Are pronouns & pronoun policing really that new?

[secular111]

I've been speculating about this recently. I watched an old episode of Upstairs Downstairs from the 1970s, set in Georgian England between 1903 and 1930. I used to watch Downton Abbey. I've also followed the sci-fi series Bridgerton, set an alternate Regency era (see Bridgerton' is an alternate universe fantasy that sci-fi fans will love).

Watching those shows it's easy-to-see that pronouns really aren't new. Indeed individuals, certainly of the upper classes expected to be addressed by the 'lower' classes in a particular and set manner, at least until the 1960s. Heaven help a parlour-maid if she addressed her mistress with the wrong pronoun, and in Dickens novels, pronoun usage is manifested as a means to ensure the lower classes know precisely who their 'betters' are.

So is insistence on pronoun usage really that new? I posit that it isn't. Whilst demanding pronouns might have declined over the last few decades, I believe the current younger generation are demanding and indeed attempting to enforce their return in an effort to distinguish between themselves and the 'lower classes'.

Ok, it might be snobbery, but it isn't really the New Snobbery that David Skelton refers-to in his book. Rather it is simply a return to an expression of entitlement that was strictly-enforced throughout British history and elsewhere in-the-past.

I doubt that those who insist that pronoun usage be enforced and if necessary policed would be grateful to see acknowledgement that they are simply echoing the classism and privileged entitlement expectation of past centuries. Nonetheless I think such people should receive recognition that they are resurrecting a past tradition that is well-documented in British history.

Oh my!!! He wrote a book, that must make him absolutely correct then after all no-one has ever written a book that is demonstrably proven as incorrect have they?

No, still wrong, still mixing up nouns, pronouns and the use of titles.

Taking an American’s opinion on anything to do with the English language is a bad idea.

There's a lot of shit books filled with misinformation out there already. Did we really need another one? Really?

Good summary there.

If I determine to use the m'lady/mistress instead of she/her

As in;

She went to the library.

became

m'lady went to the library.

or

I think it was hers

became

I think it was mistresses

Would that not be enabling a pronoun to be used as a honorific (a noun) too?

As in;

'I will be referred-to as m'lady'

or

'You will refer to me as mistress'

wtf am I reading? Brigerton is not sci fi for a start. As for pronouns, please go read a dictionary, and put down the glue 😅

Actually, I suspect Secular has misinterpreted the doctor’s work and decided that as modern day pronoun culture might well be functioning like class-based honourifics of old, that means that honourifics and pronouns are actually the same and you can use one term to describe both? So it’s not the Doc who doesn’t know what a pronoun is, it’s just Secular

From the article linked the Doc seems have done a historical deep dive on the gender neutral pronoun and decided that today’s ‘preferred pronouns’ are used less like actual pronouns (generalised short cuts describing sex) and more like honourifics (specific fancy titles describing how fancy and not boring the person is).

Hang-on. Haven't you just made my case for me?

And with a good summary too.

‘preferred pronouns’ are used less like actual pronouns (generalised short cuts describing sex) and more like honourifics

If it was supposed to be a criticism, then I'll take it and say you expressed my argument better than I did initially.

Thank you.

This is hilarious 😂!
Put this on Twitter, I dare you.

But well done to @TheClogLady for working out the source of the OP's misunderstanding.

Not really a criticism, more an interpretation!

if you just stop trying to insist that honourifics ARE pronouns and instead say gender-y people are demanding new-fangled honourifics under the guise of ‘requested pronouns’ your idea makes a lot more sense.

Are they actually used that way in schools ?

Or just in sit coms or soaps about schools? It doesn't seem a very natural way of speaking.

Yeah. No. That makes no sense.

And fyi changing from Queen to King isn't a pronoun thing either, in case you read that wee gem on Twitter. They're 2 different people, not 1 person demanding to be addressed as the opposite sex. 👍

I agree that there is a long history of societies and social groups developing correct/courteous/preferred forms of address. These aren't restricted to the aristocracy and will vary from group to group.

BUT - and it's a pretty big difference - none of these involved actively imposing a fiction that a man is a woman or a woman is a man.

These forms of address are also not pronouns.

Sounds like your book writing man is getting a whole host of things confused and not expressing his arguments particularly well.

I don't think they were used in history to police how people thought about the sex of other people, no.

Yeah. No. That makes no sense.

I feel like this should just be the stock response to all this nonsense.

Sounds like you've got your grammatical categories thoroughly mangled.

There's one single example I remember of historical pronoun usage denoting social status, but I'm reasonably sure it's not what you had in mind. Still... in 18th century German usage, servants were addressed using the 3rd person singular ("er"/"sie"). In contrast, superiors were spoken to in the 2nd person plural ("Ihr").

Lots of academics are idiots who just make shit up. Alas.

The insistence today, to include pronouns in email signatures, and to share your pronouns at the start of a meeting or gathering, is very similar to when people were forced to use the Nazi salute and say "Heil Hitler".

It's a form of coercive control, a form of abuse.

What a load of word salad! You can't just decide things are pronouns because of Bridgerton or something!

Are they actually used that way in schools ?

But yes, @TheLassWiADelicateAir , sir and miss are very much used that way in real schools, not just programmes about schools! Certainly in all the ones I've taught in except the independents. I'm guessing you didn't go to a comprehensive... Doesn't make them pronouns though, whatever the OP says.

The hyphens are worrying too

Can’t anyone spell ‘honorific’? 😢

It’s not ‘honourific’ in any form of English.

"I've also followed the sci-fi series Bridgerton"

If you think it's sci-fi I'm genuinely worried about you op 😆

Although now, gracious reader, one shall amuse oneself, with the thought of Daleks at the Featherington's Ball!

I've just read about this book and apparently he has been on a quest what he calls "the missing word : a third person singular, gender-neutral pronoun". So "they"? As used by Shakespeare according to the blurb (ignoring the fact that it is still used to this day and therefore is not missing)

I’ve stopped caring about spelling or malapropisms on mumsnet - ever since the site updated I’ve found it randomly reloads and deletes fucking everything before I get to hit post.

So while I often cringe at my mistakes, it’s less annoying (to me!) than writing something and losing it.

I tried to style it out by repeating the original mistake on my next post but you busted me

I can sort of understand what OP means. The recent push to enforce pronouns is a performance of dominance/force, a class enforcement. To force people to address obvious men as "she, her", when they are obviously male and will never be anything other than male. To be forced to defer to these people in their preferred identity, rather than acknowledge physical reality.

Similar to historical times, when some people were forced to call other people "Sir" and "Madam", "Lord" and "Lady", and curtsey, bow, dip your cap to them, because of social conventions; even though, in your mind, you were going, "Fuck off you total arse," or appropriate historical words to that effect. But if you don't curtsey/bow/grovel appropriately, you could lose your job and standing in the community, and end up destitute. And the law backed up those it called your "superiors".

Plus ça change!

Compelling people to use specific words when talking about other people in positions of power and influence is as old as the hills. The op has a point in that respect. They just aren't pronouns.