AFSCME 3357-HOF'S BLOG

Coming Soon - the report of my testdrive of the 2004 Toyota Prius


Grammatical Anarchy! - What do you use for gender-neutral possessive pronouns?

Way back in the early part of the last quarter of the twentieth century, I was taught to use his or hers as a possessive personal pronoun when the gender of the person is not known. Within the past 10 years, the plural, but neutral pronoun "their" was adopted. That always bothered me, because it was drilled into me that pronouns should always agree in subject and number. Now, it appears that the pendulum is swinging back the other way. The Chicago Manual of Style has backed off its advocacy of "their". What does U-Chi propose instead? Er, Um, well. . . Find out with the link below.





Chicago Manual of Style - Q & A - Pronouns