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diff --git a/article/chinese-pronouns.html b/article/chinese-pronouns.html index 3a73148..ecbd087 100644 --- a/article/chinese-pronouns.html +++ b/article/chinese-pronouns.html @@ -11,7 +11,7 @@ <p>Article ID: 23</p> <p>tl;dr: ``他'' uses the ``人'' (person) radical, and should cover all people, because not all people are male.</p> -<p>In contemporary English, the traditional plaural pronoun ``they'' is +<p>In contemporary English, the traditional plural pronoun ``they'' is often used as a gender-inclusive singular pronoun, alongside the feminine singular ``she'' and the masculine singular ``he''. However, there is no equivalent in Chinese. ``他'' is considered a masculine pronouns in @@ -22,9 +22,9 @@ pronoun.</p> <p>Prior to the May Fourth Movement and the broader New Culture Movement, ``他'' was a generic pronoun for all entities, including people of any gender, and inanimate objects. In the movements’ efforts to -``modernize'' the Chinese language and culture, a seperate feminine +``modernize'' the Chinese language and culture, a separate feminine pronoun ``她'' was created by the poet and linguist 刘半农, becoming an -established linguistic norm after the Chinese Civil War. (A seperate +established linguistic norm after the Chinese Civil War. (A separate ``它'' was created for inanimate objects; however this has little relevance to the arguments in this article.)</p> <p>A distinct feminine pronoun ``她'' along with ``他'' being a masculine @@ -35,8 +35,8 @@ marginalization of the feminine from the concept of personhood.</p> <p>When referring to a placeholder of unknown gender in contemporary English, singular they pronouns are often used, such as in ``someone left their laptop here''. Such colloquial conversations are generally -aproblematic as all normative third-person pronouns in Mandarin sound -the same: tā. However, in written contexts, many use ``他/她'' ressembling +unproblematic as all normative third-person pronouns in Mandarin sound +the same: tā. However, in written contexts, many use ``他/她'' resembling ``he/she''. Aside from how this reinforces gender binary and alienates women (see the next two paragraphs), it is visually unappealing (as half-width slashes look particularly distinct from full-width CJK @@ -50,12 +50,12 @@ this article into a detailed discussion of non-binary gender, please read Leah Rowe’s article ``<a href="https://vimuser.org/pronouns.html">Better respect for non-binary people, in defense of human rights</a>'' if this concept seems -unfamiliar.) The status quo of ``她'' being solely a femine pronoun and +unfamiliar.) The status quo of ``她'' being solely a feminine pronoun and ``他'' being solely a masculine pronoun reinforces gender binary and leaves no gender-neutral/inclusive pronoun for non-binary people who would prefer such pronouns.</p> <p>The more fundamental issue with ``他'' as a masculine pronoun lies in -its characater composition and etymology. ``他'' is a compound character +its character composition and etymology. ``他'' is a compound character consisting of a ``人'' (person) radical and ``也'', while ``她'' consists of a ``女'' (female) radical and ``也''. Limiting ``他'' as a male pronoun assumes the male gender as dominant in ``people'', and marginalizes other genders, @@ -65,10 +65,18 @@ subset of what used to be covered by ``他''. I believe that a character’s composition should not be deceptive to its meaning, and therefore, the ``他'' with the ``人'' radical should describe any person, not just any male person.</p> -<p>Those who prefer a unique masculine pronoun may choose to use one -with a ``男'' (male) radical instead. While ``男也'' has not been given a -unicode code-point yet, I find this solution to be much more ideal than -stereotypical generalizationis with ``他''.</p> +<p>While I believe that ``他'' should be truly gender inclusive, its current +masculine standing does make it similar to +<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_neutrality_in_languages_with_gendered_third-person_pronouns#Generic_he">Generic he</a> +to some extent. I dislike generic he as it reflects bias towards men, but +an inclusive ``他'' does carry these risks. Therefore I propose that +those who prefer a unique masculine pronoun may choose to use one +with a ``男'' (male) radical instead. While ``男也'' (read that as one character) has not been given a +Unicode code-point yet, I find this solution to be much more ideal than +stereotypical generalizations with ``他''.</p> +<p> +Please give me some of your thoughts. +</p> <div id="footer"> <hr /> <p><a href="/">Runxi Yu's Website</a></p> diff --git a/article/chinese-pronouns.html.bak b/article/chinese-pronouns.html.bak new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3a73148 --- /dev/null +++ b/article/chinese-pronouns.html.bak @@ -0,0 +1,77 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title>Reclaiming "他" as a gender-inclusive pronoun</title> + <link rel="stylesheet" href="/style.css" /> + <link rel="shortcut icon" href="/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" /> + <meta charset="utf-8" /> + </head> + <body> + <h1>Reclaiming "他" as a gender-inclusive pronoun</h1> + <p>Article ID: 23</p> +<p>tl;dr: ``他'' uses the ``人'' (person) radical, and should cover all +people, because not all people are male.</p> +<p>In contemporary English, the traditional plaural pronoun ``they'' is +often used as a gender-inclusive singular pronoun, alongside the +feminine singular ``she'' and the masculine singular ``he''. However, there +is no equivalent in Chinese. ``他'' is considered a masculine pronouns in +contemporary Chinese, despite its ``人'' radical and its history of +traditionally being a gender-inclusive pronoun until the 1920s. This +article argues for the reclaiming of ``他'' as a gender-inclusive +pronoun.</p> +<p>Prior to the May Fourth Movement and the broader New Culture +Movement, ``他'' was a generic pronoun for all entities, including people +of any gender, and inanimate objects. In the movements’ efforts to +``modernize'' the Chinese language and culture, a seperate feminine +pronoun ``她'' was created by the poet and linguist 刘半农, becoming an +established linguistic norm after the Chinese Civil War. (A seperate +``它'' was created for inanimate objects; however this has little +relevance to the arguments in this article.)</p> +<p>A distinct feminine pronoun ``她'' along with ``他'' being a masculine +pronoun poses three problems: (1) the annoyances caused by the lack of a +inclusive placeholder pronoun, (2) the reinforcement of gender binary +normatives and the lack of a neutral pronoun, and (3) the +marginalization of the feminine from the concept of personhood.</p> +<p>When referring to a placeholder of unknown gender in contemporary +English, singular they pronouns are often used, such as in ``someone left +their laptop here''. Such colloquial conversations are generally +aproblematic as all normative third-person pronouns in Mandarin sound +the same: tā. However, in written contexts, many use ``他/她'' ressembling +``he/she''. Aside from how this reinforces gender binary and alienates +women (see the next two paragraphs), it is visually unappealing (as +half-width slashes look particularly distinct from full-width CJK +ideographs and break typographical uniformity) and adds unnecessary +syntactic sugar.</p> +<p>Individuals who are not comfortable with any gendered pronoun (such +as me until <a +href="https://git.andrewyu.org/andrew/www.git/commit/note/pronouns.html?id=ce4cd5fd7b3fd19d8effd3e18f5c71dadfc5874e">this +commit</a>) often prefer singular they pronouns. (I do not wish to turn +this article into a detailed discussion of non-binary gender, please +read Leah Rowe’s article ``<a +href="https://vimuser.org/pronouns.html">Better respect for non-binary +people, in defense of human rights</a>'' if this concept seems +unfamiliar.) The status quo of ``她'' being solely a femine pronoun and +``他'' being solely a masculine pronoun reinforces gender binary and +leaves no gender-neutral/inclusive pronoun for non-binary people who +would prefer such pronouns.</p> +<p>The more fundamental issue with ``他'' as a masculine pronoun lies in +its characater composition and etymology. ``他'' is a compound character +consisting of a ``人'' (person) radical and ``也'', while ``她'' consists of a +``女'' (female) radical and ``也''. Limiting ``他'' as a male pronoun assumes +the male gender as dominant in ``people'', and marginalizes other genders, +most prominently the female gender, as groups distinct from ``people''. +This aligns with the development of the ``她'' pronoun as a distinct +subset of what used to be covered by ``他''. I believe that a character’s +composition should not be deceptive to its meaning, and therefore, the +``他'' with the ``人'' radical should describe any person, not just any male +person.</p> +<p>Those who prefer a unique masculine pronoun may choose to use one +with a ``男'' (male) radical instead. While ``男也'' has not been given a +unicode code-point yet, I find this solution to be much more ideal than +stereotypical generalizationis with ``他''.</p> + <div id="footer"> + <hr /> + <p><a href="/">Runxi Yu's Website</a></p> + </div> + </body> +</html> |