FOCUS ON LANGUAGE

Some Peculiarities of Pronouns

There are two original parts of speech – Nouns and Verbs. The label “Noun” historically has its origin from Germanic namon which produced Old English nama. Both naturally had their root in Latin nomen with the meaning “name” and “reputation”. But, in reality, the Latin word is not “primordial” and directly relates to Greek onoma/onuma – name.
Languages naturally tend to shorten words and long ago in their history invented a shorter replacement for nouns. Those alter egos of the noun were labeled Pronouns, which in Latin means a “substitute for a noun” and denote persons and things asked for, specified previously or understood from context. The English pronouns of interest in this article are Personal of the Nominative and the Objective cases and the Possessive Conjoint ones.
And in English we encounter some pronoun peculiarities which we don’t appear in Russian.
Everybody knows that nouns such as “boat” and “ship” take the Personal and Possessive “animated” pronouns “she” and “her”. For example, The Times (May 16, 1996): “The Trevessa [a steamer]… she sank in mountainous seas”. The same of the HMS (Her Majesty’s Ship) “Norfolk”: “…she fired a 21-gun salute to announce her arrival in Cape Town’s Table Bay”. Some grammar books say that the same usage is practiced with such nouns as “plane” and, even in some situations, for “car”.
Of course pronouns for animals follow a different logic. For those animals that aren’t familiar or aren’t considered as “animated”, English uses the pronoun “it”. But when a pet owner (or research scientist) knows the animal’s gender, they often use Personal (human) pronouns “he” and “she” instead. The author some time ago came across such a phrase in the Discover magazine:
“He wants to climb the trees”. The article writer spoke of Jojo, an orangutan and his family. “I see her – down comes a female orangutan with an infant clinging to her”.
When considering the gender of even fossilized beings, they can be referred to by the same “animated” pronoun. Not so long ago, the renowned international science magazine Nature (2006) carried a title “Child of Her Time”. The cover story told of the discovery of new fossils in Ethiopia where a child’s bones were unearthed, dated the same period as “Lucy’s”. (This name was given to the skeleton remains of our female African ancestor from around three million years ago. The name of this Mother Eve is from the Beatles’ song “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”.
And speaking of the sky, what about pronouns for Heaven and the Sun? I’d like to give another interesting example found in a letter of William Cooper (English poet 1731–1800). He wrote in 1783 to his friend John Newton: “Some declare that he [the Sun – as it’s understood from other lines and context] neither rises nor sets/ where he did, and assert that the day of Judgement is at hand”. This letter was reprinted in New Scientist in 2005.
Another Discover issue (June 1995) published Mark Wheeler’s article “Dead End” which gave us rather deep philosophical evidence: “Everything you need to know about Death – and you can bet he doesn’t want to play chess”. The article tells about apoptosis or programmed cell death. And from this example, we can see that at least Wheeler considers Death as a man! The article is illustrated with Mr. Death as a hooded, faceless person in a long cloak with a scythe in his hands.
It’s interesting that the names of countries and cities can also take the pronouns “she” and “her” – especially in a poetic context. I can remember my astonishment when, a long time ago, I for the first time read in Time the line “Israel and her Arab neighbors”.
But such pronouns aren’t attributed to states that are counted “non-living” and, therefore, use “it” and “its.” It is understandable when reading a paper to read after Russia and Russian Federation “it” and “its”, but rather amusing to see printed “The United States and its Army”, for example.
It might be so that this usage of Personal and Possessive pronouns has its origin in historical language development. This tradition is mirrored in our well-known formula “Kiev, the Mother of Russian cities”.
If you look through The New Testament “Book of Revelations” you can also see verses about Babylon (Chapter 16: 19):
“Now the great city was divided into three parts. And great Babylon was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of His wrath”.
And then in Chapter 17:5 the famous and very strong verse:
“And on her forehead a name was written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH”.
These lines confirm the idea of city “animation” in at least the biblical author’s mind. A very important fact, too, is that God is masculine and the pronouns used are “He”, “His” and “Him”.
And last, but not least, two nouns “baby/infant” and “child” should be mentioned. They have the neuter grammatic gender and are substituted with “it” and “its.” That’s why you easily meet the phrase about a crying child: “It cries”. The reason for this is, as usual, historical. It’s known that at first there were only two genders – masculine and neuter. The latter included women, children and slaves. Slaves in ancient Rome were considered as “speaking cattle” and “their” neuter, in this context, makes sense.
Only recently in history were girls and women removed from the neuter classification and formed the feminine gender. It was only then that women got their own pronouns “she” and “her”. But babies and infants have stayed in neuter up to now!
All these considerations and examples might be unimportant since teachers of English have much more complex and interesting problems. But amusing peculiarities are of great value in themselves and if you have some students with any sense of language history or simply with a curious eye they will get a deeper feeling by trying to understand the unfamiliar logic of the English language. And it’s the way to advancement in English.

By Igor Lalayants

NOTES from Erin Bouma on Pronoun Usage in English

Cars. Car owners, if they wish, are free to personalize and name their cars anyway they like. My sister named one of her cars “Lancelot”, so it was a “he”. I’ve also heard of a family car called “Bluebell”, so, most likely, it would be a “she”.

Animals and Pets. If you see an animal or pet that you don’t know, “it” is the most appropriate pronoun to use. “Look at that dog! It looks dangerous!” “I tried to feed the elephant but it didn’t want any peanuts.”
If you have or know a pet or farm animal, you are more likely to use the personal “he” or “she” since you know if it is male or female (and have probably given it an appropriate name).

Babies and Infants. English speakers often approach an unknown baby or very young child by asking, “How old is it?” or “What’s its name?” This is not to offend the parents, but rather a polite way to inquire whether the child is a girl or a boy. Often you will hear the answer “He is four months old.” Or “Her name is Carol.” Then you can use the appropriate “he” “she” pronoun thereafter.
If you see a photo of an unidentified child, you might say, “It’s a beautiful child.” Then again, if you are in a supermarket and some baby (you might not even see it) is crying, you might comment, “Its mother should take it home!”.