At 06:59 -0500 on 06/18/2015, Tom Marchant wrote about Re: OT STCK question:

On Wed, 17 Jun 2015 20:03:01 -0400, Robert A. Rosenberg wrote:

 >The problem is that there is no gender neutral/un-specified singular.

We have "it", but we don't like to refer to people as "it". In many
languages every object has a gender and there is a masculine and
feminine "the" to go with it.

--
Tom Marchant

I read lots of Science Fiction and unless an invented term is used, "it" is often used when an alien race has more than 2 sexes. There is also a series where there are bio-engineered Humans with both Male and Female organs. The proper gender term for them is "it".

OTOH, I have often seen the term "it" used as a gender neutral/un-specified singular in referencing a baby or animal/pet as in "The baby sucked on its pacifier".

----------------------------------------------------------------------
For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions,
send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN

Reply via email to