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Now here comes the part where I play amateur sociologist and discuss my poll from yesterday. For three out of the four questions, more than 80% of pollers voted "yes" on the proposition, some even over 90%. These people like big words in love letters, think people who "aren't into labels" is a label too, and find Starbucks coffee to be highly overrated. I actually have this soft spot for people in polls who are completely out-voted by the majority and I would vote "yes" on Proposition: People who go with their opinion even if the face of being outvoted are fabulous, even if I do disagree with them.
A couple people questioned the meaning of the Starbucks question, and I guess I could clarify a little. I did essentially mean "general public opinion" but frankly, even on an individual basis, I believe that most people really into Starbucks would not necessarily choose it in a blind taste-test. Is this total conjecture? Sure. Will I ever test my hypothesis? Never more than anecdotally. Oh, and yes, this question came from actual conversations in my life.
But the most interesting results to me were the answers for the question on pronouns and someone using "they" and "their" (which about 2/3 of pollers supported). First off, I was specifically talking about an individual choosing for themselves to go by "they", not necessarily the phenomenon of using "they" in a sentence because it's unclear what someone's gender identity is. In other words, I'm not talking about me referring to someone as "they" because I don't know their gender preference, I'm talking about an individual who says, "Hi, my name is _____ and my pronoun of choice is 'they'." Perhaps me finding it fabulous is not about the word itself, but about their willingness to stand up for how they want to self-define and engage people to change how they think about language and its limitations. Although I am admittedly less bothered by the grammar problems too, in part because there isn't a "correct" alternative -- the english language has no gender-neutral pronoun appropriate for people.
Strangely enough, people who were in my general camp when it came to strict grammar words and meanings and using words correctly (i.e. my livejournal post from several weeks ago) voted "yes" on the use of 'they', whereas other people who thought I was being too picky and snobby in stating that 'irregardless' is not a word and 'factoid' is misused and misunderstood, voted "No" on the fabulousness of someone using the grammatically incorrect pronoun "they". This perplexed me. Of course, there was no essay section, so I know there are various reasons why someone might have marked "no". And my own reasoning might perplex others, so here's my own personal explanation.
No matter what the manuals of styles tell you, language is organic and changes. However, it is also a practical tool of communication and if there is not some uniformity, it will be unable to do it's job. I'm all for making up words, as long as the artist or linguist understands the problems and confusion that come along with this creative venture. For me, the bottom line is intent. Intentionally knowing the rules and breaking them or ignoring them or changing them. And in cases where people just seem to be lazy about language, changing the meaning because they can't be bothered to learn otherwise, that's much different then recognizing all the possible meanings but morphing it anyway. So yeah, I'm all for people choosing a gender pronoun and changing it's connotation if the meaning is still clear. In this case, even though it's plural, it's still obvious we're talking about a person, not an object, and even a singular person because of other clues in the sentence. And we're also communicating that the person does not have just one gender, or rather one gender that falls simply into the "he" or "she" side of the spectrum. So actually, this person who chooses "they" as a pronoun communicates even MORE than I do by simply going by the pronoun "he".
But you know, I'm no scientist.
A couple people questioned the meaning of the Starbucks question, and I guess I could clarify a little. I did essentially mean "general public opinion" but frankly, even on an individual basis, I believe that most people really into Starbucks would not necessarily choose it in a blind taste-test. Is this total conjecture? Sure. Will I ever test my hypothesis? Never more than anecdotally. Oh, and yes, this question came from actual conversations in my life.
But the most interesting results to me were the answers for the question on pronouns and someone using "they" and "their" (which about 2/3 of pollers supported). First off, I was specifically talking about an individual choosing for themselves to go by "they", not necessarily the phenomenon of using "they" in a sentence because it's unclear what someone's gender identity is. In other words, I'm not talking about me referring to someone as "they" because I don't know their gender preference, I'm talking about an individual who says, "Hi, my name is _____ and my pronoun of choice is 'they'." Perhaps me finding it fabulous is not about the word itself, but about their willingness to stand up for how they want to self-define and engage people to change how they think about language and its limitations. Although I am admittedly less bothered by the grammar problems too, in part because there isn't a "correct" alternative -- the english language has no gender-neutral pronoun appropriate for people.
Strangely enough, people who were in my general camp when it came to strict grammar words and meanings and using words correctly (i.e. my livejournal post from several weeks ago) voted "yes" on the use of 'they', whereas other people who thought I was being too picky and snobby in stating that 'irregardless' is not a word and 'factoid' is misused and misunderstood, voted "No" on the fabulousness of someone using the grammatically incorrect pronoun "they". This perplexed me. Of course, there was no essay section, so I know there are various reasons why someone might have marked "no". And my own reasoning might perplex others, so here's my own personal explanation.
No matter what the manuals of styles tell you, language is organic and changes. However, it is also a practical tool of communication and if there is not some uniformity, it will be unable to do it's job. I'm all for making up words, as long as the artist or linguist understands the problems and confusion that come along with this creative venture. For me, the bottom line is intent. Intentionally knowing the rules and breaking them or ignoring them or changing them. And in cases where people just seem to be lazy about language, changing the meaning because they can't be bothered to learn otherwise, that's much different then recognizing all the possible meanings but morphing it anyway. So yeah, I'm all for people choosing a gender pronoun and changing it's connotation if the meaning is still clear. In this case, even though it's plural, it's still obvious we're talking about a person, not an object, and even a singular person because of other clues in the sentence. And we're also communicating that the person does not have just one gender, or rather one gender that falls simply into the "he" or "she" side of the spectrum. So actually, this person who chooses "they" as a pronoun communicates even MORE than I do by simply going by the pronoun "he".
But you know, I'm no scientist.
