English questions

[jcb]

How often do you call an animal "he" or "she" as opposed to "it"? I don't own any pets, and don't consider myself an "animal person", so I usually call an animal "it", but I've noticed that people who own pets and consider themselves an "animal person" are more likely to use "he/she". So, what is the threshold that makes an animal deserving of "he/she"? Is it just knowing whether it's male or female, knowing it's name, or something else?

[vlad]

How often do you call an animal "he" or "she" as opposed to "it"? I don't own any pets, and don't consider myself an "animal person", so I usually call an animal "it", but I've noticed that people who own pets and consider themselves an "animal person" are more likely to use "he/she". So, what is the threshold that makes an animal deserving of "he/she"? Is it just knowing whether it's male or female, knowing it's name, or something else?

Wild animals are usually "it". Sometimes people refer to wild animals as "he"/"she" in a jokey way. Like if they see a wild animal doing something funny, they might say something like "What's he up to?" (regardless of the animal's actual sex).

I would expect all pet owners to refer to their own pets as "he"/"she", regardless of whether they consider themselves as an "animal person". A pet owner calling their own pet "it" would be bizarre. And I think referring to another person's pet as "it" could be offensive. It makes you sound like Cruella de Vil.

Basically using gendered pronouns "humanizes" them, for lack of a better word.

[Darren]

There's two different things at play for me - 1) the use of he/she to reflect an animal's sex, and 2) the use of he/she as a vague sort of animacy-increasing device. (1) is pretty simple; higher animals with known sex can take he/she, although not invariably, and less often if they're a working animal. I'd call my cat she, but I know farmers who'd call their cats "it".

(2) is more complicated; especially in Australia, he and more often she can take the place of "it" when referring to anything, and I'm not sure how to define their usage. Some factors involved are
- Register - to mark colloquial register, objects or dummy subjects can be "she", which is a sort of AusEng shibboleth
- Gnomic copular statements are more likely to take "she" ("she'll be right", "she's too wide" etc., not referring to people)
- For lack of a better word "higher" (more animate?) things can take "he/she", like animals, cars, boats, cities and so on

(2) can probably overlap with (1), so it's conceivable that even a male animal could be referred to as "she", but not I don't think if it would usually be called 'he".

[Travis B.]

To me 'he'/'she' depends on domestication/petness and how 'high' an animal is but there are no firm rules. For instance most pets to me would take 'he'/'she', but some 'lower' pets like lizards could take 'it'. As for non-pet domesticated animals, 'higher' ones like cattle are likely to take 'he'/'she'. And as for wild animals, they generally take 'it' but 'higher' ones may take 'he'/'she' when used to emphasize their sex or 'high'-ness.

[Travis B.]

It is extremely common to pronounce bury with the DRESS vowel in English varieties, ranging from most NAE varieties outside the Philadelphia area (which also undergo the Mary-merry-marry merger here) to RP. But what about the suffix -bury? For me that also has the DRESS vowel (Mary-merry-marry-merged of course). But what about other English varieties?

[anteallach]

It is extremely common to pronounce bury with the DRESS vowel in English varieties, ranging from most NAE varieties outside the Philadelphia area (which also undergo the Mary-merry-marry merger here) to RP. But what about the suffix -bury? For me that also has the DRESS vowel (Mary-merry-marry-merged of course). But what about other English varieties?

As in place names like Salisbury? For me that's a schwa in citation form, with the potential for complete elision.

The town of Bury near Manchester is, as I understand it, often pronounced locally with the FOOT/STRUT vowel, but non-locals generally use DRESS. Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk also usually has DRESS; I don't know whether locals do anything different there.

[Lērisama]

It is extremely common to pronounce bury with the DRESS vowel in English varieties, ranging from most NAE varieties outside the Philadelphia area (which also undergo the Mary-merry-marry merger here) to RP. But what about the suffix -bury? For me that also has the DRESS vowel (Mary-merry-marry-merged of course). But what about other English varieties?

Bury (St Edmunds) is /bɛɹɪ/ for me, with DRESS, but Salisbury is /sɔːlzbɹɪ/ – I never have a schwa there. I'm not local myself, but various family members are, so I'm pretty sure that's the local pronunciation as well
I always

[linguistcat]

So I was using an online text editor and decided to try their grammar checker. My general thought is it's bad but it did leave me with a question that I'm posing here:

In your dialects or just your specific idiolect, is the word "sweets" used and is it synonymous to candy, or used for more general things?

In my idiolect, while I use the word sweets rarely, it has the meaning of sweet foods in general. So candies, but also sweet pastries, deserts in general, that kind of thing. Sweets = sweet foods. I don't tend to use it for fruit though, that's separate. People I talk to don't seem to bat an eye when I mention not being fond of sweets and giving the exception of anything made with chocolate and cheesecake. That said, maybe they think I'm weird and just don't ask questions.

The grammar checker said that sweets are specifically candy, and only or primarily used in British English. (As opposed to AmEng, they don't have the option for other English varieties).

So, thoughts?

[Travis B.]

Sweets is not really a native word in my native variety of English, even though I hear it in media (e.g. in the British TV I watch). I would normally say candy for candy, and for sweet bakery or pastry I would normally just call it bakery or pastry.

[Travis B.]

It is extremely common to pronounce bury with the DRESS vowel in English varieties, ranging from most NAE varieties outside the Philadelphia area (which also undergo the Mary-merry-marry merger here) to RP. But what about the suffix -bury? For me that also has the DRESS vowel (Mary-merry-marry-merged of course). But what about other English varieties?

As in place names like Salisbury? For me that's a schwa in citation form, with the potential for complete elision.

The town of Bury near Manchester is, as I understand it, often pronounced locally with the FOOT/STRUT vowel, but non-locals generally use DRESS. Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk also usually has DRESS; I don't know whether locals do anything different there.

Allegedly Salisbury has NURSE in GA, but it has merged Mary-merry-marry for me.

[Travis B.]

Of course, my pronunciation of Salisbury could be a combination of spelling pronunciation and interference from bury, since I pronounce the first vowel as TRAP (when even GA has THOUGHT there)...

[jal]

How often do you call an animal "he" or "she" as opposed to "it"?

I think it's quite common in nature documentaries, even for "lower" animals - calling a mother spider "she" for example. (As for me personally, in my native Dutch there's no "it" equivalent one can use, so I sometimes slip up in English, but not often.)


JAL

[Travis B.]

How often do you call an animal "he" or "she" as opposed to "it"?

I think it's quite common in nature documentaries, even for "lower" animals - calling a mother spider "she" for example. (As for me personally, in my native Dutch there's no "it" equivalent one can use, so I sometimes slip up in English, but not often.)

I hear that in northern Standard Dutch the gender system has collapsed from the historical German-like three-way system to a Standard Swedish or Standard Danish-like two-way system, which makes me wonder what about inanimate nouns that were historically referred to with hij or zij ─ what are they referred to with now in such varieties, since Standard Dutch doesn't have anything like Standard Swedish or Standard Danish den? Or were they just referring to the use of de versus het as an article... but isn't that true of all varieties aligned with Standard Dutch in the first place and not just northern ones?

[jal]

I hear that in northern Standard Dutch the gender system has collapsed from the historical German-like three-way system to a Standard Swedish or Standard Danish-like two-way system, which makes me wonder what about inanimate nouns that were historically referred to with hij or zij ─ what are they referred to with now in such varieties, since Standard Dutch doesn't have anything like Standard Swedish or Standard Danish den? Or were they just referring to the use of de versus het as an article... but isn't that true of all varieties aligned with Standard Dutch in the first place and not just northern ones?

I'm not familiar with the term "nothern Standard Dutch". There's Netherlands Dutch and Belgian Dutch, the latter also called Flemmish or Flemmish Dutch, but that's imho a confusing term since it can also refer to the dialects of Flemmish, or even the Tussentaal. Regardless, there is only a single gender system in both Standard Netherlands Dutch and Standard Belgian Dutch, which is a collapse of the original 3-way system like German, grouping feminine and masculine together ("de" words) and having a seperate neuter ("het" words). Except for "het" words sometimes missing an "e" at the end of adjectives, there's not much of a "system" otherwise. Note that in many dialects, there's a much more complex gender system, some of them retaining the old 3-way distinction, including noun cases similar to German. Dutch pronouns have a 3-way distinction in 3rd person singular only: hij (he), zij (she), het (it). For persons, we mostly use "hij"/"zij", but "het" can be used in case it refers to a het-word (e.g. "Ik zie het meisje. Het staat op de hoek." - I see the girl. She's standing at the corner.), though most people will use "hij" or "zij". For objects it depends on the article: "het" to refer to het-words, "hij" to refer to de-words, though sometimes they get "zij" if it's an original feminine word, but since nobody knows the distinction that's old fashioned, except for some groups of people ("government", "comittee") that sometime get "zij" while officially the word is masculine.

So to answer your question: I think what you heard is bollocks, there's no difference in the wat gender is treated in the official language standards of The Netherlands and Belgium, and in both countries the dialects vary in how they treat gender.


JAL

[Travis B.]

I hear that in northern Standard Dutch the gender system has collapsed from the historical German-like three-way system to a Standard Swedish or Standard Danish-like two-way system, which makes me wonder what about inanimate nouns that were historically referred to with hij or zij ─ what are they referred to with now in such varieties, since Standard Dutch doesn't have anything like Standard Swedish or Standard Danish den? Or were they just referring to the use of de versus het as an article... but isn't that true of all varieties aligned with Standard Dutch in the first place and not just northern ones?

I'm not familiar with the term "nothern Standard Dutch". There's Netherlands Dutch and Belgian Dutch, the latter also called Flemmish or Flemmish Dutch, but that's imho a confusing term since it can also refer to the dialects of Flemmish, or even the Tussentaal. Regardless, there is only a single gender system in both Standard Netherlands Dutch and Standard Belgian Dutch, which is a collapse of the original 3-way system like German, grouping feminine and masculine together ("de" words) and having a seperate neuter ("het" words). Except for "het" words sometimes missing an "e" at the end of adjectives, there's not much of a "system" otherwise. Note that in many dialects, there's a much more complex gender system, some of them retaining the old 3-way distinction, including noun cases similar to German. Dutch pronouns have a 3-way distinction in 3rd person singular only: hij (he), zij (she), het (it). For persons, we mostly use "hij"/"zij", but "het" can be used in case it refers to a het-word (e.g. "Ik zie het meisje. Het staat op de hoek." - I see the girl. She's standing at the corner.), though most people will use "hij" or "zij". For objects it depends on the article: "het" to refer to het-words, "hij" to refer to de-words, though sometimes they get "zij" if it's an original feminine word, but since nobody knows the distinction that's old fashioned, except for some groups of people ("government", "comittee") that sometime get "zij" while officially the word is masculine.

So to answer your question: I think what you heard is bollocks, there's no difference in the wat gender is treated in the official language standards of The Netherlands and Belgium, and in both countries the dialects vary in how they treat gender.

By 'northern Standard Dutch' I meant Standard Netherlands Dutch. So the system in Standard Dutch is that there are practically two genders, the de-words and the het-words, except that people are normally referred to by natural gender (hence hij versus zij except for certain words such as meisje which receive het; in this regard it isn't much different from colloquial German) whereas objects are referred to by hij versus het except in a limited set of fossilized cases which receive zij (regardless of their original gender). Am I right here?

[Travis B.]

Do you perceive the vowels in Sirius (and in serious, for those who merge the two) and in tour to be lax or tense? I ask because supposedly in GA the vowels in both of these are supposed to be lax, but I personally perceive the vowels in both of these as tense.

[Travis B.]

Of course, my pronunciation of Salisbury could be a combination of spelling pronunciation and interference from bury, since I pronounce the first vowel as TRAP (when even GA has THOUGHT there)...

It gets weirder. Okay, I tried pronouncing some -bury words (e.g. the title of a Peter Gabriel song) and they have neither my normal NURSE [ʁ̩ˤːʁˤ] nor my merged Mary/merry/marry vowel [ɛ̝ːʁˤ]. Rather they have [ɜːʁˤ], as if I were splitting the difference between NURSE and DRESS. I think of it as my merged Mary/merry/marry vowel, but in reality it is significantly laxer and more central.

[Lērisama]

Do you perceive the vowels in Sirius (and in serious, for those who merge the two) and in tour to be lax or tense? I ask because supposedly in GA the vowels in both of these are supposed to be lax, but I personally perceive the vowels in both of these as tense.

I'm non-rhotic, so tour feels like it's in a different group to me, but Sirius and serious are distinguished by vowel length – it's actually a weak point in the Vowel-glide/r analysis of long vowels, as Sirius is [ˈsɪɹ̠ɪjɵs], which is /ˈsirijʉs/, while serious is [ˈsɪːɹ̠ɪjɵs], which also should be /ˈsirijʉs/. You can assume phonemic syllable boundaries, so serious would be /ˈsir.ijʉs/, or assume it is still phonemically /ijr/, which then has an uncomfortable knock on effect to all other cases of [ɪː]. All my truely long vowels¹ feel like they are counterparts of the corresponding short vowels, but tense/lax isn't really a useful distinction in my dialect, as all the formerly ‘tense’ vowels have diphthonised.

¹ i.e. not diphthongs, from PALM, CAUGHT and vowels before /r/

[zompist]

Do you perceive the vowels in Sirius (and in serious, for those who merge the two) and in tour to be lax or tense? I ask because supposedly in GA the vowels in both of these are supposed to be lax, but I personally perceive the vowels in both of these as tense.

[sɪ ri əs] and [tu ɹ̩] for me. There's definitely a vowel contrast for me in "took a tour" but not "two tours".

[Travis B.]

Do you perceive the vowels in Sirius (and in serious, for those who merge the two) and in tour to be lax or tense? I ask because supposedly in GA the vowels in both of these are supposed to be lax, but I personally perceive the vowels in both of these as tense.

[sɪ ri əs] and [tu ɹ̩] for me. There's definitely a vowel contrast for me in "took a tour" but not "two tours".

These examples are complicated by adjacent consonants for me; for instance took is [tʷʲʰʏ̆ʊ̯̆ʔk], two is [ˈtʷʲʰy(ː)], and tours is [ˈtʷʲʰyu̯ʁˤsʲ]. But I intuitively perceive took as having a different vowel phoneme from both two and tours, which I perceive as having the same vowel phoneme ignoring the rhotic.