Furry Writers' Guild Forum

Alternative pronouns, non-binary characters

General Writing Discussion
#1

I’ve always fought shy of writing characters who are genderless, multi-gendered, between genders, genderqueer etc, because it’s not a world I know a lot about and I don’t want to mess up. But I have a character on my paws whom it makes sense to write that way, so I’m having a stab at it.

What are your thoughts on characters who fall outside traditional male/female lines? Do you have any preferences on how their pronouns are handled: they/their, xe/xir, ze/zir, alternating between he and she, always cunningly avoided, something else? Do you find it irritating, intriguing, confusing?

#2

I haven’t delved into multi-gender fiction much, but I have seen the pronoun ‘hir’ used in real life when in an author’s biography. If that helps at all…

#3

There was a mirror-mirror Star Trek book that did s/he, he/r, etc for their herm character, and I thought that was well done and easy enough to adapt to.

#4

I have seen the slash technique used and accepted in fiction and essays as well.

#5

I’d not thought of s/he - I rather like that. Thanks, all!

#6

I had a genderless character in one of my stories at one point. They were a weaver ant (a person I had the wonderful luxury of actually knowing) and they personally explained the gender pronouns they wanted me to use.
For genderless I used the Xe set of pronouns. From wikipedia:
Nominative (subject) Oblique (object) Possessive determiner Possessive pronoun Reflexive
Xe: Xe laughed I called xem Xyr eyes gleam That is xyrs Xe likes xemself

The wikipedia page on pronoun usage might be helpful: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender-specific_and_gender-neutral_pronouns

#7

Thanks - I’ve looked at that page but never known anyone, even secondhand, who used the pronouns. That’s really helpful!

#8

Whatever you do, don’t use ‘it’. I saw MCA Hogarth do that, and there’s just too much emotional package in the term ‘it’. It’s dehumanizing, and counter-productive, unless the author wants to actually dehumanize the subject. But then, I can’t imagine that said gender would accept and openly use ‘it’ to refer to themselves.

#9

I concluded both ‘it’ and ‘they’ are way too confusing in a sci-fi setting.