Are there any gender-neutral or non-binary honorifics?
I've been thinking a good bit about gender-neutral language lately, and I've been making an effort to eliminate unnecessarily gendered language from my day-to-day speech. However, there are a few sticking points for me that I am having a hard time with finding my way around. One of the most difficult for me, having been brought up in the deep south and still living there, are honorifics like "sir" and "ma'am". I use these when addressing pretty much anyone, and it's a habit I'm having a hard time breaking. It's got me thinking about whether there are any good alternatives that would feel respectful of the person I'm addressing while not sticking out too much. If that's not an option (and I suspect it would be asking too much) then what are your ideal alternatives, either neologisms, borrowed from other languages, or just repurposed words that are in current use?
Examples of usage that I would love to replace:
"Yes, sir/No, ma'am"
"Excuse me, sir/ma'am"
"Mr./Mrs./Ms." (I use this less often but still catch myself at times. I also think this one has the best alternative currently in use, with Mx. catching on in some places)
Also, if this question is missing the mark or disrespectful in any way, please let me know. I'm still learning!
Japan's honorifics are mostly gender neutral, and they have a wide variety covering a broad range of different types of relationships.
I only mention it because the thought of everyone in America using Japanese honorifics while speaking English like they're in an anime is endlessly amusing.
It's a funny mental image, but I really think that this is probably a more realistic future than one where we invent gender-neutral honorifics and they actually get adopted. I feel like anime and Japanese culture are popular enough in the US, particularly with my generation and the ones after mine, that there's an actual chance - however vanishingly small - that there's some universe where this happens. It's definitely an amusing thought, babypuncher-san.
John-kun, haha.
I'm not a fan of pursuing gender neutrality in needless places, but I find the idea of playing honorifics hilarious. Calling each other "comrade", or starting off my mass emails with "Dearly beloved", just makes me grin pretty hard.
I'm generally not into policing other people's speech, but having kids has made me realize how much we enforce gender roles in a lot of unconscious ways. I've also been realizing that there are a lot of things I say and do that sort of unconsciously force those roles in small ways on other people, and if I can cut those things out of my speech and writing habits without any inconvenience or discomfort to anybody but myself, I don't see a reason not to.
I like the idea of calling everyone babe or babes. "Hey babes" as I walk into a room of my fellow male colleagues tickles me the same way.
Funny, my close friends and I occasionally do exactly that.
I would love to use "comrade", but like you said it definitely wouldn't play well in the South. Waaay too many folks here are still fighting the cold war.
I get your point about hierarchical nature of "sir" and "ma'am", although I tend to use them in a very egalitarian way. Everybody gets an honorific, not just folks that are in charge. They definitely have some etymological baggage. I've seen people suggest "citizen" as a more U.S. friendly version of "comrade", but that sounds pretty dystopian to my ear (so maybe it is appropriate). I've seen "per" (short for "person") suggested, as in "Excuse me, per?", but that's enough of a neologism that I have a feeling it won't ever catch on. Feels too artificial I think.
Based.
More seriously, (but also definitely nitpicking) to me citizen doesn’t really sound dystopian, more so depersonalized and vaguely robotic.
My main issue with citizen is that it makes everyone who is not recognized by the state explicitly an other. This creates a hierarchy between people who are empowered by the government and those who are not (non-citizen immigrants, for example). It also drives a wedge between many existing governments and their indigenous populations.
That is a fantastic point, beyond just the aesthetic issues that I had with it, that I hadn't particularly considered.
Yeah I think that is what makes it seem dystopian to me. I think it's got a dehumanizing feel. "Comrade" (Soviet associations aside) at least has an explicit denotation of shared membership or companionship that "Citizen" doesn't really carry, to me at least.
It's very clinical-feeling to me, like it's something I'd only expect to hear coming through customs after an international trip, or being addressed as such in a courtroom. Even there it'd be bizarre, but hearing it from, say, a customer of mine? Incredibly off-putting, sadly.
I couldn't see it being anything other than a government equivalent of the tell of a person who's worked at Chick-fil-A recently where they'll reply with "My pleasure" when being thanked.
"Sup, per?" Nah, folk, i just ate. Thanks though.
That was the first thought that came to mind lol
Ha, that is exactly what it made me think of!
I think "Mx" is close enough to what we already use that maybe it's less of a leap. You already have 'Mr.' and 'Ms.', so it doesn't look that odd to add 'Mx.' to a form or something. Plus, I think people are maybe conceptually used to substituting 'x' for something unknown or ambiguous, so it makes sense on that level too. I do think the generally accepted pronunciation isn't great, but that's just personal preference and I have a feeling that if it became common enough it wouldn't sound as odd or harsh to my ears.
EDIT: I meant to include this but forgot, I think Mx also has the advantage of being similar to some other gender neutral innovations that are being adopted pretty widely, like the use of 'Latinx' as a gender neutral form of 'Latina/Latino'.
Comrade has way too much baggage. Still used in China and other “communist” countries, albeit in the local language. Try getting most 1st or 2nd generation non-Party Asians in the US to use comrade would likely not fly.
This is the main thing I have against sir and ma'am, mister and misses, and words we hardly use anymore like lord and lady. The idea that it shows respect doesn't hold water. I can write or say a very nasty sentence and refer to someone as sir or ma'am the entire time and disrespect them in a variety of ways. The real way to show respect is with your other words and actions and those do not require an honorific to work.
You're absolutely right about that, and Southerners are very good at saying the most awful things in the "politest" possible way. "Bless his/her heart" is a stereotype for a reason.
I just have a hangup that is almost certainly due to habit and upbringing that if I answer a question or get someones attention without adding "sir/ma'am" to the end that I am somehow being curt or rude. I doubt other people even notice or care, it just makes me feel like I'm not being polite. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I would love to have an answer to this that was both gender-neutral and didn't have the connotations that "sir/ma'am" have, but I do realize that those things are really just verbal filler and not really doing much heavy lifting in terms of tone or actual politeness. Plus, any substitute that I came up with would most likely end up sounding artificial.
If it's a struggle to find natural sounding, gender neutral, non-hierarchical honourifics, could you look for fillers and/or linguistic workarounds that make you more comfortable in skipping them entirely?
Would you feel less curt saying "Excuse me, can I ask you a quick question?" rather than just "Excuse me", for example? Or "Yes, I'd be happy to help with that" rather than "Yes".
You might have to push yourself to steamroll your way into the second half part until you get used to it, but making a full sentence gives you more opportunity to emphasise a positive and friendly tone, and carry the same meaning you'd been using sir/ma'am for.
This is really good advice, I appreciate the thought you've obviously put into it! I do think that this is probably the best suggestion, both in that it will sound natural and help me feel like I'm not being inexcusably rude to people. I know that sounding polite isn't the highest civic good that I should be aspiring to, but I really do place some value is speaking politely to everyone I interact with, and I've just been really bumping up against how to do that in an inclusive way. I think you're absolutely right that dumping the gendered honorifics altogether and training myself to replace them with some workarounds is probably the way to go.
Unfortunately this word simply does not exist. At this point it needs to be created, which means it will, by definition, sound artificial until one day people forget that it was created. It would appear that sir was created back in the 12th century and so it's been quite some time, but it too was purely artificial at one point.
Personally, I like “boss” but it’s definitely less formal and doesn’t work in every situation where you might use “sir” or “ma’am”. Also calling it an “honorific” might be a stretch, but I do think it gives a casual vibe of “I’m here to help you”.
I find chef similar to boss when responding. "yes chef"
I think I've heard "mix" used as a sir/ma'am replacement in the context of nonbinary bdsm.
I feel like I use “friend” a lot in this context. “Excuse me, friend!” is definitely something I’ve said to a complete stranger.
I actually kinda like this! I think I would feel a little self conscious saying it but it would be better than just assuming a random strangers gender for sure.
Now I'm wondering if I could pull off "Neighbor". Everybody like Mr. Rogers, right?
Friend, neighbour, homie, holmes/homes (I've always spelled it holmes, personally), ese (for the Latinx folx). I'd like to see folk be used as singular, and folks (and change it to folx because why not, need more Xs in words) stay plural.
Can I ask you why you prefer to spell the word "folx?" I've seen that alternate spelling used in some of the circles I occupy online, and I've been a bit perplexed by it - "folks" seems perfectly inclusive to me already.
For me it's simply an ease of spelling. Reducing the amount of characters one has to write or type, especially in the confines of mobile messaging, can help. I don't believe it's about inclusivity, or lack thereof, in online circles, either. I simply think it's done as a means of simplifying the written or typed word. But I cannot speak for others, only myself.
Because that is not how plural works :/ Do you really want more inconsistencies in the English language? Or do you want to change every word with ks in it?
You are correct, that is not how how plurals work. I guess my stance is less change it to ONLY use 'x', and more to allow the use of 'x', as that is the evoked sound at the end of the word.
I think, overall, I want less inconsistencies, but no one is advocating for changing the language to adopt appropriate letter and spelling usage. To simplify the language, we should be utilizing 'k' and 's' more, and 'c' less, even to the point of changing the use of 'c' to something like 'ch'. We should also be looking at words like 'through', ''though', and 'cough', and adopting a more proper spelling to make it less confusing.
Since no one really brings it up as a main topic, though, nothing gets done. No discourse is had, and people move on, but during the learning, will complain about it. Then, the only answer given as to why it's like that is "well that's how it's always been done" or "it came from this word so we aught to spell it like this".
And finally, yes,of course. I'm all for allowing the use of 'x' in place of 'ks'. Why not? To me, it's simplifying writing, switching out two letters for one.
And I'm over here low-key wishing we'd do away with x altogether, although English spelling reform is probably a pipe dream too.
This is all making me want to conlang a gender neutral English dialect with spelling reform incorporated. If only I had the time...Maybe I can come up with some other improvements that will never be adopted while I'm at it.
“Neighbor” is also a good one! I love that and may use it more often. :)
I have input on a couple threads here so I'll do a single summary comment to prevent clutter. :)
Re. honorifics -- you can just drop them. So "may I take your coat ma'am?" -> "may I take your coat?", "excuse me, sir" -> "excuse me". When writing letters you can use "Dear <name>" if you know the name or "To whom it may concern" if you do not. I also start a lot of emails with "Hello, " because fuck it, it's a friendly way to start a letter even if it's not 'correct form' or whatever.
Re. "dude" / "guys", I have also replaced these in my vocabulary with "folks", "peeps" and "y'all" for plural and "friend", "you" or "<name>" for singular. In the UK there is also "mate", meaning 'friend', but I don't use this as much, no reason though.
I just can't use the word y'all without a Southern US accent. I usually just say "everyone," which seems to fit with most situations I use "guys."
I need to try using peeps. I used to say "guys" collectively in both professional and personal settings, but have been working on removing that from my vocabulary. "Folks" has been working well for me in professional contexts, but it still feels really weird to me to ask my roommates "do you folks want to grab dinner?" Maybe "peeps" is what I've been looking for.
Sir and ma'am are so classist. I hate being called sir - I'm not better than you!
My preference is just to call everyone mate
...technically Dr. Is gender neutral too
Also, bonus question. What about "dude"? I mostly use this with my friends so it's less of an issue because I generally know their preferences, but it does sometimes come out in casual conversation. Do most folks consider "dude" gendered? I tend to use it pretty universally, but I don't know if that would bother folks that are trans women or non-binary.
I've mostly managed to cut out "guys" from my vocabulary. I usually use "folks" because it doesn't sound too weird in most settings (especially here in the South) and includes everyone better than "guys" or "ladies and gentlemen" or things like that. I don't know if you could get away with "folks" in other parts of the country without sounding a little backwoods, though.
“Folks” and “y’all” are two of my favorite words.
Isn't this how chicos/as works in Spanish?
That is, indeed, how gender is (supposed to be) applied to number in Spanish. And not just in the case of chico/a, for any pluralisation referring to people, if there are any male members of the group, it's masculine, and feminine only if there are no men. It's a little insidiously sexist.
I don't know if I'd call it "sexist", but it might be evidence of sexism. The good news is a lot of young Spanish speakers are starting to add a neuter gender to their language, though. Like these days sometimes you will find people talking about "les elles" instead of "los ellos" for a mixed gender group of people.
I called it sexist in the sense that an institution is, i.e. it is either a sign of or a means of enforcing bigotry. I have a lot of hope that the RAE will shift their position on the gender issue, but until they do, it's hard overlook that sort of erasure of women being built into the language as it "is supposed to be".
I guess my thing is that linguistic gender is a lot more complicated than just "gender, but for words" and in a lot of cases, has basically nothing to do with the popular conception of what "gender" is, and we don't really understand the nature of linguistic gender very well, or why it even developed in the first place. There are multiple languages that have more than 2 genders, for example, where none of the genders have anything to do with "masculinity" or "femininity". With all that being said, I'm just not comfortable with the idea of making positive assertions about linguistic gender unless there is a lot to back it up.
I understand that line of reasoning, and have one issue with it: if linguistic gender is really so divorced from social gender, why are they conflated along so many lines? Yes, a table is feminine in Spanish despite being, you know, a table, but that doesn't negate that the language's concept of gender is 'required' to agree with the social gender of a person specified. Linguistic gender is not 1:1 with social gender, but, at least in Spanish, it's still clearly tied to it.
I don't want to give the impression that grammatical gender is completely divorced from gender as a social concept. After all, in many languages there is a pretty indisputable relationship. I also think it's worth taking note of how popular use of language makes people feel, and adjust our behavior to always be more respectful and inclusive. I think a marginalized group explaining how the popular use of language negatively impacts their life to a bunch of people who do nothing to address the issues this group brings up is totally an example of institutional oppression. But when "ellos" started to be used to refer to mixed gender groups of people, was it a consequence of that same sort of thing? We just can't really say (although, don't get me wrong, it seems pretty reasonable).
I'm hardly an expert on the politics of the Spanish language, but I'm of the impression that the RAE has been petitioned more than once about the gendering of the language, and have responded by basically invalidating the complaints as hypersensitivity. My original statement regarding the sexist nature of the number/gender agreement issue in Spanish was written with that in mind.
Most trans individuals I know do not consider dude gendered, but some do. I don't think they'll ever be converted, as it just triggers something in their brain that releases the bad juice™ whenever they hear it. With that being said, as you mentioned in a later reply, I tend to fall back to y'all and folks and people and other gender non-specific words.
"Y'all" is the goddam swiss army knife of words and I love it. I don't care about guns or anything, you can take those, but you can take "ya'll" out of my cold, dead hands.
I didn't realize how useful it was until I realized that Spanish (and most romance languages) has a separate second person plural pronoun and standard English doesn't, although we used to...
Former southerner here.
I have lost nearly every southern identifier I used to have in my time away from my home state, but "y'all" remains and always will. It is too useful and too ingrained in my language. I literally can't NOT use it when talking to a group and, as a teacher, I'm almost always talking to groups. :)
This varies greatly person to person. I personally use "dude" and "bro" with my friends regardless of gender, but would obviously honor anybody's wishes who didn't want to be called that. I absolutely see how it could be uncomfortable for AMAB trans or non-binary people, and in that case, I generally ask the person directly if they're uncomfortable with me addressing them like that.
y'all and buddy kinda work. Mr/Ms when used as form of respect for a person though don't have much of a replacement in English. I think that particular custom may just die out over time, but that would probably take generations.
I'd suggest just continuing to use it, but only when addressing older individuals (who expect it). For others, y'all (directed towards an individual and used in the singular) has a bit of formality to it that you could use. This isn't common in the south, but the singular y'all might be an option.
Yeah I think the singular ya'll smells a little of "fake southern" down here. Most people don't actually use it that way in the part of the south that I'm from (piney woods region is what it's called, I think) but it might be more of a coastal thing. I see it more in movies with bad fake southern accents than in real life, and I associate it with non-rhotic southern accents which are increasingly rare, from my understanding.