gam@amdahl.UUCP (12/19/84)
I am reposting this article because some sites didn't get it,
and I thought it important enough to be read by all.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The following is from "American Tongue and Cheek: A Populist Guide
to Our Language" by Jim Quinn.
The OED says of "their": "Often used in relation to a singular
substantive or pronoun denoting a person, after 'each',
'every', 'either', 'neither', 'no one', 'every one', etc.
Also so used instead of 'his' or 'her', when the gender
is inclusive or uncertain." Also "they", "them", in
the same way.
Amongh users cited, in a tradition that stretches back to the
fourteenth century, are Fielding, Goldsmith, Thackeray,
Walter Bagehot, Shaw, Chesterfield, Rusking, and Richardson.
In no case does the OED call this usage an error.... It
does say the usage is "not favoured by grammarians." But
it refers the reader to grammarian Otto Jespersen and his
defense of the usage. Jesperson mentions that the usage
can be found in Congreve, Defoe, Shelley, Austen, Scott,
George Eliot, Stevenson, Zangwill, and Oliver Wendell
Holmes, as well as Swift and Herber Spencer.
Jespersen points out that if you try to put the sentence
"Does anybody prevent you?" into another interrogative
formula, begining "Nobody prevents you", then "you will
perceive that 'Nobody prevents you, does he?' is too
definite, and you will therefore say (as Thackeray
does, 'The Story of Pendennis', II, p. 260), "Nobody
prevents you, do they?"
...[T]he OED does not say that the use of "they" and
"their" with singular antecedents is "a grammatical
error." The OED does not even say that the use is
"considered ungrammatical" (which is the OED's way of
warning readers that though there is nothing wrong
with a usage, there are lots of uninformed people ...
who think otherwise).
The OED simply notes the usage as correct.
I add From "The Evolution of the English Language", by
George H. McKnight, still more evidents. McKnight notes
that Richard Grant White, in "Every-day English",
complains about the fact that the British quite often
combine "them" and "their" and "they" with singular
antecedent, and adds:
The kinds of "misuse" here condemned in
American use, in British use are established
not only by long tradition but by current
practice. The awkward necessity so often
met with in American speech of using the
double pronoun "his or her" is obviated by
the "misused" of "their"....
McKnight then gives a long list of quotes illustrating
this point: Jane Austen, Thomas De Quincey, Matthew
Arnold, Cardinal Newman, James Stephens, Frank Swinnerton,
Lord Dunsany, Samuel Butler in "The Way of All Flesh",
and A. E. (Jane Austen, "Mansfield Park": "nobody put
themselves out of the way"; James Stephens, "The Crock
of Gold": "everybody has to take their chance.")
I have spent a long time on this single construction, but
I want to be very plain about this. If you go away from
this book with none of your cherished opinions about good
English changed, at least you must recognize there is NO
justification for attacking the use of plural pronouns
with singular antecedents when the sex is uncertain or
mixed. For example, says Bergen Evans:
Only the word "his" would be used in "every
soldier carried his own pack", but most people
would say "their" rather than "his" in
"everybody brought their own lunch". And it
would be a violation of English idiom to say
"was he?" in "nobody was killed, were they?"
The use of "they" in speaking of a single
individual is not a modern derivation of classical
English. It is found in the works of many
great writers including Malory ....
And another list, all of which we have heard before.
Again, from the OED: "The pronoun referring to 'every one'
[sometimes written as one word] is often plural: the
absence of a singular pronoun of common gender rendering
this violation of grammtical concord sometimes necessary."
--
Gordon A. Moffett ...!{ihnp4,hplabs,sun}!amdahl!gam
37 22'50" N / 121 59'12" W [ This is just me talking. ]