this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2023
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Help With Non-Binary Pronouns in French? (beehaw.org)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by communication@beehaw.org to c/lgbtq_plus@beehaw.org
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I know, I know. It's complicated, and maybe impossible. A lot needs to change to make this easy, and I'm certainly in no position to revolutionize the French language.

I need to add French pronouns to my email signature. I don't necessarily need to use them, but ideally I could explain to someone how to use them in a sentence.

"Iel" isn't perfect, but it's the most popular right now. That's good enough for me.

I'm confused about the rest. Can anyone give me guidance on the most popular Iel equivalent of [il/le/lui] and [elle/la/elle]?

Is there a good website where I can see the pronouns in use, that isn't a style guide about pronouns?

Thanks for stopping by :)

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[–] gaael@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I have no source for you, just persobal experience. In my small circles (irl and online) which are not statistically significant, we usually use :

  • "iel" for third person singular, used the same way as "they" in the singular form
  • "ellui" also used for the third person by someone who wanted the feminin "elle" to come first
  • "ol" is also used for the third person, mostly by people who want to get rid of the binary "il" and "elle" sounds of "iel"
  • "elleux" for the third person plural, used the same way as "they" in its usual sense

Maybe this wikipedia page could be useful ?

Just FYI: from my experience as a native French speaker and a French resident, these neopronouns have a hard time existing outside militant and lgbtqi+ circles. Our most popular media (which are right-wing/conservative) regularly paint them as a problem, an attack on the "mothertongue" etc. and I've faced violent reactions from people I gave my pronouns to.

Kudos to you for including them in your signature !

[–] alex@jlai.lu 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

aw yay I made this page!

[–] gaael@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago

Thank you so much for making it :)

[–] communication@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks a ton for this, it's really helpful! I've been conflicted because intellectually I like things like "ol" or "ul" more than "iel" for the reason you described, but I'm not strong enough in French to be a good advocate for them. "Iel" feels easiest, right now.

Would "elleux" replace all uses of third-person plural, or only those including non-binary people?

Regarding your FYI: Sorry you've dealt with that, it's so frustrating!! It's so hard to know what approach will help people understand, and I can see why a lot of people don't bother. Thanks for working to make things better :)

[–] gaael@beehaw.org 1 points 1 year ago

Happy to help :)

Iel clearly has the most tractiin, enough to get included in one french dictionary recently.

"Elleux" does actually replace all uses of 3rd person plural.

Thanks for your support :)

[–] Kajo@beehaw.org 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I've seen non binary people using [iel/ellui], but to be honest the object pronoun "ellui" is much less popular than the subject pronoun "iel".

(I can't find a reliable source on that)

[–] communication@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thanks! It's really hard to get a feel for what people actually use and recognize. There are resources saying "here are 20 NB pronouns that exist", which is great, but they're not helpful to someone without a fairly sophisticated level of fluency. Perhaps [iel/ellui/lea] is an option, despite my dislike of the gender-combo construction.

[–] alex@jlai.lu 2 points 1 year ago

my friends and I tend to use iel/iel/lae more, for simplicity. it's technically correct as well :)

[–] alex@jlai.lu 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Hi! We actually tend more to use il, elle and iel, rather than il/lui, elle/elle, and iel/iel, because as you can see from this sentence, it's pretty useless to add the accusative form which only changes for "il". For instance, my email signature and what I have here only references il. For convenience I put they, il here, but in my email signature I have: "they/them, il".

[–] alex@jlai.lu 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And yes, non-binary options in English are underwhelming to say the least, which is why I use il and not a neutral alternative :(

[–] krimsonbun@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

English is pretty good when it comes to nonbinary/gender neutral language compared to French, right? I mean neopronouns aren't that unheard of and we still have They/them being grammatically accepted

[–] alex@jlai.lu 1 points 1 year ago

Yep, and your grammar is largely ungendered. Our nouns and adjectives almost all are, so it's really hard to avoid gendering people too.

[–] communication@beehaw.org 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thank you SO much for your answers here! And for writing that awesome Wikipedia page, which I somehow hadn't seen before. A few follow up questions, if you don't mind:

  1. I found a dropdown somewhere with [iel/iel/iel]. This is a mistake, right? "Je iel connais" feels wrong. It should be something like "Je lae connais"?
  2. You may have answered this already, but what's a good way to present my pronouns that says "I prefer non-binary, but I don't want to torture you so feel free to use il or elle? Something like [iel ou il, lui, le]? Useful point about accusative being unneccessary, but I'm in a situation where other people are adding it so I think I probably need to include it...
[–] alex@jlai.lu 1 points 1 year ago
  1. Definitely wrong!
  2. I'd say (iel préféré, elle/il acceptés) might do the trick?