Re: Hebrew Translation for Debian About Page
Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Jun 2008, MJ Ray wrote:
> > When reasonably possible, phrase things in such a way to avoid
> > assuming gender, or switch some examples, but don't assume that the
> > Sapir-Whorf hypothesis is true or use it to justify the sort of
> > language errors that certain debian-women members advocate in
> > English.
>
> There's no inherent error in using singular they. It may not agree
> with your perception of style or seem awkward to you, but many
> grammarians are on both sides, and singular they has enough traction
> in modern English to be acceptable. As users of a language, we can
> quite easily decide that a single word will fill in for both singular
> and plural pronouns of indeterminate gender. [...]
Simply restating things doesn't make them any truer. There is no
English Academy which can settle this for us. Using the
usually-plural "they" for a singular of indeterminate gender confuses
non-native speakers, as mentioned in the previously-linked thread.
Please read the old thread and bring only new points, or simply avoid
using "they" for singulars.
Regards,
--
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
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