sereshka

Can you say what exactly makes 1, 2, 4, 7, 11, 13 acceptable and the rest "awkward"?

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Кстати, а ты бы как сказала:
"Anyone can scratch their noses" или "Anyone can scratch their nose"?

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В мире, где у подавляющего большинства людей один нос, я бы сказала Anyone can scratch their nose.

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В мире, где один человек может одновременно вести только одну машину, в 1 тогда обязательно 'car', а не 'cars'?

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Мне вариант с car кажется более приемлемым, но cars не вызывает особенного протеста. Я могу аргументировать оба варианта. Надо?

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интересно, чем 2 отличается от 12?

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tasha-dm.livejournal.com

Ээээ, ни в каких?

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это по интуиции или исходя из грамматики?

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tasha-dm.livejournal.com

Из грамматики)

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marmir.livejournal.com

Interestingly enough, Brits accepted this practice significantly earlier than their Americans counterparts.

1, 7, 11, 12 - Yes
2 - Would rephrase to make the noun plural (students)
3, 5, 6, 7, 9, 13 - No, because the sentence suggests that you know the person's gender (even in the case of the anonymous one).
4, 10 - This one is tricky. It doesn't sound right, but is probably OK

Reminds me of the row once in Russian grammar over "общий род", which Akhmatova considered symptomatic of the decline of Russian language.

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- Could you articulate why 11 is different from 10?
- What if the meaning of 2 is "A student is expected to turn in their homework to me today"? Meaning, I am expecting a particular student to turn something in, but I don't know or do not wish to reveal the gender?
- 3,6,8: Is it the perception that the gender information is obtainable in principle? (I suppose you meant 8 instead of 7.) Interestingly, a grammar manual suggests that 3 can sometimes be acceptable.
- 13: If the sentence could be interpreted as being about the paper (journalists, editor, owner, etc.), i.e. about a number of people rather than a single person who wrote the editorial, would the use of 'their' be acceptable?

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In 5, 6, 9, 13 you may be uncertain of the gender, depending on your ability to infer the gender from the name. Would the assumption that you are not sure if the person in question is male or female change your perception of these sentences?

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So, what has your experiment with native speakers reveal?

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It revealed that overall they are fine with singular they, provided there is no other way to phrase the sentence or find the gender of the person in question.

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ikadell.livejournal.com

Whenever you are talking to or about men and women, regardless of the gender.

3 does not work - you know the gender of the friend, or the phrase does not make sense.
5, 6, 9 and 13 do not work - you should know, or you should be polite enough to find out the gender of Dr. Zhu, Frule Mozgol and Prikle Tuffinen.

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So, 8 works, in your opinion?
What if in 3 you know the gender but don't want to give it out? (I personally find this sentence very awkward, but at least one grammar manual says that it may be acceptable, if you don't want to identify your friend.)

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ikadell.livejournal.com

Well, yes, 8 sounds stupid, but it works.
If you don't want to give out, I think it's better to structure it differently: I borrowed the keys from a friend (for instance).

I have seen people use ze. It looks even worse.

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+1
Plus anytime you use the definite article - "the" - you're talking about a specific person, so in that case you would also use either he or she, as in the case of "the politician"

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in #13 I would say "its" as in "the paper's"
Also, for some reason I want to say "a lawyer should listen to his client", not "their"

Edited Date: 2011-04-03 02:28 am (UTC)

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Does the combination "its journalistic ethics" sound right to you? It sounds awkward to me to apply the concept of ethics to a non-person, although the pronoun 'its' is certainly right for the 'paper'. I don't have a big problem with 'their' either, as the paper may be considered as a collective noun, meaning "its journalists".

12 and 2 seem the same to me, unless 2 refers to a single particular student, in which case it becomes unacceptable to me, despite the use of an indefinite article.

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I think it's because an indefinite article is used indicating that it's a singular student/lawyer. I mean, if they wanted to use "their", they should have also used the plural - students/lawyers

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It's interesting that you choose to use "they" to refer to the person who wrote the sentences.

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i actually mean "they" - the people who wrote it :)

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I feel the same way. As long as you can use an indefinite article, there is some room for wiggling. As soon as you know the person, there is no ambiguity. That's why 10 "the donor X" does not work either, although an "anonymous donor" is somewhat acceptable.

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spamsink

3. Как при этом может быть неизвестен пол, неясно.
4. Ну, допустим, пол ЖЖ-френда может быть неизвестен.
6. "A paper" is "it". Therefore, "its findings".
13 = 6.

В остальных случаях все в порядке.
Есть один нюанс - когда they используется в контекстах, предполагающих знание говорящим пола человека, упоминаемого в предложении, оно воспринимается слушателем как очень явное "и не ваше собачье дело, мужчина это или женщина", так что приемлемость будет варьироваться в зависимости от отношения респондента к подобному поведению.

Edited Date: 2011-04-03 12:24 am (UTC)

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Мне кажется, в 6 their относится не к paper, а к Frule Mozgol.

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