Two and a half geezerhood after the Associated Pressannouncedit would recognizetheyas a rummy pronoun , America ’s oldest dictionary is following wooing . The Guardianreportsthat Merriam - Webster has officially addedtheyinto its on-line dictionary as a grammatically correct nonbinary pronoun .
Merriam - Webster notes in a blogpostthat people have been usingtheyas a singular pronoun since the 1300s , and cite an 1881 letter in which Emily Dickinson refer to a someone of unknown gender with the pronounsthey , theirs , and eventhemself . The post also mentions that usingyouas a unique pronoun was n’t always consideredgrammaticallycorrect , either : it was born out of requirement , gained popularity in casual conversation , and finally became officially accept as a singular pronoun .
Merriam - Webster does acknowledge that this young program oftheydiffers from how the ecumenical public has most commonly used it in previous centuries . In the past tense , the singulartheyhas referred to “ a mortal whose grammatical gender is n’t know or is n’t significant in the context . ” For case , you would belike say “ Tell each person that they are creditworthy for pick up their own methamphetamine , ” rather than “ Tell each individual that he or she is responsible for cleaning up his or her own chicken feed . ” Now , however , we usetheyto account a person who merely does n’t name as either male or female .
It ’s a much more lineal use of the pronoun , and it ’s this definition that Merriam - Webster isaddingto the be dictionary entry for the wordthey : “ used to mention to a single person whose gender identity element is nonbinary . ”
And with that , “ Do n’t usetheyas a singular pronoun ” has become nothing more than bad authorship advice , much like “ Don’tsplit infinitive ” and these othergrammar myth .
[ h / tThe Guardian ]
