daemon@decwrl.UUCP (03/01/84)
From: akov68::boyajian
Prentiss Riddle points out that my statement regarding a generic "she"
in German is not true. Well, not *exactly*. What I should have made clear, and
apparently didn't is that *sie* is not a third person *singular* generic pronoun
but is *the* third person plural pronoun (which, since it does not have gender,
is generic). So *sie* means either "she" or "they". I think that despite this
minor correction, my argument stills hold water. Making a analogy in English,
the situation of *sie* as "she/they" would be as if "he" were used as the third
person plural instead of "they". I'm sure that if this were true, there would be
just as much of a row put up by the anti-sexist language people as there cur-
rently is about the singular generic "he".
Second of all, while it's true that *Sie* (formal "you") and *sie*
("she/they") are two different words (capitalization in German makes for differ-
ent words), I've been saying the same thing about "he" (masculine) and "he"
(generic).
At any rate, I thank Prentiss for pointing out the flaw in my statement
and thereby offering me the chance to clarify it.
--- jayembee
(Jerry Boyajian, DEC Maynard)
UUCP: (decvax!decwrl!rhea!akov68!boyajian)
ARPA: (decwrl!rhea!akov68!boyajian@Shasta)