The attic idea was not surreally related to the "it" idea. This is.
In many European languages there are two or three grammatical genders. English has the vestiges of this system in having what's referred to as "natural gender" - there are feminine and masculine animate beings and most other things are neuter. However, English doesn't really have grammatical gender at all because the forms of adjectives don't change according to the "gender" of the noun. All we really have are personal pronouns which vary, and that's not a proper grammatical gender system.
Outside Europe there are, however, languages which do divide the world up in a manner quite similar to gender. Bantu languages and their noun classes come to mind, although they don't change pronouns. These include things like animate beings, tools, inanimate beings/plants/groups, things which can cover expanses (e.g. custard, sand and water), kinship terms and so forth. A slightly similar situation obtains in the Far East where Mandarin and Indonesian, for example, count items using different words, grouping them together as drops, pairs, loaves and individual quadrupeds, similar to our own tendency to refer to "head of cattle", "pairs of trousers" and so on.
The closest we really get to gender in English is in our tendency to refer to trousers, scissors, spectacles and other often-paired items in the plural when it can be argued that they are in fact single items. So we then proceed to refer to "these glasses" when there is in fact only one object being mentioned".
It's been noted that referring to objects by different pronouns is very useful because too many "it"s are confusing, so gendered pronouns are in fact quite useful.
This, then, is what I propose:
Invent more genders, possibly hundreds, or maybe just twenty or so, but get rid of "she", "it" and "he". Instead, have categories for things which are small and round, long and thin, masses, occur in pairs, can be placed over one's head, are short-term actions, are jagged and natural, are tools, suggestions or ideas, can be poured over things, are meant to be used to swap for goods and services, and many many more. Give each of these appropriate pronouns, adjectival declensions, distinctive plurals and all the other accoutrements of proper gender. But, do not use gender to refer to gender or sex at all.
This would reduce ambiguity. We would also be able to reuse words which have the same form but give them different genders, as with the Danish word which refers to an ear or a coin and the various other examples in that language. Hence vocabulary could be made smaller without compromising subtlety or meaning.
Imagine a group of people characterisable as tall, short, recumbent or doing the lotus position. Each one of these people could be referred to using a different gender and no confusion would result. It would also be possible for someone to change gender by standing up or crossing their legs, gaining or losing weight or taking off their shoes.
This is what I want, and it would be good.-- nineteenthly, Aug 03 2017 https://www.youtube...watch?v=fGoWLWS4-kU [2 fries shy of a happy meal, Aug 03 2017] // and most other things are neuter. //
Most. Things that, although clearly inanimate - such as ships and aircraft - are frequently assigned a female gender - even if they've been given a masculine name.
// This is what I want, //
Would you prefer a pound for a cup of tea ?
// and it would be good. //
No. No, it wouldn't. It would be very, very bad.-- 8th of 7, Aug 03 2017 Well maybe bad is the new good. Do you not ever feel that English is no fun, what with its boring lack of inflexions and lack of almost everything? All it's got is weird diphthongs and phrasal verbs.
Regarding tea, people seem to have unaccountably mistaken an ink for a drink there, so no, but I'll take the money if you absolutely insist.
When we call a ship "she", we are not using grammatical gender because if we were, the words around it would sometimes also change. We'd end up saying "the redde ship", "the red fox" and "the redde vixen" or something similar. Because we don't do that, we don't really have grammatical gender except that it could be argued that legwear, eyewear and pairs of cutting devices are gendered in the sense that we pretend they're plural. The she/it/he thing is not gender, grammatically speaking.-- nineteenthly, Aug 03 2017 Given human nature this will default to veiled racism and short jokes.-- RayfordSteele, Aug 03 2017 Is "Redneck" masculine, feminine, or neuter ?
Don't explain to us, though. There are a bunch of good ol' boys from Alabama, Georgia* and Mississippi outside, who are eager to hear what you have to say, before they make use of that length of hemp rope they've got tied to the towhitch of the pickup truck.
*They seem to have been separated from the rest of the coach party, and until they can get a flight back to Tbilisi they're happy to partake of any alcohol-fuelled antisocial violence that they can find.-- 8th of 7, Aug 03 2017 // do not use gender to refer to gender or sex at all.... This would reduce ambiguity.//
Those words, also, mean not that which you think.-- lurch, Aug 03 2017 //So we then proceed to refer to "these glasses" when there is in fact only one object being mentioned".//
That would be because there are two distinct glass lenses, so instead of a looking-glass they are looking-glasses.
As for tea... [link]-- 2 fries shy of a happy meal, Aug 03 2017 But how would we refer to two cups of coffee?
A pair of pants, but only one bra. And then there's 'some underwear.' As if we're confused by the pants and not entirely certain what quantitative value should be placed on a single undergarment.-- RayfordSteele, Aug 04 2017 How?
- global english pre-school education programme - ten year subtle embeded ad campaign. - virus with encoded proteins to lend a physical weight to remembering the new genders - or just add a script to the matrix, and reset the big clock.-- wjt, Aug 04 2017 Minima - minimum; bra - brum.-- nineteenthly, Aug 05 2017 random, halfbakery