It

09/03/2024

October 17th is the international day dedicated to celebrating gender-neutral and nonbinary personal pronouns, to recognize and promote the use of pronouns like ze, hir, E, per, xi, ip, thon, heesh, co, um, le, and the singular they.

While these pronouns might seem unfamiliar, the singular “they” has been used in English for over 700 years.

It is claimed by many to be the only gender-neutral pronoun that occurs naturally in the English language. They, not it, Viv.

I’d counter that by noting that I’ve used “it” as a singular gender-neutral pronoun in the past. It might be argued that it was colloquial and not correct. But no less correct than heesh, eh? Familiarity breeds Oxford insemination.

I’m also called “Dr” from time to time by the less educated fraction of the population. What do you call that?

Other gender-neutral pronouns, many of which are more recent innovations, are used by smaller groups of people and often in specific contexts. Like my use of youse as a personal pronoun.

So get over it, Sherlock.