Pronouns – How to Deal With Unknown Genders in English?

genderpronounssingular-they

When I start a sentence with words like "someone" or "somebody", I don't know how to choose the right pronoun at the end of the sentence.

Examples:

  1. If anybody asks you about the money, tell (Him – Her – It – Them) that it is in my bank account.

  2. I felt that somebody was in the garden but I did not see (Him – Her – It – Them).

  3. Speaker 1: A friend of mine helped me a lot.

    Speaker 2: You should thank (Him – Her – It – Them).

  4. Congratulations on your new baby! What's (His – Her – Its – Their) name?

Those are the cases or situations that I can think of. If you have any other different situations, please let me know.

Best Answer

If you want to sound formal and don't want to be accused of any kind of sexism or if you really don't know the gender of the person you're talking about, I'd recommend using the pattern him or her. It is by far the safest way refer to somebody previously mentioned in a manner that's not gender-specific (because it simply includes both genders):

If anybody asks you about the money, tell him or her that it is in my bank account.

Congratulations on your new baby! What's his or her name?

More colloquially, however, you'd just say them (this wouldn't work with the baby example though). When them is used like that, it is called the singular they. It is a lot shorter while being completely gender-neutral:

If anybody asks you about the money, tell them that it is in my bank account.

Speaker 1: A friend of mine helped me a lot.
Speaker 2: You should thank them.

Here's a short excerpt from the Wikipedia article I linked you to above that sums it all up nicely about this singular they thing:

The singular they had emerged by the 14th century. Though it is commonly employed in everyday English, it has been the target of criticism since the late 19th century. Its use in formal English has increased with the trend toward gender-inclusive language.

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