Gender Pronouns: Using ‘THEY’, ‘THEIR’, and ‘THEM’ for a single person in English

Hello. I'm Gill at engVid, and today we have a lesson on personal pronouns, particularly

on "they", "them", and "their", which are the plural, third-person plural. So, why do

they... Why are they different? Well, subject, object, possessive. So, if they are the subject,

you say "they". "They are here." If they're the object, "I see them." Okay? And then "They

came in their car", possessive. So, that's those. So, that's third-person plural. And

then just to look at the third-person singular, because this is also relevant to the lesson,

we have masculine, feminine, and neuter in the singular, which we don't have in the plural.

These could be masculine or feminine or neuter to do with a thing rather than a person or

with an animal. But in the singular, we have masculine, feminine, neuter. So, "he", "him",

"his". Again, "He is here. I see him. He came in his car." Okay? And "she", "her", "hers".

And then for the neuter, "it", "it", and "its" for subject, object, possessive again. But

there's a situation where sometimes the plural pronouns are used in a singular sense, and

that happens when you don't actually know whether... If it's a person, you don't know

whether they're male or female. Okay? So, for example, if someone's talking about a

talk that they went to and they say, "The speaker was so inspiring." A speaker, that

could be a male or female. We don't know. So, somebody might reply, "Oh, really? What

did...?" So, they can't say, "What did he talk about?" and they can't say, "What did

she talk about?" either, because they don't know if it was a man or a woman at this point.

So, often in conversation, people would say, "What did they... What did they talk about?"

Because that's not specific to masculine or feminine; it's non-gender specific. So, it's...

It's an easy way of asking the question or referring to that speaker when you don't know

if they're male or female. You don't really want to say, "Oh, was it a man or a woman?"

when you can ask the question, "What did he talk about?" or "What did she talk about?"

You would... You want to immediately ask the question, "Oh, what did they talk about?"

So that's when you would use the plural, "they", when you know it's only one person, one speaker,

because you just don't know who... Who they are.

There's another thing that's done in writing when you're trying to be non-gender specific

and you want to include both genders. You want to use male and female if you're talking

about maybe a teacher teaching in a classroom, and say something general, like instead of

saying "he" or "she", which people have also done in the past, you know, the teacher in

the classroom, "he" or "she" needs to show that they understand their subject very well,

otherwise the students won't take them seriously. So, you can either say "he" or "she" should

appear knowledgeable about their subject, but there's... In writing, there's a way of

putting "s" stroke "he" so that it can mean "he" or "she" in that way, and it's quicker

and easier. It takes up less space, especially if you keep saying the same sorts of things

with the same construction, and you're constantly trying to say "he" or "she", you can just...

If it's in writing, you can put "s" stroke "he", "s" stroke "he", because people are

reading it silently, usually, so they don't have to say it. So, that's another option.

And then there's another thing that's happened quite recently. Some organizations, I think

especially charities and NGOs, when people send emails, they put their name at the bottom

and probably their job title, and then they've started putting how they want to be referred

to. So, they could put "Jane Smith, volunteer manager", "she" stroke "her", because Jane

is a woman's name. So, I mean, you'd think, well, why? Because, I mean, if she's a woman,

I would refer to her as "she" or "her". Anyway, so sometimes it's obvious, and then a mail

of somebody writing "John Smith, volunteer director", "he" stroke "him", and you think,

well, he's a man, so of course I'll say "he" or "him". But some people now, they don't

want to be referred to with a gendered pronoun. They don't want people to use a male pronoun

or a female pronoun when referring to them, and so they might put under their name "they"

stroke "them", because "they" as a person... Oh, how's John today? Oh, they are quite busy.

I suppose that's how you would say it. Or, how's John today? Oh, I haven't seen them

yet this morning. I guess that's how you would say it. I've never actually heard this put

into practice so far. I've only seen it written on emails, and usually I've seen the obvious

one anyway, "he" stroke "him", "she" stroke "her". I don't know if I've ever seen the

plural version, but it's something to look out for. And I don't know how... If that appears

at all in other languages other than English, but it's a new trend in the English language,

so that's something to look out for. So, it's an interesting development.

So, okay, so if you don't know the gender, going back to the older way of doing this,

you use "they". What did they talk about? And some people don't like this. Some people

think it's ungrammatical because "they" is plural and the speaker is singular. Some people

don't like the sound of it; it doesn't sound good to them. That's usually older generation

people, but, you know, I think it's... There's no other option, really, other than say, "Oh,

what did the speaker talk about?" It's a bit, you know, not so elegant. Okay.

And then similarly, there's someone at the door. "What _____ want?" Well, do you say

"What do _____ want?" or "What does _____ want?" So, perhaps you can work out what would you

put here? If you don't know... There's someone at the door, male or female, we don't know,

so how would you put that? And you've got to get the right form of the auxiliary verb

here, as well as the alternative to "he" or "she". So, it's obviously, again, "What _____

they want?" But if it's "they", which is supposedly plural in grammatical terms, "What do they

want?" If it was "he", it was "What does he want?" So, that would be "What does he want?"

or "What does she want?" So, you have to sometimes change the form of the verb, as well, to go

with the plural "they". There's someone at the door, what do they want? Because you're

not going to say, "Oh, are they male or female? Oh, all right, then. So, what does she want?"

So, you wouldn't take time to do that.

Right, and then here's another. "My new neighbour is coming to our party." Then someone replies,

"Great. When did _____ move in?" The new neighbour moving in next door. "When did..." Well, again,

it's "they", isn't it? "When did they move in?" But then once you know, you can say,

"Oh, when did he move in? When did she move in?" And there's no change to the verb form

here because it's a more straightforward... And it's the past form of "do", so "did" stays

the same. Okay.

Right, and then finally, another. "My cousin is visiting me next week." I've deliberately

chosen "cousin" because a cousin can be male or female. If I'd said "my niece" or "my nephew",

you immediately get the gender. So, sister, brother, I thought, no, I can't use that one.

What sort of family member has the same word for both genders? Ah, cousin. Right. "My cousin

is visiting me next week." That's nice. What's "name"? So, we've got to be non-gender specific,

so we've got... But this time it's the possessive form, isn't it? So, we've got to go for "their".

What's "their name"? Okay? You can't say, "What's his name? What's her name?" because

you don't know male or female, so what's "their name"? And it sounds okay because it's done

in conversation. People have spoken like this for years now, and it's just accepted. Even

though some people don't like it, there's really no alternative.

So, I hope that's been a helpful explanation, and if you'd like to do a quiz to test your

knowledge, go to the website, www.engvid.com, and do the quiz. And thanks for watching,

and hope to see you again soon. Okay. Bye for now.