GENDER-NEUTRAL LANGUAGE IN STATUTORY, OFFICIAL AND LEGAL DOCUMENTS
The feasibility of this Project is founded on the belief that if you take care of the pronouns, the
nouns will follow and take care of themselves. We explain is needed by adopting the following
definitions:
Gender-specific pronouns are 'he, him, his'.
Gender-inclusive pronouns are 'he or she', 'him or her', 'his or hers' (or he/she, him/her, his/hers)
Gender-neutral language entirely avoids these pronouns, and documents are expressed more
appropriately, and elegantly too, for statutory, official and legal purposes, in impersonal language.
The Historical Background
There used to be a commonly-held belief, which still exists in some places, that the use of gender-specific
language is sanctified in grammatical usage because its origin is lost in the mists of time. This belief is
historically erroneous. That usage was first introduced only by the Interpretation Act of 1850, but even
then it was not officially authorized for every sort of document, because its stated purpose was simply 'for
shortening the Language used in Acts of Parliament'. The same provision was re-enacted or renewed in
1889 and 1978, and the most recent version stated that 'In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears
… words importing the masculine gender include the feminine'. This meant that only the pronouns 'he /
him / his' were used throughout, so that the 'specified' gender was male. This usage was adopted with
enthusiasm (though without the presumed legal justification) by many organizations until quite recently,
and has remained unchanged in numerous documents ever since.
Before 1850, people were much more relaxed about their pronouns, and there are instances in earlier
literature, including Shakespeare, of 'they' being used to refer to a single person.
Nowadays increasing numbers of people regard the gender-specific usage as reprehensible. To replace it,
some have adopted supposedly preferable 'he or she' (sometimes 's/he') phrases which certainly exemplify
the intended gender-inclusive style, though rigid traditionalists are inclined to view these as undesirably
clumsy, and some criticize them as sloppy. But the most valid reason for rejecting that usage is that it
comes with the unfortunate connotation that the female presence must be mentioned in order to dispel any
doubt over whether the particular document applies to women as well as to men.
In recent years there has been a call for the repudiation of gendered pronouns in all cases when it is wished
to refer to people without discrimination. This has been done in the past, analogously, by avoiding
mention of skin colour, except when there is, unusually, some compelling reason for it. This move towards
gender-neutral language made a positive leap when on 8th March 2007 (Women's Day) the following
report appeared in Hansard:
The Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. Jack Straw): For many years the drafting of primary
legislation has relied on section 6 of the Interpretation Act 1978, under which words referring to the masculine
gender include the feminine. In practice this means that male pronouns are used on their own in contexts where a
reference to women and men is intended, and also that words such as chairman are used for offices capable of being
held by either gender. Many believe that this practice tends to reinforce historic gender stereotypes and presents an
obstacle to clearer understanding for those unfamiliar with the convention. I have worked with colleagues in
Government to secure agreement, that it would be right, where practicable, to avoid this practice in future and,
accordingly, Parliamentary Counsel has been asked to adopt gender-neutral drafting.
From the beginning of next Session, Government Bills will take a form which achieves gender-neutral drafting so far
as it is practicable, at no more than a reasonable cost to brevity or intelligibility. This policy already applies to tax
law rewrite Bills and is consistent with the practice in many other jurisdictions in the English-speaking world.
Since then the policy has been somewhat randomly implemented, perhaps partly because Parliamentary
Counsel has received no clear guidance on what is to be defined as gender-neutral drafting. On 12th
December 2013 there was a debate in the House of Lords at which the Spokesperson for the DCMS
assured the Lords that the government believes 'that gender-neutral drafting is perfectly compatible with
[the] objective' of 'producing high-quality legislation that is clear, accessible and free from ambiguity'.
Towards Best Practice – Guidelines for Implementation (some hints on how to do it)
We are aiming to reflect the population as a whole – in which the numbers of women and men are moreor-less equal. Strictly gender-neutral language will provide a standard of impersonal expression
appropriate for the statutory and other official documents under consideration. This approach is bound to
entail total reconstruction of a few sentences in order to sidestep the need for gender-specific pronouns,
without detriment to the sense — but it seems likely that the process will soon become automatic.
Adjustment of the pronouns alone will effectively ensure that every statutory or legal document will apply
to each citizen without question. Implementation can be achieved in several complementary ways:
(1) In a surprising number of cases, a gender-specific pronoun can be replaced by 'a', 'the', 'this' or 'that';
(2) References to people in the singular can be turned to the plural;
(3) Sentences with an active verb can be turned into the passive form;
(4) Non-subjective terms can be adopted, such as 'one', 'individual', 'person';
(5) It may be possible to omit the pronoun altogether, or (occasionally) the phrase containing the pronoun;
(6) The sentence can be inverted so as to use 'who' instead of the conditional 'if [the person]';
(7) A present or past participle may be used to change the sentence slightly.
Note that sometimes one can substitute the pronouns THEY, THEM, THEIR (as people do, colloquially,
in speaking). Before 1850, this usage was quite common and examples occur in various writers of
standing, including Shakespeare1. However, the usage is controversial to the extent that there remains a
hard core of entrenched grammarians who still believe it to be prohibited – though its future adoption
seems irreversible, according to Fowler 2. It can only be satisfactorily used when the drafter is highly
skilled, and consequently this alternative will be discussed separately in an Appendix. If the proposed
readers are likely to object, the change must be made in another way until people have had time to get
accustomed to this development — analogous with the situation in the past when 'you' superseded 'thou'.
A E L Davis Ph.D.
08/03/17
1
2
Oxford English Dictionary (second edition 1989), Vol. XVII.
Fowler's Modern English Usage, revised 3rd edition by R W Burchfield, 2004 (p.776-9).
[email protected]