Wordsmith Talk |
About Us | What's New | Search | Site Map | Contact Us | |||
Register Log In Wordsmith.org Forums General Topics Miscellany Is there a rule?
Previous Thread
Next Thread
Print Thread
Coincidence. While I was away a friend left a newspaper article next to my computer about the shift that's going on in the use of pronouns. Where we used to make a difference between male, female and neuter now the tendency is towards changing the neuter to a gender related pronoun.(for as yet mostly in spoken language) "Het meisje (girl), dat..." (neuter) now often is shifted to "Het meisje, die..." (female). This happens mainly with living creatures.
Quote:
"This counts as well for animals that live close to people, like pets and cattle. All other animals are simply, whether they are male of female: 'he'. Plants and countable items (like objects)
are also all 'he'- a 'he' that in fact is not really male, but just neuter. And non-countable items, such as 'rice', 'milk'
and 'pepper', are 'it' - the pronoun that since the old days
already has a neuter meaning."
Moderated by Jackie
Link Copied to Clipboard
Forum Statistics Forums16Topics13,913Posts229,372Members9,182 Most Online3,341
Dec 9th, 2011
Newest Members Ineffable, ddrinnan, TRIALNERRA, befuddledmind, KILL_YOUR_SUV
9,182 Registered Users
Who's Online Now 0 members (), 381 guests, and 1 robot. Key: Admin, Global Mod, Mod
Top Posters(30 Days) A C Bowden 25
Top Posters wwh 13,858Faldage 13,803Jackie 11,613wofahulicodoc 10,561tsuwm 10,542LukeJavan8 9,919Buffalo Shrdlu 7,210AnnaStrophic 6,511Wordwind 6,296of troy 5,400
Forum Rules · Mark All Read Contact Us · Forum Help · Wordsmith.org