Columns

PLOWE | Don’t Ask Me For My Pronouns Yet

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Gender queer students’ — and especially gender questioning students’ — discomfort in this pronoun-sharing circle might be spared with the instructor’s simple addition of the following words: “if you feel comfortable sharing.” This way, cisgender students who are unversed or uninterested in gender terminology do not have to make a show of having the same pronouns as what they were assigned at birth, and gender queer students will not feel pressure to present their non-conforming pronouns to a room full of strangers. 

Opinion

ONONYE | The Problem With Pronoun Use in Professional Emails

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I never met a person who didn’t refer to themselves with he/him or she/her pronouns until my first semester at Cornell. As someone passionate about gender justice and gender equity, I had previously understood the importance of questioning gender pronouns and identifying individuals in the ways that they wanted. However, my knowledge about pronoun use was very restricted to theory classes, news articles, lectures, TedTalks, Youtube videos and social justice conferences. Meeting students, faculty, and community members who identify with pronouns besides she/her and he/him has challenged me to “check” my own bias and to ask for pronouns (and present my own pronouns) during introductions. Two years later, I am in no way perfect.

Columns

HAGOPIAN | They are the World: What Pronouns Can Teach Us About Political Correctness

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“I think she’s a computer science major.”

“You mean they’re a computer science major.”

“Whatever.”

The above conversation took place between my roommate and I a few weeks ago. To clarify, I used the pronoun she to refer to a mutual acquaintance of ours, and my roommate Troy corrected me, pointing out that the person I had mentioned uses they pronouns. One thing about Troy; he’s a very reasonable person. (Troy if you’re reading this, don’t get a big head. Also please take out our garbage.) After I said “whatever,” he proceeded to admonish me in a very fair and thoughtful way, which was more than I deserved considering how dismissive I was of him.