Singular they

A pronoun sticker that reads "My pronoun is they"

A sticker indicating the wearer's use of singular they pronouns

Singular they, along with its inflected or derivative forms, them, their, theirs, and themselves (also themself and theirself), is a gender-neutral third-person pronoun derived from plural they. It typically occurs with an indeterminate antecedent, to refer to an unknown person, or to refer to every person of some group, in sentences such as:

Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent This use of singular they had emerged by the 14th century, about a century after the plural they.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name="OED">Template:OED</ref> Singular they has been criticised since the mid-18th century by prescriptive commentators who consider it an error.Template:Sfn Its continued use in modern standard English has become more common and formally accepted with the move toward gender-neutral language.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Some early-21st-century style guides described it as colloquial and less appropriate in formal writing.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn However, by 2020, most style guides accepted the singular they as a personal pronoun.<ref name="cambridge-2020-11-16">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="aces-2020">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="mla-2020">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In the early 21st century, use of singular they with known individuals emerged for non-binary people, as in, for example, "This is my friend, Jay. I met them at work."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> They in this context was named Word of the Year for 2015 by the American Dialect Society,<ref name="ads-woty"/> and for 2019 by Merriam-Webster.<ref name="bbc-woty"/><ref name="ap-woty"/><ref name="mw-woty"/> In 2020, the American Dialect Society also selected it as Word of the Decade for the 2010s.<ref name="dw-wotd"/>

Inflected forms and derivative pronouns

Like the "singular you", "singular they" permits a singular antecedent, but is used with the same verb forms as plural they,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and has the same inflected forms as plural they (i.e. them, their, and theirs),Template:Sfn except that in the reflexive form, themself is sometimes used instead of themselves.<ref name="websters-2019-09">Template:Cite web</ref>

Inflected forms of third-person personal pronouns

Pronoun	Subjective (nominative)	Objective (accusative)	Template:Nowrap (dependent genitive)	Template:Nowrap (independent genitive)	Reflexive
He	Template:Em is my son.	When my son cries, I hug Template:Em.	My son tells me Template:Em age.	If I lose my phone, my son lends me Template:Em.	My son dresses Template:Em.
She	Template:Em is my daughter.	When my daughter cries, I hug Template:Em.	My daughter tells me Template:Em age.	If I lose my phone, my daughter lends me Template:Em.	My daughter dresses Template:Em.
Plural they	Template:Em are my children.	When my children cry, I hug Template:Em.	My children tell me Template:Em ages.	If I lose my phone, my children lend me Template:Em.	My children dress Template:Em.
Template:Nowrap<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>	Template:Em are my child.	When my child cries, I hug Template:Em.	My child tells me Template:Em age.	If I lose my phone, my child lends me Template:Em.	My child dresses Template:Em [or Template:Em].
Generic he	Template:Em is my child.	When my child cries, I hug Template:Em.	My child tells me Template:Em age.	If I lose my phone, my child lends me Template:Em.	My child dresses Template:Em.
It	Template:Em is my child.	When my child cries, I hug Template:Em.	My child tells me Template:Em age.	If I lose my phone, my child lends me Template:Em.	My child dresses Template:Em.

Themself is attested from the 14th to 16th centuries. Its use has been increasing since the 1970sTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn or 1980s,Template:Sfn though it is sometimes still classified as "a minority form".Template:Sfn In 2002, Payne and Huddleston, in The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, called its use in standard dialect "rare and acceptable only to a minority of speakers" but "likely to increase with the growing acceptance of they as a singular pronoun".Template:Sfn It is useful when referring to a single person of indeterminate gender, where the plural form themselves might seem incongruous, as in:

Regional preferences

The Canadian government recommends themselves as the reflexive form of singular they for use in Canadian federal legislative texts and advises against using themself.Template:Sfn

Usage

Template:Further They with a singular antecedent goes back to the Middle English of the 14th centuryTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn (slightly younger than they with a plural antecedent, which was borrowed from Old Norse in the 13th century),<ref>Template:Cite American Heritage Dictionary</ref> and has remained in use for centuries in spite of its proscription by traditional grammarians beginning in the mid-18th century.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

Informal spoken English exhibits universal use of the singular they. An examination by Jürgen Gerner of the British National Corpus published in 1998 found that British speakers, regardless of social status, age, sex, or region, used the singular they more often than the gender-neutral he or other options in the context of being anaphors after indefinite pronouns like "everybody" and "anybody".Template:Sfn

Prescription of generic he

He has been used with antecedents of indeterminate gender since the Old English period,<ref>Template:Cite OED</ref> as in the following:

The earliest known explicit recommendation by a grammarian to use the generic he rather than they in formal English is Ann Fisher's mid-18th century A New Grammar assertion that "The Masculine Person answers to the general Name, which comprehends both Male and Female; as, any Person who knows what he says." (Ann FisherTemplate:Sfn as quoted by OstadeTemplate:Sfn)

Nineteenth-century grammarians insisted on he as a gender-neutral pronoun on the grounds of number agreement, while rejecting "he or she" as clumsy,Template:Sfn and this was widely adopted: e.g. in 1850, the British Parliament passed an act which provided that, when used in acts of Parliament "words importing the masculine gender shall be deemed and taken to include females".Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Baskervill and Sewell mention the common use of the singular they in their An English Grammar for the Use of High School, Academy and College Class of 1895, but prefer the generic he on the basis of number agreement.

Baskervill gives a number of examples of recognized authors using the singular they, including:

It has been argued that the real motivation for promoting the "generic" he was an androcentric world view, with the default sex of humans being male – and the default gender therefore being masculine.Template:Sfn There is some evidence for this: Wilson wrote in 1560:

Template:Blockquote Template:Blockquote And Poole wrote in 1646: Template:Blockquote

In spite of continuous attempts on the part of educationalists to proscribe singular they in favour of he, this advice was ignored; even writers of the period continued to use they (though the proscription may have been observed more by American writers).Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Use of the purportedly gender-neutral he remained acceptable until at least the 1960s,Template:Sfn though some uses of he were later criticized as being awkward or silly, for instance when referring to:Template:Sfn

• Indeterminate persons of both sexes:

• Known persons of both sexes:

Contemporary use of he to refer to a generic or indefinite antecedent

He is still sometimes found in contemporary writing when referring to a generic or indeterminate antecedent. In some cases, it is clear from the situation that the persons potentially referred to are likely to be male, as in:

Template:Blockquote In some cases the antecedent may refer to persons who are only probably male or to occupations traditionally thought of as male: Template:Blockquote Template:Blockquote In other situations, the antecedent may refer to an indeterminate person of either sex: Template:Blockquote Template:Blockquote In 2010, Choy and Clark still recommend the use of generic he "in formal speech or writing":Template:Sfn

In informal spoken English, plural pronouns are often used with indefinite pronoun antecedents. However, this construction is generally not considered appropriate in formal speech or writing.

In 2015, Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage calls this "the now outmoded use of he to mean 'anyoneTemplate:'",Template:Sfn stating:Template:Sfn Template:Blockquote

In 2016, Garner's Modern English calls the generic use of masculine pronouns "the traditional view, now widely assailed as sexist".Template:Sfn

Rise of gender-neutral language

The earliest known attempt to create a new gender-neutral pronoun in English dates back to 1792, when Scottish economist James Anderson advocated for an indeterminate pronoun ou.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

In 1808, poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge suggested it and which as neutral pronouns for the word person:<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Sfn

In the second half of the 20th century, people expressed more widespread concern at the use of male-oriented language.Template:Sfn This included criticism of the use of man as a generic term to include men and women and of the use of he to refer to any human, regardless of sex (social gender).Template:Sfn

It was argued that he could not sensibly be used as a generic pronoun understood to include men and women. William Safire in his On Language column in The New York Times approved of the use of generic he, mentioning the mnemonic phrase "the male embraces the female".Template:Sfn C. Badendyck from Brooklyn wrote to the New York Times in a reply:Template:Sfn

By 1980, the movement toward gender-neutral language had gained wide support, and many organizations, including most publishers, had issued guidelines on the use of gender-neutral language,Template:Sfn but stopped short of recommending they to be third-person singular with a non-indeterminate, singular antecedent.Template:Citation needed

Contemporary usage

The use of masculine generic nouns and pronouns in written and spoken language has decreased since the 1970s.Template:Sfn In a corpus of spontaneous speech collected in Australia in the 1990s, singular they had become the most frequently used generic pronoun (rather than generic he or he or she).Template:Sfn Similarly, a study from 2002 looking at a corpus of American and British newspapers showed a preference for they to be used as a singular epicene pronoun.<ref name="Baranowski Current Usage of They">Template:Cite journal</ref>

The increased use of singular they may owe in part to an increasing desire for gender-neutral language. A solution in formal writing has often been to write "he or she", or something similar, but this is often considered awkward or overly politically correct, particularly when used excessively.Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> In 2016, the journal American Speech published a study by Darren K. LaScotte investigating the pronouns used by native English speakers in informal written responses to questions concerning a subject of unspecified gender, finding that 68% of study participants chose singular they to refer to such an antecedent. Some participants noted that they found constructions such as "he or she" inadequate as they do not include people who identify as neither male nor female.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

They in this context was named Word of the Year for 2019 by Merriam-Webster<ref name="bbc-woty">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="ap-woty">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="mw-woty">Template:Cite web</ref> and for 2015 by the American Dialect Society.<ref name="ads-woty">Template:Cite web</ref> On January 4, 2020, the American Dialect Society announced they had crowned they, again in this context, Word of the Decade for the 2010s.<ref name="dw-wotd">Template:Cite web</ref>

Use with a pronoun antecedent

The singular antecedent can be a pronoun such as someone, anybody, or everybody, or an interrogative pronoun such as who:

• With somebody or someone:

• With anybody or anyone:

• With nobody or no one:

• With an interrogative pronoun as antecedent:

• With everybody, everyone, etc.:

Notional plurality or pairwise relationships

Although the pronouns everybody, everyone, nobody, and no one are singular in form and are used with a singular verb, these pronouns have an "implied plurality" that is somewhat similar to the implied plurality of collective or group nouns such as crowd or team,Template:Efn and in some sentences where the antecedent is one of these "implied plural" pronouns, the word they cannot be replaced by generic he,Template:Sfn suggesting a "notional plural" rather than a "bound variable" interpretation Template:See below. This is in contrast to sentences that involve multiple pairwise relationships and singular they, such as: Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent

There are examples where the antecedent pronoun (such as everyone) may refer to a collective, with no necessary implication of pairwise relationships. These are examples of plural they: Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Which are apparent because they do not work with a generic he or he or she: Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent In addition, for these "notional plural" cases, it would not be appropriate to use themself instead of themselves as in: Template:Blockindent

Use with a generic noun as antecedent

The singular antecedent can also be a noun such as person, patient, or student:

• With a noun (e.g. person, student, patient) used generically (e.g. in the sense of any member of that class or a specific member unknown to the speaker or writer)

• With representatives of a class previously referred to in the singular

Template:Blockindent Even when referring to a class of persons of known sex, they is sometimes used:Template:Sfn Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent They may also be used with antecedents of mixed genders: Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Even for a definite known person of known sex, they may be used in order to ignore or conceal the sex. Template:Blockindent The word themself is also sometimes used when the antecedent is known or believed to be a single person. Template:Blockindent

Use for specific, known people, including non-binary people

Known individuals may be referred to as they if the individual's gender is unknown to the speaker.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn

A known individual may also be referred to as they if the individual is non-binary or genderqueer and considers they and derivatives as appropriate pronouns.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Several social media applications permit account holders to choose to identify their gender using one of a variety of non-binary or genderqueer options,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> such as genderfluid, agender, or bigender, and to designate pronouns, including they/them, which they wish to be used when referring to them.Template:Sfn Explicitly designating one's pronouns as they/them increases the chance that people will interpret "they" as singular.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> Though "singular they" has long been used with antecedents such as everybody or generic persons of unknown gender, this use, which may be chosen by an individual, is recent.Template:Sfn The earliest recorded usage of this sense documented by the Oxford English Dictionary is in a tweet from 2009;<ref>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref><ref>Template:Cite tweet</ref> the journal American Speech documents an example from 2008 in an article in the journal Women's Studies Quarterly.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> As of 2020, singular they is the most popular pronoun set used by non-binary people. Approximately 80% consider it appropriate for themselves.<ref name="gendercensus2020">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Hekanaho2020">Template:Cite thesis</ref>

The singular they in the meaning "gender-neutral singular pronoun for a known person, as a non-binary identifier"Template:Sfn was chosen by the American Dialect Society as their "Word of the Year" for 2015.Template:Sfn In 2016, the American Dialect Society wrote:

Template:Blockquote The vote followed the previous year's approval of this use by The Washington Post style guide, when Bill Walsh, the PostTemplate:'s copy editor, said that the singular they is "the only sensible solution to English's lack of a gender-neutral third-person singular personal pronoun".Template:Sfn

In 2019, the non-binary they was added to Merriam-Webster's dictionary.<ref name="MW">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="NBC">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="CNN">Template:Cite web</ref>

The first non-binary main character on North American television appeared on the Showtime drama series Billions in 2017, with Asia Kate Dillon playing Taylor Mason.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Both actor and character use singular they.

Acceptability and prescriptive guidance

Though both generic he and generic they have long histories of use, and both are still used, both are also systematically avoided by particular groups.Template:Sfn

Style guides that avoid expressing a preference for either approach sometimes recommend recasting a problem sentence, for instance replacing generic expressions with plurals to avoid the criticisms of either party.

Sources differ about whether singular they is more accepted in British or American English, with Garner's Modern English Usage stating British EnglishTemplate:Sfn and A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language stating American English.Template:Sfn

Usage guidance in American style guides

Garner's Modern American Usage

Garner's Modern American Usage (4th ed., 2016) recommends cautious use of singular they, and avoidance where possible because its use is stigmatized. Template:Blockquote Garner suggests that use of singular they is more acceptable in British English: Template:Blockquote and apparently regrets the resistance by the American language community: Template:Blockquote He regards the trend toward using singular they with antecedents like everybody, anyone and somebody as inevitable: Template:Blockquote Garner also notes that "resistance to the singular they is fast receding" in all national varieties of English.Template:Sfn

The Chicago Manual of Style

In the 14th edition (1993) of The Chicago Manual of Style, the University of Chicago Press explicitly recommended using singular they and their, noting a "revival" of this usage and citing "its venerable use by such writers as Addison, Austen, Chesterfield, Fielding, Ruskin, Scott, and Shakespeare."Template:Sfn From the 15th edition (2003), this was changed. In Chapter 5 of the 17th edition (2017), now written by Bryan A. Garner, the recommendations are:Template:Sfn

Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association

The 7th edition of the American Psychological Association's Publication Manual, released in October 2019, advises using singular "they" when gender is unknown or irrelevant, and gives the following example:<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

APA style also endorses using Template:Pronoun pair if it is someone's (for example, a non-binary person's) preferred pronoun set.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Strunk & White's The Elements of Style

William Strunk Jr. & E. B. White, the original authors of The Elements of Style, found use of they with a singular antecedent unacceptable and advised use of the singular pronoun (he). In the 3rd edition (1979), the recommendation was still:Template:Sfn

The assessment, in 1979, was that:Template:Sfn

In the 4th edition (2000), use of singular they was still proscribed against, but use of generic he was no longer recommended.Template:Sfn

Joseph M. Williams's The Basics of Clarity and Grace (2009)

Joseph M. Williams, who wrote a number of books on writing with "clarity and grace", discusses the advantages and disadvantages of various solutions when faced with the problem of referring to an antecedent such as someone, everyone, no one or a noun that does not indicate gender and suggests that this will continue to be a problem for some time. He "suspect[s] that eventually we will accept the plural they as a correct singular" but states that currently "formal usage requires a singular pronoun".Template:Sfn

Purdue Online Writing Lab

The Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) states that "grammar shifts and changes over time", that the use of singular they is acceptable,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and that singular "they" as a replacement for "he" or "she" is more inclusive:

The Washington Post

The Washington PostTemplate:'s stylebook, as of 2015, recommends trying to "write around the problem, perhaps by changing singulars to plurals, before using the singular they as a last resort" and specifically permits use of they for a "gender-nonconforming person".Template:Sfn

Associated Press Stylebook

The Associated Press Stylebook, as of 2017, recommends: "they/them/their is acceptable in limited cases as a singular and-or gender-neutral pronoun, when alternative wording is overly awkward or clumsy. However, rewording usually is possible and always is preferable."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing

In The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing, Casey Miller and Kate Swift accept or recommend singular uses of they in cases where there is an element of semantic plurality expressed by a word such as "everyone" or where an indeterminate person is referred to, citing examples of such usage in formal speech.Template:Sfn They also suggest rewriting sentences to use a plural they, eliminating pronouns, or recasting sentences to use "one" or (for babies) "it".Template:Sfn

Usage guidance in British style guides

In the first edition of A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (published in 1926) use of the generic he is recommended.Template:Sfn It is stated that singular they is disapproved of by grammarians. Numerous examples of its use by eminent writers in the past are given, but it is stated that "few good modern writers would flout [grammarians] so conspicuously as Fielding and Thackeray", whose sentences are described as having an "old-fashioned sound".Template:Sfn

The second edition, Fowler's Modern English Usage (edited by Sir Ernest Gowers and published in 1965) continues to recommend use of the generic he; use of the singular they is called "the popular solution", which "sets the literary man's teeth on edge".Template:Sfn It is stated that singular they is still disapproved of by grammarians but common in colloquial speech.Template:Sfn

According to the third edition, The New Fowler's Modern English Usage (edited by Robert Burchfield and published in 1996) singular they has not only been widely used by good writers for centuries, but is now generally accepted, except by some conservative grammarians, including the Fowler of 1926, who, it is argued, ignored the evidence:

The Complete Plain Words was originally written in 1948 by Ernest Gowers, a civil servant, in an attempt by the British civil service to improve "official English". A second edition, edited by Sir Bruce Fraser, was published in 1973. It refers to they or them as the "equivalent of a singular pronoun of common sex" as "common in speech and not unknown in serious writing " but "stigmatized by grammarians as usage grammatically indefensible. The book's advice for "official writers" (civil servants) is to avoid its use and not to be tempted by its "greater convenience", though "necessity may eventually force it into the category of accepted idiom".Template:Sfn

A new edition of Plain Words, revised and updated by Gowers's great-granddaughter, Rebecca Gowers, was published in 2014. It notes that singular they and them have become much more widespread since Gowers' original comments, but still finds it "safer" to treat a sentence like 'The reader may toss their book aside' as incorrect "in formal English", while rejecting even more strongly sentences like Template:Blockindent

The Times Style and Usage Guide (first published in 2003 by The Times of London) recommends avoiding sentences like Template:Blockindent by using a plural construction: Template:Blockindent

The Cambridge Guide to English Usage (2004, Cambridge University Press) finds singular they "unremarkable": Template:Blockquote

It expresses several preferences.

• "Generic/universal their provides a gender-free pronoun, avoiding the exclusive his and the clumsy his/her. It avoids gratuitous sexism and gives the statement broadest reference ... They, them, their are now freely used in agreement with singular indefinite pronouns and determiners, those with universal implications such as any(one), every(one), no(one), as well as each and some(one), whose reference is often more individual ..."Template:Sfn

The Economist Style Guide refers to the use of they in sentences like Template:Blockindent as "scrambled syntax that people adopt because they cannot bring themselves to use a singular pronoun".Template:Sfn

New Hart's Rules (Oxford University Press, 2012) is aimed at those engaged in copy editing, and the emphasis is on the formal elements of presentation including punctuation and typeface, rather than on linguistic style, although – like The Chicago Manual of Style – it makes occasional forays into matters of usage. It advises against use of the purportedly gender-neutral he, and suggests cautious use of they where he or she presents problems. Template:Blockquote

The 2011 edition of the New International Version Bible uses singular they instead of the traditional he when translating pronouns that apply to both genders in the original Greek or Hebrew. This decision was based on research by a commission that studied modern English usage and determined that singular they (them/their) was by far the most common way that English-language speakers and writers today refer back to singular antecedents such as whoever, anyone, somebody, a person, no one, and the like."Template:Sfn

The British edition of The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing, modified in some respects from the original US edition to conform to differences in culture and vocabulary, preserved the same recommendations, allowing singular they with semantically plural terms like "everyone" and indeterminate ones like "person", but recommending a rewrite to avoid.Template:Sfn

Australian usage guidance

The Australian Federation Press Style Guide for Use in Preparation of Book Manuscripts recommends "gender-neutral language should be used", stating that use of they and their as singular pronouns is acceptable.Template:Sfn

Usage guidance in English grammars

The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language discusses the prescriptivist argument that they is a plural pronoun and that the use of they with a singular "antecedent" therefore violates the rule of agreement between antecedent and pronoun, but takes the view that they, though primarily plural, can also be singular in a secondary extended sense, comparable to the purportedly extended sense of he to include female gender.Template:Sfn

Use of singular they is stated to be "particularly common", even "stylistically neutral" with antecedents such as everyone, someone, and no one, but more restricted when referring to common nouns as antecedents, as in Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent

Use of the pronoun themself is described as being "rare" and "acceptable only to a minority of speakers", while use of the morphologically plural themselves is considered problematic when referring to someone rather than everyone (since only the latter implies a plural set).Template:Sfn

There are also issues of grammatical acceptability when reflexive pronouns refer to singular noun phrases joined by or, the following all being problematic: Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent Template:Blockindent

On the motivation for using singular they, A Student's Introduction to English Grammar states:Template:Sfn

The alternative he or she can be "far too cumbersome", as in: Template:Blockindent or even "flatly ungrammatical", as in Template:Blockindent

"Among younger speakers", use of singular they even with definite noun-phrase antecedents finds increasing acceptance, "sidestepping any presumption about the sex of the person referred to", as in:

Older style guides (not newly published after 2000)

According to A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (1985):Template:Sfn

The Little, Brown Handbook (1992)

According to The Little, Brown Handbook, most experts – and some teachers and employers – find use of singular they unacceptable: Template:Blockquote

It recommends using he or she or avoiding the problem by rewriting the sentence to use a plural or omit the pronoun.Template:Sfn

The American Heritage Book of English Usage (1996)

According to The American Heritage Book of English Usage and its usage panel of selected writers, journalism professors, linguists, and other experts, many Americans avoid use of they to refer to a singular antecedent out of respect for a "traditional" grammatical rule, despite use of singular they by modern writers of note and mainstream publications:Template:Sfn

Grammatical and logical analysis

Notional agreement

Notional agreement is the idea that some uses of they might refer to a grammatically singular antecedent seen as semantically plural: Template:Blockquote Template:Blockquote

According to notional agreement, in the Shakespeare quotation a mother is syntactically singular, but stands for all mothers;Template:Sfn and in the Shaw quotation no man is syntactically singular (taking the singular form goes), but is semantically plural (all go [to kill] not to be killed), hence idiomatically requiring they.Template:Sfn Such use, which goes back a long way, includes examples where the sex is known, as in the above examples.Template:Sfn

Distribution

Distributive constructions apply a single idea to multiple members of a group. They are typically marked in English by words like each, every and any. The simplest examples are applied to groups of two, and use words like either and or – "Would you like tea or coffee?". Since distributive constructions apply an idea relevant to each individual in the group, rather than to the group as a whole, they are most often conceived of as singular, and a singular pronoun is used:

However, many languages, including English, show ambivalence in this regard. Because distribution also requires a group with more than one member, plural forms are sometimes used.Template:EfnTemplate:Example needed

Referential and non-referential anaphors

The singular they, which uses the same verb form that plurals do, is typically used to refer to an indeterminate antecedent, for example:

In some sentences, typically those including words like every or any, the morphologically singular antecedent does not refer to a single entity but is "anaphorically linked" to the associated pronoun to indicate a set of pairwise relationships, as in the sentence:Template:Sfn

Linguists like Steven Pinker and Rodney Huddleston explain sentences like this (and others) in terms of bound variables, a term borrowed from logic. Pinker prefers the terms quantifier and bound variable to antecedent and pronoun.Template:Sfn He suggests that pronouns used as "variables" in this way are more appropriately regarded as homonyms of the equivalent referential pronouns.Template:Sfn

The following shows different types of anaphoric reference, using various pronouns, including they:

• Coreferential, with a definite antecedent (the antecedent and the anaphoric pronoun both refer to the same real-world entity):

• Coreferential with an indefinite antecedent:

• Reference to a hypothetical, indefinite entity

• A bound variable pronoun is anaphorically linked to a quantifier (no single real-world or hypothetical entity is referenced; examples and explanations from Huddleston and Pullum, The Cambridge Grammar of the English LanguageTemplate:Sfn):

Cognitive efficiency

A study of whether "singular they" is more "difficult" to understand than gendered pronouns found that "singular they is a cognitively efficient substitute for generic he or she, particularly when the antecedent is nonreferential" (e.g. anybody, a nurse, or a truck driver) rather than referring to a specific person (e.g. a runner I knew or my nurse). Clauses with singular they were read "just as quickly as clauses containing a gendered pronoun that matched the stereotype of the antecedent" (e.g. she for a nurse and he for a truck driver) and "much more quickly than clauses containing a gendered pronoun that went against the gender stereotype of the antecedent".Template:Sfn

On the other hand, when the pronoun they was used to refer to known individuals ("referential antecedents, for which the gender was presumably known", e.g. my nurse, that truck driver, a runner I knew), reading was slowed when compared with use of a gendered pronoun consistent with the "stereotypic gender" (e.g. he for a specific truck driver).Template:Sfn

The study concluded that "the increased use of singular they is not problematic for the majority of readers".Template:Sfn

A 2024 study by Arnold, Venkatesh, and Vig stated that two-thirds of people used an incorrect pronoun at least once in speaking about someone who used singular they, versus never when speaking about someone who used he or she, suggesting that singular they caused some difficulty, but the rate of errors was low (9%). They wrote that whereas people may repeat a name to avoid using the pronoun they in writing, in speech people used singular they at least as frequently as binary pronouns, "suggesting that any difficulty does not result in pronoun avoidance" in speech.Template:Sfn

Comparison with other pronouns

The singular and plural use of they can be compared with the pronoun you, which had been both a plural and polite singular, but by the 18th century replaced thou for singular referents.Template:Sfn For "you", the singular reflexive pronoun ("yourself") is different from its plural reflexive pronoun ("yourselves"); with "they" one can hear either "themself" or "themselves" for the singular reflexive pronoun.

Singular "they" has also been compared to nosism (such as the "royal we"), when a single person uses first-person plural in place of first-person singular pronouns.Template:Sfn Similar to singular "you", its singular reflexive pronoun ("ourself") is different from the plural reflexive pronoun ("ourselves").

While the pronoun set derived from it is primarily used for inanimate objects, it is frequently used in an impersonal context when someone's identity is unknown or established on a provisional basis, e.g. "Who is it?" or "With this new haircut, no one knows it is me."<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> It is also used for infants of unspecified gender but may be considered dehumanizing and is therefore more likely in a clinical context. Otherwise, in more personal contexts, the use of it to refer to a person might indicate antipathy or other negative emotions.Template:Sfn

It can also be used for non-human animals of unspecified sex, though they is common for pets and other domesticated animals of unspecified sex, especially when referred to by a proper nameTemplate:Sfn (e.g. Rags, Snuggles). Normally, birds and mammals with a known sex are referred to by their respective male or female pronoun (he and she; him and her).

See also

• English personal pronouns
• Gender neutrality in English
• Notional agreement
• Spivak pronoun
• Third-person pronoun#Historical, regional, and proposed gender-neutral singular pronouns
• Neopronoun
• Gender neutrality in languages with gendered third-person pronouns

References

Sources

Sources of original examples Template:Refbegin

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• Template:Cite book; quoted in Reader's Digest, 1983, as an example of its awkwardness when referring to both sexes.
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Bibliography

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• Template:Cite book. N.B.: This is not the English usage authority Henry Watson Fowler.
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Further reading

• Amia Srinivasan, "He, She, One, They, Ho, Hus, Hum, Ita" (review of Dennis Baron, What's Your Pronoun? Beyond He and She, Liveright, 2020, Template:ISBN, 304 pp.), London Review of Books, vol. 42, no. 13 (2 July 2020), pp. 34–39. Srinivasan writes (p. 39): "People use non-standard pronouns, or use pronouns in non-standard ways, for various reasons: to accord with their sense of themselves, to make their passage through the world less painful, to prefigure and hasten the arrival of a world in which divisions of sex no longer matter. So too we can choose to respect people's pronouns for many reasons."

External links

• "Anyone who had a heart (would know their own language)" by Geoff Pullum. Transcript of a radio talk.
• A brief history of singular 'they' (OED word stories, Dennis Baron)