Posted on 11/18/2021 12:08:06 PM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
PARIS (AP) — It’s a neutral pronoun that’s proving anything but: A nonbinary pronoun added to an esteemed French dictionary has ignited a fierce linguistic squabble in the country.
Le Petit Robert introduced the word “iel” — an amalgamation of “il” (he) and “elle” (she) — to its online edition last month. While the term is gaining currency among young people, it is still far from being widely used, or even understood, by many French speakers.
Though at first the change went mostly unnoticed, boisterous debate broke out this week in a nation that prides itself on its human rights tradition but that also fiercely protects its cultural heritage from foreign meddling. In one camp are the traditionalists, including some political leaders, who criticize the move as a sign that France is lurching toward an American-style “woke” ideology. In the other is a new generation of citizens who embrace nonbinary as the norm.
“It is very important that dictionaries include the ‘iel’ pronoun in their referencing as it reflects how the use of the term is now well accepted,” said Dorah Simon Claude, a 32-year-old doctoral student who identifies as “iel.”
“It is,” they added, “also a way of confronting the Academie Francaise that stays in its conservative corner and continues to ignore and scorn users of the French language.”
Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer is not in the same camp. He went to Twitter on Wednesday to say that “inclusive writing is not the future of the French language.” The 56-year-old former law professor warned that schoolchildren should not use “iel” as a valid term despite its inclusion in Le Robert, seen as a linguistic authority on French since 1967.
(Excerpt) Read more at apnews.com ...
I can’t keep up. They should start a weekly update on verboten words.
The Jacobins only attempted to change the Calendar.
Today’s radicals want to change language itself.
“It is very important that dictionaries include the ‘iel’ pronoun in their referencing as it reflects how the use of the term is now well accepted,” said Dorah Simon Claude, a 32-year-old doctoral student who identifies as “iel.”I
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Well, of course “iel” would think that. Change everything to accommodate “iel”. I have always wondered if this stuff was going on in other languages.
From the article at the link:
“In Greece, where all nouns have not two, but three possible genders, there is no official nonbinary pronoun, but groups who support them suggest using “it.””
_Somebody_ gets _it_.
I have been calling those “things” It for a while now!
Idiocy.
”On” as in, “On dit” translates as “One says.”
This should be fun to watch! I was wondering what would occur with the romance languages where each noun is male or female!
If you can’t language something it is hard to think it.
That is why some folks here have a lot of trouble dealing with concepts that are hard to explain with specific words designed for that purpose.
And what about the possessives?
Son = his
Sa = hers
and "its"???
Regards,
instead of adding a new one, why not dump the other two?
i hope it causes no end of troubles in general, let alone legal documents...
will misgendering a word become a hate crime?
/Ducking ;)
Would have been most appropriate to use “ill”.
There is only one personal pronoun that works and it’s all inclusive because everybody no matter what, has one.
Therefore by their definition it is gender-neutral. The word is... (drumroll please):
a**hole
Mais oui!
Or is it, may we?
thank you...
Equivalent to our He/she or “shemale”?.................
“It’s a beautiful thing, the destruction of words.”
― George Orwell, 1984
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