[Feature Request] "they/them" changed to "they/them (plural)"

Official Memrise Courses Chinese
#1

Hello. I’m nonbinary and use they and them as singular pronouns. (In English, singular “they” came before singular “you”.) Other plural pronouns in the course have (plural) after them in English to demarcate them as such. Every time I encounter “they/them” I have to stop and think a moment, and every time I get a little sad and a little frustrated that you haven’t added “(plural)” to the end.

Could you please add the text “(plural)” after “they/them”? I’m not asking for you to even include whatever a nonbinary singular they would be in Mandarin—I have no idea if that’s a thing yet. I’m just asking for this little demarcation that will help not just me but a lot of people (especially younger people) for whom “they” is not plural in all cases. Thanks.

#2

Hello @jtth and welcome to the forum!

Is this about this course here?

#3

Yes, though I imagine it applies to many courses.

#4

A post was merged into an existing topic: [Course Forum] Mandarin Chinese 1-3 by Memrise

#5

OK. I’ve copied/moved your posting to the course’s official thread (see the link above) which is where Memrise staff should be reading your posting.

Out of interest: how can “they/them” be a singular pronoun (or when was it)?
I’m not a native speaker (although I [had to]read MacBeth et al back in school), but that does sound completely unfamiliar to me, even considering all that thou and thee and the such …
To me, they and them is always plural, so I wouldn’t need any further hint, but I might be totally off, of course.

#6

You can learn more about singular they here: A brief history of singular ‘they’ | Oxford English Dictionary

It has always been singular. It’s a non-gendered animate pronoun. I am nonbinary, which means I am not a man nor a woman, so when people refer to me, or when I refer to myself in the third person, “they” is the correct pronoun. So when I see it as implicitly plural in the course that is both technically wrong (especially when such a demarcation exists for “you”) and personally frustrating, because it delegitimizes nonbinary people in the assumptions of its scope.

1 Like
#7

Thank you!