The best and worst ways to tackle linguistic sexism

ENGLISH HAS a long tradition of wrangling over its lack of a gender-neutral pronoun. For centuries the orthodox view was simply that “he” includes “she”. But in the 19th century, when suffragettes in Britain and America argued that they were entitled to vote, they were told that the “he” used to describe voters in laws referred only to men. More recently some (including this columnist) have argued for a generic singular “they”, which has been employed in this way for centuries. But conservatives insist that it is illogical.

As the dispute rumbles on, people have invented pronouns to fit the bill: hesh, hizzer, herm and others. Many aim to combine he, she, him and her in some way. But English is unfortunate in that these words simply don’t blend into one that feels entirely natural.

Activists trying to take default maleness out of other languages have banged their heads against the same wall. In German, the current solution is the “Gendersternchen” (gender asterisk). The feminine ending (often -innen) is added after the masculine base plus an asterisk, as in Student*innen, a genderless...