Gendered languages question

[Drunknsubmrnr]

Now that it’s almost Fire pit season in NJ I have a question I have thought about it and I have to say I have no idea.

How do gendered languages like French or Spanish work with transgendered people?

[Sukhoiman]

as french speaker, i dont quite understand what you mean.

As in with il/elle/on (he, she, one/you) pronouns and their conjugation?

Nothing changes there, if one of those 3 feels/deemed unsuitable, I guess new ones can be made in whichever context

When we say "gendered" language, it often refers to regular nouns either being masculine or feminine....but thats all upstream and baked in for this matter.

The problem arises (pretty stupidly) when you try to essentially do something androgynous like parts of "the left" pushed with "latinx" as they felt latino vs latina distinction was something bad to have.

[Drunknsubmrnr]

I definitely thought “Latinx” but I also meant “Il/elle” or whatever other pronouns are involved. Perhaps the elusive “Lui” which doesn’t seem to be used much in either Alberta high school French or in anglophone/bilingual CF units.

[Sukhoiman]

Off the bat, I would say "on" (one) probably easiest existing one to use if one doesnt want to use il or elle....it gets conjugated same way and doesn't imply any gender..it is a broad pronoun though and probably sounds weird since it often carries plural collective meaning like they/we etc.

Though maybe my hunch proves correct a new one basically gets put in along with il/elle/on...from google:

The French pronoun for transgender and non-binary individuals is often
iel, a gender-neutral alternative to the traditional il (he) and elle (she). "Iel" is a neopronoun that has been adopted by the transgender community, but it is not universally accepted and its use remains a topic of debate, though it has been included in online editions of some dictionaries like Le Robert. For those who are not transgender, the specific pronouns will depend on the individual's gender identity (il or elle), though it's always best to ask the person directly which pronouns they prefer

Basically I haven't kept up with it....so I learned something looking it up just now heh.

"lui" I always learned as him/her (rather than he/she).... which one it is is contextual, so I guess nothing changes in use if transgender either...

same with things like chez-lui and chez-elle where english would be "his/her place" though it directly translates to him/her place (i.e you can get away with not using a possessive sometimes like English always does and has its foible in reverse with her and hers, there is just his and his).

I forget what this is called...when elle has to be used instead of lui like in chez-elle for (at) her place....but all other times lui is fine for her too.

[gral]

Now that it’s almost Fire pit season in NJ I have a question I have thought about it and I have to say I have no idea.

How do gendered languages like French or Spanish work with transgendered people?

Some people have been trying to reintroduce the neutral gender in Portuguese. For personal pronouns, they have invented 'elu'(Portuguese has 'ele' -> 'he', and 'ela' -> 'she', but no 'it'), and for suffixes, they adopt 'e' in the end of substantives and adjectives(stereotypical male gender suffix in Portuguese is '-o',the corresponding female one is '-a' - for example, 'advogade', instead of the correct forms 'advogado/advogada'('lawyer/barrister', in male and female forms). They tried using '-x' as a suffix(like in "latinx'), but it doesn't work in Portuguese, so they adopted the '-e'.

I hold these people in contempt, but they are trying to change the language.

[Nik_SpeakerToCats]

Been a life-time, but the last rudiments of my School French (*) would suggest 'On' as 'safe-enough'.

Similarly, after wary excavation of soul crop marks left by my scant School Latin, IIRC, there's a 'Non Personal' conjugation for 'You'.

Some local dialects, such as around here, may employ 'Youse' in like manner...
'Folks' being 'silly', 'Guys' potentially insulting three ways, four if mis-heard etc etc
--
*) Although both my parents were 'passably polyglot', I was not.
I really, really wanted to do Spanish at school, but was flagged as 'Bright Enough' to do French and Latin.
Both of which, despite 'fair' application, I duly failed.
Did some German translation at Uni, casting classic Organic syntheses crafted in hyper-terse Gothic Fractur from 'post-fix' to 'in-fix'.
Triple-plus Un-good.
Upside, that experience primed me for learning BASIC some years later, briskly combing out 'spaghetti code'...

[Jotun]

In Germany, there is a neuter pronoun, but it is used for things. So that one simply isn‘t used for persons. Think "It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again."

There have been attempts to introduce the Swedish "hen" for nonbinary persons but so far it hasn‘t caught on.

[Micael]

In Germany, there is a neuter pronoun, but it is used for things. So that one simply isn‘t used for persons. Think "It puts the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again."

There have been attempts to introduce the Swedish "hen" for nonbinary persons but so far it hasn‘t caught on.

Given that virtually every Swede understands English I have, ever since someone came up with ”hen”, been irritated that they couldn’t have come up with a better word that doesn’t mean a type of poultry in English. It would have been better to copy English practice instead and use ”de” (they).

[David Newton]

They tends to be used for situations where the sex is unknown.

A distinctly less polite formulation sometimes used to insult activists is to refer to them as it.

[Nik_SpeakerToCats]

IIRC, there's mid-century regional option to refer to all and sundry as 'Ducky'.

I cannot find a sufficiently credible derivation, most being variously insulting, but the least rude seem a diminutive of 'Duke / Duchess'.

This would derive from era when there were a lot of variously impoverished European 'lesser' nobility uprooted by Central European conflicts. When you literally could not skeet a coaster across bar / coffee-house without scattering several penniless princes, a duke or two...