Pronouns in email signature

[thirdfiddle]

I'm sure this has been discussed before but couldn't find a thread. People are talking about getting everyone at work to put their pronouns in their email signature. I really don't like the idea. Why do they want us to do this, and can anyone suggest a good neutral way to answer if asked why I don't?

Hopefully won't come up as immediate colleagues are very cynical and liable to silently roll eyes at any such initiative that gets off the ground rather than enforce it.

Simon Evans uses one/one’s in his Twitter bio.

Yes, I can see this happening in my workplace. It's already started in our public facing departments. I'm not in a public facing department, but I suspect it's only a matter of time. Thankfully my closest colleagues are completely against the idea, so hopefully it won't be forced upon us.

If it is, I'm going with a previous poster and using your majesty.

Fuck that..

I shorten my name to one that is unisex. I dont have to send emails at work but outside of work when I do I never say. Then I wait to see what I get back

I am not sure which poster above said this - and sorry I cannot find it scrolling back - but the point about unconscious bias against female people is so well made. That is a very good reason for not adding female pronouns.

Some colleagues have added their pronouns where I work. I have not and if anyone ever asks me to, then I shall quote research substantiating the above at them. Adding pronouns surely shapes gendered expectations of communications and that is against equality, not for it.

Side issue but the NHS is offering out rainbow badges. Not quite as visible as a lanyard tho....

If I was asked to do this at work I'd ask for what purpose? I generally don't get it. If someone doesn't know whether I am male or female, when I am not in their presence (this is generally when pronouns are used) they can just refer to me by my name it's not difficult.

*genuinely

I saw a very apt term for people like this, which someone on Twitter was using: “the under-deprived”.
I like that term. There needs to be a label for people who've never really experienced hardship or struggles or real issues who want to identify their way into an oppressed class as some societal game of oppression top trumps.

It's an interesting one as working internationally I've got into the habit of using they and instead of he/she said I'd use Jane said as it's clearer.

Then I screw it all up by saying "right guys" alot in meetings.

I think on a signature it's going to look very odd when sent externally to people who don't work in a culture where it would be considered normal to make a point of it

I saw a very apt term for people like this, which someone on Twitter was using: “the under-deprived

That's exactly what it is.

Won't someone think of the plight of the non binary, pansexual , demiromantic????

This came up on my twitter recently via friend's retweet. It's from an academic/research institution. Friend has now added pronouns to twitter bio.

I just thought WTAF?

I’m sorry it took me so long to add He/Him to my bio.

It wasn’t until recently that I understood it wasn’t there for others to know how to refer to me, but for me to support the community that wants others to know how to refer to them.

I find that 'you' works quite well as a pronoun.

I think on a signature it's going to look very odd when sent externally to people who don't work in a culture where it would be considered normal to make a point of it

Absolutely! I got an email with this on a while back and thought "what the fuck?!" It looks really unprofessional

I have retired so this won’t affect me, but I would be tempted to put:

She/him

Or

He/her

Or even

Fu/kof

Whenever I see those She/her preferred pronouns I think of;

She, who’s she the cats mother?!

I think I might be a ‘thou’.

I have a friend who works as a university chaplain, and this is what he puts on his name-tag (which requires pronouns, of course) at student union events.

If you are going to email someone, it’s going to be to them so it’s either going to be their name or you or your. If you are referring about them to someone else, they aren’t going to see it so what the hell does it matter ?

Ridiculous.

We’ve been encouraged to do this too. I haven’t but if compelled will pinch either Xeno’s wonderful suggestion or ‘it’ as suggested above. Thanks mumsnet feminists!

My pronouns are I/me/my.

When you speak to me, please use you/you/your, or thou/thee/thy, if you know how to use that form correctly.

When you're speaking about me in the third person because I am not there, I don’t really care what you use, but third person singular feminine forms will usually cover it.

Yes, how the hell am I supposed to remember the preferred pronouns of 150 students?

It's completely impractical. It would be better just to dispense with pronouns. The whole point is that they aren't really individualised much, if they are going to be individualised, then what we need are names.

One of the GC bio's I saw on Twitter had 'Pronouns: OD/FOD'.

Got to be a Mumsnetter!

Charmap is your friend.

It has Heiroglyphic and Cuneiform, or if you insist on being conventional, Georgian and Ethiopian are also good.

I am gender fluid so mine are he/her.

These ideas are giving me a good laugh at least! Prize to
TigerCubScout for 456321's genius idea of rooting 456321's pronouns in 456321's corporate identity.

Practically just forgetting may be simplest. There is also much truth in the line that reminding people of your sex reminds them to be unconsciously biased against you. You wouldn't put your disability, your age, or your sexuality in your email signature so why your sex?

Stormy: or as gender free, perhaps my pronouns are / .