For what it's worth, I agree with what Carol said several messages back. It's what is substantive that counts in the effort to make social changes, not the ritual, symbolic ap-parent changes pointed to by language. What women need is real equality in the job market, in the professions, in education and economically and politically: if all of that exists, being "subsumed" to the male by being included under the pronoun "his" doesn't make any difference. If those important kinds of equality don't exist, then being flattered linguistically by twists in the language that render it less accurate won't do any good.
I don't mind at all being part of "mankind" or being referred to as "he" in sentences, so long as my rights and abilities are respected in the real world, where such things count.
As it happens, my native language is one that does have a neutral singular pronoun--"su"--that avoids having to call women "he" in speech or writing. It would be interesting to do a survey as to whether that linguistic feature of romance languages has done anything to improve the lot of women in those countries where romance languages are spoken. Absent such a survey, I'm tempted to go with common sense: making language--any language--less accurate, as by using plural pronouns for singular items, can't possibly enhance expression, no matter what prestigious writers did it in what centuries, or how old a pedigree the error has: it remains an error. And "his/her" is cumbersome and ungraceful and atrocious; end of story.
Of course, if this forum wanted to use its astronomical joint IQ to better purpose than to cuss and call each other names, we could come up with some neutral singular pronoun in English to operate as "su" does in Spanish. I nominate
"hin," as in "Every member of Eratosphere should exert hin wit to resolve this linguistic problem." Not that anything at all would come of our efforts, but who cares?
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