密歇根新闻广播 They are还是They is

 

Pronouns are on the front burner of language change at the moment. As such, we get a lot of questions about them.

For example, a listener recently asked if you should say, "They are going to the store," or "They is going to the store," when referring to one person.

Since it's perfectly¹ fine to use "they" in this manner, we need to address the question of whether the verb should be singular.

It's helpful to remember that there are two different constructions for singular "they."

In one construction, gender² is irrelevant³ or unknown. This singular "they" goes back hundreds of years and has consistently used plural⁴ agreement with the verb. You might say, "You should ask someone who knows where they are going." In this example, "someone" refers to one person, but we still use the plural "they are."

This construction makes more sense when you think about the pronoun "you." This is another pronoun that, in most varieties of English, kept the same verb agreement when it took over the singular function in addition to the plural. You can use "you are" to refer to one person, or you can use it to refer to lots of people.

The other singular "they" construction is the non-binary "they." This is the pronoun we use when there's a specified⁵ person who does not identify as "he" or "she" and prefers "they/them" pronouns. With this construction, we tend to see the same plural agreement as the other construction: "They went to the store on their own."

This construction is pretty new and some people may still be getting used to using it. However, as Professor Anne Curzan says, it's important to use the pronouns that people prefer.

"Using people's pronouns is about respect, in the same way that using people's names is about respect," Curzan says. "If someone says their pronoun is 'they,' then that's their pronoun."

The question remains⁶, will we ever start to see "they is" for the non-binary singular "they"? Maybe. It could become a way to distinguish this particular "they" from other uses. Right now though, we tend to see "they are."

However, as Curzan likes to remind us, language changes.

1 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

2 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

3 irrelevant   

adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的

参考例句：

• That is completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion.这跟讨论的主题完全不相关。
• A question about arithmetic is irrelevant in a music lesson.在音乐课上，一个数学的问题是风马牛不相及的。

4 plural   

n.复数；复数形式；adj.复数的

参考例句：

• Most plural nouns in English end in's '.英语的复数名词多以s结尾。
• Here you should use plural pronoun.这里你应该用复数代词。

5 specified   

adj.特定的

参考例句：

• The architect specified oak for the wood trim. 那位建筑师指定用橡木做木饰条。
• It is generated by some specified means. 这是由某些未加说明的方法产生的。

6 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。