The state of this article seems wildly out of touch with the opening and assumed subject from the title. If the article is just about the usage of terms on a specific internet community, which itself seems a little trivial, then it doesn't need a running list of similar terms used throughout the last two hundred years. I'm not sure of a more appropriate article that the table describing said terms and the history section could be moved to however. XeCyranium (talk) 00:09, 19 December 2023 (UTC)