Do you think people will prefer gender-inclusive language in literature?

Japanese, while it does have gendered pronouns, almost never uses them. The only two gendered third person pronouns are "kareshi/kanojo", and these are also used to mean "boyfriend/girlfriend" (the male being more common in this context than the female).

Otherwise, where pronouns are used at all, a gender neutral one such as "ano hito" or more informally "aitsu", or simply referring to the person by name - so rather than saying "he did this", you'd just say "A-san did this".

 

I'm not offended by 'it,' but again, like so many other pronouns, it already has a meaning. "It" refers to a non-human. So referring to a gender neutral person as 'it' implies a lack of humanity, rather than a lack of gender.

Why not just create a new pronoun that doesn't already exist for something else? I'm sure if we put our collective minds to it, we can do this.

 

No, it's okay. It is an issue we should be addressing. I think what is probably needed is some consensus among the groups in question about how they would like to be referred to ...with the caveat that it NOT be a pronoun already in use for something else. If they just start using this word, it will catch on. I'm sure.

For example, while everybody knows what 'gay' means these days—and yes, that used to be a word that meant something else entirely, and now we don't get to use that word in its original meaning any more. But we also use 'bi,' and now everybody knows what bi means ...and it didn't co-opt another word to get there.

That's what I mean. Create a new word? It saves confusion, and will get folks what they want. It doesn't have to be something unpronounceable-looking like Xir, either. It could be zeo for the singular form, and zeos for the plural form and zeosh for the possessive form. Or whatever.

 

I think the real question is why shouldn't we? It's a concept that doesn't already exist in our language. We create lots of new words, when the need for them arises.

 

It is definitely unfortunate that these words are co-opted. People argue nowadays that what some of these people actually want is control. I'm don't know if I agree with that or not, but it's clearly unhelpful that gay/bi had its original meaning altered. In fact, I don't even really know why gay (happy) turned into gay (homosexual). It's odd. But back to control... Practically everyone understood or connected with the concept of a woman being someone who was of the female sex. Now, it seems, even calling a woman calling herself a woman is "transphobic" because it denies the "lived experience" of people who have transitioned. If one says, "Trans women are not women," believing that a physical operation upon genitalia does not in fact change a person's sex, that is in some cases misconstrued as hate speech or a denial of someone's core identity. I understand that words change, but can we not just have male/man, female/woman?

This sort of stuff is a minefield. It's a funny world out there.

 

Hey, I resemble that remark! And I wonder how people are pronouncing my noun...

 

I've never thought about this before... Dare I say that every time I see your name I pronounce it "Zo-ik"? Don't tell me it's "zoyk!"

 

I must respectfully disagree. "It" is a pronoun that refers to anything or anyone that/who is not masculine or feminine. Those who choose to self-identify as "non-binary" are, by choice, not masculine or feminine. The only pronoun left is "it."

I'm a senior citizen. I have been speaking English for nearly 80 years. I'm not going to learn a new pronoun or batch of pronouns to satisfy a tiny segment of the populace. Years ago, I gave in and added "Ms." to "Mr.," "Mrs.," and "Miss." I've done my part.

 

Lol, I'm fine with either actually (I'm inclusive like that). My original signature was "It exists at the intersection of Stoic and Zoiks—sometimes I lean more one way and sometimes the other". Personally I pronounce it like Stoic or Mesozoic.

 

Stoic--so I was correct! And, yeah, I remember that signature. Good stuff.

 

Then, as all of our different experiences demonstrates, there is no one preference as far as pronouns are concerned amongst the non-binary.

And if we write non-binary characters, the pronoun we choose to use is a reflection of our experiences, and will probably offend someone.

Unless you choose to refer to different characters by entirely different pronouns which will really confuse the reader and please absolutely no-one.