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In English grammar, singular they (or generic they) is the use of the pronoun they and its inflected forms (them, their, etc.) with grammatically singular antecedents, often of indeterminate sex and/or number:
If anyone claims this seat is theirs, tell them theyll have to show their reservation.
Those who support use of the singular they claim historical precedents from literature; however, it can be noted that some claimed precedents are from a period before the standardization of modern English (before 1800), or follow a grammatical rule, whereby singular indefinite antecedents (such as everyone, anyone, no one, all etc.) in a clause which do service as plurals, are followed in a coordinate or independent clause containing the plural pronoun 'they'. The singular they, although technically a plural pronoun, can be justified in those circumstances when an indefinite number is signified by an indefinite singular antecedent.
All other modern uses appear to be driven by the needs of gender neutral English specifically where English's syntactically singular third-person personal pronouns are all either gender-specific (he and she and their inflected forms) or inappropriate for reference to people (it and its inflected forms), singular they has also come to be used in cases of a non-specific referent of unknown sex (as in "A child becomes an adult when they turn 18"), as well as sometimes in cases of a non-specific referent of known sex (as in "Each player on the boys' basketball team has had their physical"), or of a specific referent of unknown sex (as in "Someone called for you, but they didn't leave a message"). Many speakers object to some or all of these uses as producing what they feel are awkward sounding sentences.
Despite its name, singular they is a plural pronoun in that it takes the same verb forms as plural they; for example, "The person you mentioned, are they coming?", not *"[…] is they coming?". (This is analogous to the pronoun you, which originally was only plural, but eventually came to be used as a singular pronoun as well — first as a mark of respect, and later in all cases — and which uses the same verb forms in all uses.) Further, the plural reflexive form themselves is often used for singular they as well, though many speakers use the singular form themself, especially with semantically singular they. (This development was irrelevant in the case of you, since yourself was already in use as a plural when you developed its singular senses.)
It has been argued that singular they responds as much to the semantic category of genericness as it does to either number or indeterminate gender. Thus, even if the gender is known, it might be used when a generic, as opposed to individuated, real referent is mentioned; for example: “A teenage boy rarely thinks about their future.”[1][2]
Many writers have criticised this usage on various grounds. Michael Newman, however, claims singular they has a centuries-long history of use. He cites examples from the works of several notable authors, the earliest taken from manuscripts of The Canterbury Tales, circa 1400.[3] Other examples include the following.
Ed. J.A. Simpson and E.S.C. Weiner. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989. OED Online Oxford University Press. Accessed June 11, 2006.
There's not a man I meet but doth salute me / As if I were their well-acquainted friend — Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors, Act IV, Scene 3, 1594
Arise; one knocks. [...] Hark, how they knock! — Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene 3, 1599
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Tis meet that some more audience than a mother, since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear the speech. — Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act III, Scene 3, 1600–1602
A person cannot help their birth. — Thackeray, Vanity Fair, 1848
Matthew 18:35 is a famous example of a classic plural they following a distributive pronoun.[4] Some early translations into English are:
So lyke wyse shall my hevenly father do vnto you except ye forgeve with youre hertes eache one to his brother their treaspases. — Tyndale's Bible, 1526
So likewise shall mine heauenly Father doe vnto you, except ye forgiue from your hearts, eche one to his brother their trespasses. — The Geneva Bible, 1587
So likewise shall my heauenly Father doe also vnto you, if yee from your hearts forgiue not euery one his brother their trespasses. — King James Bible, 1611
These examples prove that they is plural not singular in such usages. As can be seen from the interpolation below,[5] these literal translations copy the Greek which has plural they (αυτων). Personal pronouns, that have distributive pronoun antecedents like each, frequently have plural grammatical markers in many languages. The linguistic effect of distribution is to cause semantic, syntactic and logical ambivalence with regard to grammatical number.
Likewise, Newman's first example above only demonstrates the uncontested fact that the reflexive pronoun can be used with a singularizing suffix to agree with the singularizing force of the distributive pronoun each.[6] The ambivalence of English in cases involving distributive constructions is also demonstrated by Nelson's famous, "England expects that every man will do his duty" – distributive antecedent with singular pronoun. Hence the acceptability of the following four analogous constructions to Caxton's "Eche of theym sholde … make theymselfe redy.":
In the example from Hamlet, Shakespeare uses singular they for a referent of indefinite number (it refers both to a mother, namely Hamlet's mother, and to mothers in general) even though the gender cannot be in doubt. Similarly, the example from The Comedy of Errors also involves indefinite number.[7] Romeo has two lines between the friar's "one knocks" and "how they knock", also Juliette's nurse, who enters, is accompanied by her servant Peter in a previous scene, which reduce the value of that example.[8] The examples from the Bible are all cases of indefinite number, as each and every presume more than one brother.[9] Only Thackeray provides a plausible example of a use of they to communicate indefiniteness with regard to gender, though the context makes it a very interesting choice of pronoun:
"It can't be true what the girls at the Rectory said, that her mother was an opera-dancer--" "A person can't help their birth," Rosalind replied with great liberality. "And I agree with our brother, that as she is in the family, of course we are bound to notice her." [Emphasis added.][10]
However, the Oxford English Dictionary does provide other, and clearer, examples.
Singular they retains this implication of indefinite reference, and is most commonly used with indefinite referents such as someone, anyone, everyone, and no one, where the reference is not to one particular person but to a large group taken one at a time, causing influence from this implied plural (as also sometimes with singular collective nouns, e.g. "The XZ Mining Company say that they are unwilling to make an exception for one newspaper reporter."). The motivation for this can be clearly seen in:
I would have everybody marry if they can do it properly. — Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, 1814
That's always your way, Maim – always sailing in to help somebody before they're hurt. — Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, 1884
Caesar: No, Cleopatra. No man goes to battle to be killed. Cleopatra: But they do get killed. — George Bernard Shaw, Caesar and Cleopatra, 1901
Few people today would easily use he where Shaw used they, but according to traditional grammar, phrases like no man and everybody are grammatically singular, and therefore cannot have plural pronominal coreferents. Semantically, however, they refers to the men who are killed, just as Austen's singular everybody refers to the people who get married.
The use of masculine generic nouns and pronouns in written and spoken language has decreased since the 1960s (Pauwels 2003, p. 563). In a corpus of spontaneous speech collected in Australia in the 1990s, singular they had become the most frequently used generic pronoun (op. cit., p. 564). The increased usage of singular they may be at least partly due to an increasing desire for gender-neutral language; while writers a hundred years ago might have had no qualm using he with a referent of indeterminate gender, writers today often feel uncomfortable with this. One solution in formal writing has often been to write he or she, or something similar, but this is condemned as awkward when used excessively , overly politically correct,[11] or both.
In certain contexts, singular they may sound less obtrusive and more natural than generic he, or he or she; Huddleston and Pullum (2005, p. 104) give the following example:
Nobody in their right mind would do a thing like that.
The alternative formulation ("Nobody in his right mind […]") "now seems inappropriate to a large proportion of speakers, who systematically avoid the use of he in such contexts" (loc. cit.).
Today, some grammar and usage guides that have accepted singular they state[12] that singular they can only be used to refer to an indeterminate person, but not to a person identified as a particular individual, even if that person's gender is unknown. For example, one might say "A person might find themself in a fix" but not *"Dr. Brown might find themself in a fix." In the latter case, the most usual thing to do is to recast the sentence in the plural ("Doctors might find themselves […]"), second person ("If you're a doctor, you might find yourself […]"), or sometimes reflexive ("One might find oneself […]"). Singular they is occasionally used to refer to an indeterminate person whose gender is known, as in "No mother should be forced to testify against their child", or two of the three Shakespeare quotations above.
However, this usage is controversial. Some grammarians (e.g., Fowler 1992, pp. 300–301) continue to view singular they as grammatically inconsistent, and recommend either recasting in the plural or avoiding the pronoun altogether. Others say that there is no sufficient reason not to extend singular they to include specific people of unknown gender, as well as to transgender or intersexual people who do not identify exclusively with one gender or the other.[13][14] As discussed in detail at the references and external links below, current debate relates to wider questions of political correctness and equal rights. The extent to which language influences thought may also be an important factor.
Australia is one of the few places in the English-speaking world to officially sanction its use in publishing and academic contexts.[15] In particular, the Australian Government officially encourages its use in publications as a gender-neutral alternative to "he or she".
While usage is now widespread in most circles in terms of gender-indeterminate antecedents, usage of singular they with gender-determinate antecedents is not overly common, and is still seen by most grammarians as problematic, as it can cause confusion; in the case of the sentence "A man said they needed to use my phone" it is hard to see that "they" refers to the man — it might more easily refer to a third party. One study indicated that when used with a gender-determinate antecedent, reading time of singular they increases significantly, indicating that use in this situation can be confusing.[16] In these situations, most style guides recommend seeking an alternative to avoid confusion.
For a variety of approaches to this problem as used in other modern languages, see Gender-neutral pronoun.