Re: Gender in pronouns
Martina Luise Pachali 
Wed, 14 Oct 1998 17:55:20 -0400


Saul Epstein wrote:
>So I think it would make a lot of
>sense if the most commonly used pronouns only distinguished sentient
>from non, while a speaker could have the option of specifying gender
>if it were pertinent to her statement.<

This seems indeed the most logical way of solving the problem.
Nevertheless, we would potentially arrive at another connotative problem,=

namely, that the use of sentient gender-specific pronouns might carry a
connotation of either biological or gender discriminatory nature. I can't=

quote a Terran example, but in the "Foreigner", "Invader" and "Inheritor"=

trilogy by C,J. Cherryh (an excellent study of xenology in action, by the=

way, that can only be recommended to any Vulcan studying species
interaction), the human ambassador among the atevi population is expressl=
y
recommended to avoid gender-specific pronouns at all cost and use only th=
e
gender-neutral ones on account of the sexual meaning the specific pronoun=
s
are loaded with. Vulcans, on the other hand, do not really need that
connotation for anything that I could think of. It should be logical that=

one's wife ormother is female.

T'Pel