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Gender-neutral language or gender-inclusive language is language that avoids bias towards a particular sex or gender. In English, this includes use of nouns that are not gender-specific to refer to roles or professions, formation of phrases in a coequal manner, and discontinuing the blanket use of male or female terms. For example, the words ''policeman'' and ''stewardess'' are
gender-specific job title A gender-specific job title is a name of a job that also specifies or implies the gender of the person performing that job. For example, in English, the job title ''stewardess'' implies that the person is female. A gender-neutral job title, on the ...
s; the corresponding gender-neutral terms are ''police officer'' and ''flight attendant''. Other gender-specific terms, such as ''actor'' and ''actress'', may be replaced by the originally male term; for example, ''actor'' used regardless of gender. Some terms, such as ''chairman'', that contain the component ''-man'' but have traditionally been used to refer to persons regardless of sex are now seen by some as gender-specific. An example of forming phrases in a coequal manner would be using ''husband and wife'' instead of ''man and wife''. Examples of discontinuing the blanket use of male terms in English are referring to those with unknown or indeterminate gender as singular ''they'', and using ''humans'', ''people'', or ''humankind'', instead of ''man'' or ''mankind.''


History

The notion that parts of the
English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...
were sexist was brought to mainstream attention in Western English cultures by feminists in the 1970s. Simultaneously, the link between language and ideologies (including traditional gender ideologies) was becoming apparent in the academic field of linguistics. In 1975, the
National Council of Teachers of English The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) is a United States professional organization dedicated to "improving the teaching and learning of English and the language arts at all levels of education. Since 1911, NCTE has provided a forum ...
published a set of guidelines on the use of "non-sexist" language. Backlash ensued, as did the debate on whether gender-neutral language ought to be enforced. In Britain, feminist
Maija Blaubergs Maija Sibilla Blaubergs (February 20, 1947 – November 10, 2010) was a German-born Latvian educational psychologist, feminist scholar, and lawyer, raised in Canada. She taught at the University of Georgia, where she was the first coordinator of ...
' countered eight commonly used oppositional arguments in 1980. In 1983, New South Wales, Australia required the use of ''they'' in place of ''he'' and ''she'' in subsequent laws. In 1985, the Canadian Corporation for Studies in Religion passed a motion for all its ensuing publications to include "non-sexist" language. By 1995, academic institutions in Canada and Britain had implemented "non-sexist" language policies. More recently, revisions to the Women's Press publications of ''The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing'' and ''The A–Z of Non-Sexist Language'' were made to de-radicalize the original works. In 2006, "non-sexist" was challenged: the term refers solely to the absence of sexism. In 2018, the State of New York enacted policy to formally use the gender-neutral terms ''police officer'' and ''firefighter''.


Terminology and views


General

Historically, the use of masculine pronouns in place of generic was regarded as non-sexist, but various forms of gender-neutral language became a common feature in written and spoken versions of many languages in the late twentieth century.
Feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
s argue that previously the practice of assigning masculine gender to
generic antecedents Generic antecedents are representatives of classes, referred to in ordinary language by another word (most often a pronoun), in a situation in which gender is typically unknown or irrelevant. These mostly arise in generalizations and are particul ...
stemmed from language reflecting "the prejudices of the society in which it evolved, and English evolved through most of its history in a male-centered,
patriarchal Patriarchy is a social system in which positions of Dominance hierarchy, dominance and Social privilege, privilege are primarily held by men. It is used, both as a technical Anthropology, anthropological term for families or clans controll ...
society." During the 1970s, feminists
Casey Miller Casey Geddes Miller (February 26, 1919 – January 5, 1997) was an American feminist author and editor best known for promoting the use of non-sexist writing in the English language. With Kate Swift, her business partner and platonic domestic ...
and
Kate Swift Kate Swift (December 9, 1923 – May 7, 2011) was an American feminist writer and editor who co-wrote (with Casey Miller, her business partner and platonic domestic partner) influential books and articles about sexism in the English language.http: ...
created a manual, ''
The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing ''The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing: For writers, editors, and speakers'' was first published in 1980 by Casey Miller and Kate Swift. It was the second book produced by the two in an effort to raise awareness of issues concerning gender in the ...
'', on gender neutral language that was set to reform the existing sexist language that was said to exclude and dehumanize women. In 1995, the Women's Press published ''The A–Z of Non-Sexist Language'', by Margaret Doyle. Both publications were written by American authors, originally without the consideration of the British-English dialect. Many feminist efforts were made to reform the
androcentric Androcentrism (Ancient Greek, ἀνήρ, "man, male") is the practice, conscious or otherwise, of placing a masculine point of view at the center of one's world view, culture, and history, thereby culturally marginalizing femininity. The related a ...
language. It has become common in some academic and governmental settings to rely on gender-neutral language to convey inclusion of all sexes or genders (gender-inclusive language). Various languages employ different means to achieve gender neutrality: *
Gender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender Gender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender is the usage of wording that is balanced in its treatment of the genders in a non-grammatical sense. For example, advocates of gender-neutral language challenge the traditional use of masc ...
*
Gender neutrality in genderless languages A genderless language is a natural or constructed language that has no distinctions of grammatical gender—that is, no categories requiring morphological agreement between nouns and associated pronouns, adjectives, articles, or verbs. The no ...
*
Gender neutrality in English Gender-neutral language is language that minimizes assumptions about the social gender or biological sex of people referred to in speech or writing. In contrast to most other Indo-European languages, English does not retain grammatical gender and m ...
Other particular issues are also discussed: *
Gender marking in job titles A gender-specific job title is a name of a job that also specifies or implies the gender of the person performing that job. For example, in English, the job title ''stewardess'' implies that the person is female. A gender-neutral job title, on the ...
*
Gender-specific and gender-neutral pronouns A third-person pronoun is a pronoun that refers to an entity other than the speaker or listener. Some languages with gender-specific pronouns have them as part of a grammatical gender system, a system of agreement where most or all nouns have a va ...


Gender indication

There are different approaches in forming a "gender-neutral language": * Neutralising any reference to
gender or sex Though the terms ''sex'' and ''gender'' have been used interchangeably since at least the fourteenth century, in contemporary academic literature they usually have distinct meanings. ''Sex'' generally refers to an organism's biological sex, while ...
, like using "they" as a third-person singular pronoun instead of "he" or "she", and proscribing words like ''actress'' (female actor) and prescribing the use of words like ''actor'' for persons of any gender. Although it has generally been accepted in the English language, some argue that using "they" as a singular pronoun is considered grammatically incorrect, but acceptable in informal writing. *Creating alternative gender-neutral pronouns, such as "hir" or "
hen Hen commonly refers to a female animal: a female chicken, other gallinaceous bird, any type of bird in general, or a lobster. It is also a slang term for a woman. Hen or Hens may also refer to: Places Norway *Hen, Buskerud, a village in Ringer ...
" in Swedish. * Indicating the gender by using wordings like "he or she" and "actors and actresses". * Avoiding the use of "him/her" or the third-person singular pronoun "they" by using "the" or restructuring the sentence all together to avoid all three. *
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
now prefers the use of "crewed" and "uncrewed" instead of "manned" and "unmanned", including when discussing historical spaceflight (except proper nouns).


Controversy


Canada

University of Toronto psychology professor
Jordan Peterson Jordan Bernt Peterson (born 12 June 1962) is a Canadian media personality, clinical psychologist, author, and professor emeritus at the University of Toronto. He began to receive widespread attention as a public intellectual in the late 2010s ...
uploaded a video to YouTube expressing his opposition to Bill C-16 – ''
An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code ''An Act to amend the Canadian Human Rights Act and the Criminal Code'' (french: Loi modifiant la Loi canadienne sur les droits de la personne et le Code criminel) is a law passed by the Parliament of Canada. The law adds gender expression and ...
'', a bill introduced by Justin Trudeau's government, in October 2016. The proposed piece of legislation was to add the terms "
gender identity Gender identity is the personal sense of one's own gender. Gender identity can correlate with a person's assigned sex or can differ from it. In most individuals, the various biological determinants of sex are congruent, and consistent with the i ...
" and "
gender expression Gender expression, or gender presentation, is a person's behavior, mannerisms, interests, and appearance that are associated with gender, specifically with the categories of femininity or masculinity. This also includes gender roles. These cat ...
" to the ''
Canadian Human Rights Act The ''Canadian Human Rights Act'' (french: Loi canadienne sur les droits de la personne) is a statute passed by the Parliament of Canada in 1977 with the express goal of extending the law to ensure equal opportunity to individuals who may be vi ...
'' and to the ''Criminal Code'''s
hate crime A hate crime (also known as a bias-motivated crime or bias crime) is a prejudice-motivated crime which occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their membership (or perceived membership) of a certain social group or racial demograph ...
s provisions. In the video, Peterson argued that legal protection of gender pronouns results in "
compelled speech Compelled speech is a transmission of expression required by law. A related legal concept is ''protected speech''. Just as freedom of speech protects free expression, in many cases it similarly protects an individual from being required to utter o ...
", which would violate the right to freedom of expression outlined in the ''
Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms The ''Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms'' (french: Charte canadienne des droits et libertés), often simply referred to as the ''Charter'' in Canada, is a bill of rights entrenched in the Constitution of Canada, forming the first part o ...
''. In the view of Peterson, legal pronoun protects would force an individual to say something with which one has an opposition to. The bill passed in the
House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. ...
and in the
Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
, becoming law once it received
Royal Assent Royal assent is the method by which a monarch formally approves an act of the legislature, either directly or through an official acting on the monarch's behalf. In some jurisdictions, royal assent is equivalent to promulgation, while in other ...
on 19 June 2017. In response to the passing of the bill, Peterson has stated he will not use gender-neutral pronouns if asked in the classroom by a student.


France

In 2021, controversy spiked in
France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
when the dictionary ''
Petit Robert ''Le Petit Robert de la Langue Française'' (), known as just ''Petit Robert'', is a popular single-volume French dictionary first published by Paul Robert in 1967. It is an abridgement of his eight-volume ''Dictionnaire alphabétique et analog ...
'' included the gender neutral term – composed of ('he') and ('she'). The dictionary's director, Charles Bimbenet, stated it was added as researchers noted "an increasing usage" of the neutral pronoun in "a large body of texts drawn from various sources." However, a number of French politicians have opposed the new addition.
Jean-Michel Blanquer Jean-Michel Blanquer (; born 4 December 1964) is a French jurist and government official serving as Minister of National Education under Prime Ministers Édouard Philippe and Jean Castex from 2017 to 2022. Education and early career Born in ...
, the French Minister of Education, publicly tweeted: "inclusive writing is not the future of the French language." Similarly,
François Jolivet François Jolivet (born 21 March 1966) is a French politician of La République En Marche! (LREM) who was elected to the French National Assembly on 18 June 2017, representing the department of Indre. Political career From 1995 to his election ...
, a French politician, accused the dictionary of pushing a "
woke ''Woke'' ( ) is an adjective derived from African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) meaning "alert to racial prejudice and Racial discrimination, discrimination". Beginning in the 2010s, it came to encompass a broader awareness of social ineq ...
" ideology that "undermines
heir Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Officiall ...
common language and its influence", in a letter addressed to the
Académie Française An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...
. The controversy weighs into the ongoing debate regarding masculine dominance in the French language.


United States

The
American English language American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and in most circumstances i ...
contains gendered connotations that make it challenging for gender-neutral language to achieve the desired linguistic equality. "Male default" is especially prominent in the United States and often when gender-neutral language is used around traditionally male institutions, the neutrality doesn't prevent people from automatically translating "they" to the default "he." A study conducted in June 2021 at UCLA School of Law Williams Institute found that 1.2 Million LGBTQ adults identify as nonbinary.


Argentina

Argentina's capital, Buenos Aires, implemented a policy in June 2022 that forbade public educational institutions from using gender-neutral language on the basis gender-neutral language is grammatically incorrect and causes developmental learning issues for students. In the Spanish language nouns are either feminine (usually ending in "a") or masculine (usually ending in "o"), but in recent years gender-neutral endings like "x" and "e" have gained popularity; For example, "Latinx" has become the gender-neutral option for the previously binary "Latino" or "Latina." Buenos Aires' objection to gender-neutral language in the classroom stems from concerns about linguistic correctness and preservation of the Spanish language. Those who support the development of gender-neutral language have expressed frustration with the male-dominance of the Spanish language: a group of students who are all female is "compañeras," but if one male student enters the group, the grammatically correct term for the students becomes "compañeros" with the masculine "o" ending.


Italy

The
Italian language Italian (''italiano'' or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Together with Sardinian, Italian is the least divergent language from Latin. Spoken by about 85 m ...
contains grammatical gender where nouns are either male or female with corresponding gendered pronouns, which differs from English in that nouns are typically neutral. For example, "la tavola" in Italian has a feminine prefix and ending, while "the table" in English is neutral. Developing a gender-neutral option in Italian is linguistically challenging because the Italian language contains only male or female: "friends" in Italian is either "amici" or "amiche" where the male "i" pluralized ending is used as an all-encompassing term, and "amiche" with the feminine "e" pluralized ending refers specifically to a group of female friends. Italian linguistically derived from
Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
, which does contain a third "neuter" or neutral option. Use of the
schwa In linguistics, specifically phonetics and phonology, schwa (, rarely or ; sometimes spelled shwa) is a vowel sound denoted by the IPA symbol , placed in the central position of the vowel chart. In English and some other languages, it rep ...
has been suggested to create an Italian gender-neutral language option. Some Italian linguists have signed a petition opposing the use of the schwa on the basis it's not linguistically correct.


See also


In specific languages

*
Gender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender Gender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender is the usage of wording that is balanced in its treatment of the genders in a non-grammatical sense. For example, advocates of gender-neutral language challenge the traditional use of masc ...
**
Gender neutrality in English Gender-neutral language is language that minimizes assumptions about the social gender or biological sex of people referred to in speech or writing. In contrast to most other Indo-European languages, English does not retain grammatical gender and m ...
**
Gender neutrality in Spanish Feminist language reform has proposed gender neutrality in languages with grammatical gender, such as Spanish. Grammatical gender in Spanish refers to how Spanish nouns are categorized as either masculine (often ending in -o) or feminine (often ...
**
Gender neutrality in Portuguese Gender-neutral language in Portuguese is a recent strand of demands for greater gender equality and social inclusion between men, women and non-binary individuals. It can be divided into inclusive or non- sexist language, and non-binary or neute ...


Related topics

*
Epicenity Epicenity is the lack of gender distinction, often reducing the emphasis on the masculine to allow the feminine. It includes androgyny – having both masculine and feminine characteristics. The adjective ''gender-neutral'' may describe epicenit ...
*
Gender in Bible translation Gender in Bible translation concerns various issues, such as the gender of God and generic antecedents in reference to people. Bruce Metzger states that the English language is so biased towards the male gender that it restricts and obscures the ...
*
Gender binary The gender binary (also known as gender binarism) is the classification of gender into two distinct, opposite forms of masculine and feminine, whether by social system, cultural belief, or both simultaneously. Most cultures use a gender bina ...
*
Gender neutrality Gender neutrality (adjective form: gender-neutral), also known as gender-neutralism or the gender neutrality movement, is the idea that policies, language, and other social institutions (social structures or gender roles) should avoid distinguish ...
*
Gender role A gender role, also known as a sex role, is a social role encompassing a range of behaviors and attitudes that are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on that person's sex. Gender roles are usually cent ...
*
Genderless language A genderless language is a natural or constructed language that has no distinctions of grammatical gender—that is, no categories requiring morphological agreement for gender between nouns and associated pronouns, adjectives, articles, or verbs. ...
*
Generic antecedent Generic antecedents are representatives of classes, referred to in ordinary language by another word (most often a pronoun), in a situation in which gender is typically unknown or irrelevant. These mostly arise in generalizations and are particul ...
*
International Gender and Language Association The International Gender and Language Association (IGALA), is an international interdisciplinary academic organization that promotes research on language, gender, and Human sexuality, sexuality. Claire Maree is its current president. History Th ...
, an interdisciplinary academic organization *
Markedness In linguistics and social sciences, markedness is the state of standing out as nontypical or divergent as opposed to regular or common. In a marked–unmarked relation, one term of an opposition is the broader, dominant one. The dominant defau ...
*
Non-binary gender Non-binary and genderqueer are umbrella terms for gender identities that are not solely male or femaleidentities that are outside the gender binary. Non-binary identities fall under the transgender umbrella, since non-binary people typicall ...
*
Unisex name A unisex name (also known as an epicene name, a gender-neutral name or an androgynous name) is a given name that is not gender-specific. Unisex names are common in the English-speaking world, especially in the United States. By contrast, some c ...
*
Gender-neutral pronoun A third-person pronoun is a pronoun that refers to an entity other than the speaker or listener. Some languages with gender-specific pronouns have them as part of a grammatical gender system, a system of agreement where most or all nouns have a va ...
**
Neopronoun Neopronouns are a category of neologistic English Third person (grammar), third-person personal pronouns beyond "he (pronoun), he", "she (pronoun), she", "singular they, they", "one (pronoun), one", and "it (pronoun), it". Neopronouns are preferr ...
***
Spivak pronoun The Spivak pronouns are a set of gender-neutral pronouns in English promulgated on the virtual community ''LambdaMOO'' based on pronouns used in a book by American mathematician Michael Spivak. Though not in widespread use, they have been employed ...
***
Ri (pronoun) (, possessive: ) is a singular third-person gender-neutral pronoun in Esperanto intended as an alternative to the gender-specific ("he") and ("she"). It is used by some speakers when the gender of a person is not known or when it is not desi ...
, Esperanto ***
Elle (Spanish pronoun) ''Elle'' (, , or , plural: , , or ) is a neopronoun in Spanish intended as an alternative to the third-person gender-specific pronouns ("he") and ("she"). It is supposed to be used when the gender of a person is not known or when it is not des ...
***
Hen (pronoun) () is a gender-neutral personal pronoun in Swedish intended as an alternative to the gender-specific ("she") and ("he"). It can be used when the gender of a person is not known or when it is not desirable to specify them as either a "she" or "h ...
, Swedish ***
Iel (pronoun) is a neo-pronoun in the French language intended as an alternative to the gender-specific pronouns (" she") and (" he"). It has been adopted by the Le Robert dictionary but is not officially accepted by the Académie Française. Backgroun ...
, French *
Pronoun game "Playing the pronoun game" is the act of concealing sexual orientation in conversation by not using a gender-specific pronoun for a partner or a lover, which would reveal the sexual orientation of the person speaking. Someone may employ the pronou ...
*
Feminist language reform Feminist language reform or feminist language planning refers to the effort, often of political and grassroots movements, to change how language is used to gender people, activities and ideas on an individual and societal level. This initiative h ...
*
Lavender linguistics LGBT linguistics is the study of language as used by members of LGBT communities. Related or synonymous terms include lavender linguistics, advanced by William Leap in the 1990s, which "encompass sa wide range of everyday language practices" in ...
*
Gender marking in job titles A gender-specific job title is a name of a job that also specifies or implies the gender of the person performing that job. For example, in English, the job title ''stewardess'' implies that the person is female. A gender-neutral job title, on the ...


References


Further reading

* * * * * * * * * * * {{Authority control Etiquette Sociolinguistics Feminist terminology Linguistic controversies