Gender neutral language in French
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Like all Romance languages, French has many gendered markers in nouns and adjectives. This page explains the different strategies that are used to be as neutral as possible with this language.
Non neologisms
Refeminization[1]
Before the 17th century, French had — as Italian, Spanish, and other Romance languages still have today — a feminine inflection for female professionals. However, for several reasons (both societal, i.e., misogynistic[2] and linguistic[3], as the French language was being standardized and dialect speakers were expected to learn French), grammarians made sure that the feminine denominations vanished from the language.[2] Today, a lot of people talk of 'feminization', because they feel like these occupational titles are neologisms. However, they actually aren't, since they are being recovered from an older version of the French language, which is why 'refeminization' is more accurate. Even though it sounds counter-intuitive, refeminization is part of a process to degenderize the French language, since studies from different languages have shown that the generic masculine is cognitively not neutral,[4][5] even though the French prescriptive grammar considers it as such.[6] By mentioning also the feminine form of a word, speakers visualize people of more genders than just one.
| Masculine | Feminine by the Académie | Refeminized |
|---|---|---|
| un auteur | une auteur(e) | une autrice |
| un professeur | une professeur(e) | une professeuse |
| un peintre | une peintre | une peintresse |
| un chirurgien | une femme chirurgien | une chirurgienne |
Doublets
For example, « Nous prions les étudiantes et (les) étudiants de remettre leur copie à la personne responsable ». Some people don't enjoy the repetition,[7] others consider that the doublets don't encompass all genders,[8] others again are unsure which form to mention first, since the order conveys information about the value the speaker gives to each item.[9]
Shortened doublets[8]
The feminine suffix is attached to the masculine, rather than the whole word being repeated (as in classical doublets).[7]
| Middle dot | Dot | Parentheses | Slash | Dash |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| professionnel·les
professionnel·le·s |
acteur.rice | employé(e) | chanteur/euse | boulanger-ère |
Epicene person descriptions[1]
For example, « Les élèves apprennent leur leçon. »; « L'enfant regarde la télévision. »; « Les juges ont pris leur décision. ». Since singular articles mark gender ('la' and 'le'), this functions best with plural forms. It works with singular forms if the noun starts with a vowel, because the article automatically turns into 'l'...', which doesn't mark gender. A downside is that there aren't epicene occupational titles for all professions or functions.
Grammatically fixed gender nouns and impersonal formulations[10]
The table below shows gendered language on the left and neutral — i.e. grammatical gender that has nothing to do with biological sex or gender identity — language on the right.
| Gendered inclusive language | Neutral inclusive language |
|---|---|
| Les auditrices et auditeurs sont attentifs. | L'auditoire est attentif. |
| Les spectateurs et spectatrices sont très calmes aujourd'hui. | Le public est très calme aujourd'hui. |
| Marked binary gender | Grammatically fixed gender |
|---|---|
| Je ne connais pas cet homme. | Je ne connais pas cette personne. |
| La mère de Jo ne parle pas le néerlandais. | Le parent de Jo ne parle pas le néerlandais. |
Proximity agreement[11]
Up to the 18th century, in adjectives and past participles, the masculine gender didn't necessarily prevail over the feminine in cases where the genders could theoretically be congruent: proximity agreement coexisted along with the masculine-over-feminine rule.[3] For a long part of ancient French history, proximity agreement was even the most widespread way to make adjectives, past participles, etc. agree (cf. Anglade 1931:172).[12] Today, this agreement could allow for equality between grammatical genders instead of the masculine-over-feminine hierarchy that was suggested in the 17th and 18th century by the French grammarians Malherbe, Vaugelas, Bouhours and Beauzée:
- « Le genre masculin, étant le plus noble, doit prédominer toutes les fois que le masculin et le féminin se trouvent ensemble. » (Claude Favre de Vaugelas, Remarques sur la langue française, 1647).[2]
- « Lorsque les deux genres se rencontrent, il faut que le plus noble l’emporte. » (Bouhours 1675).[6]
- « Le genre masculin est réputé plus noble que le féminin à cause de la supériorité du mâle sur la femelle. » (Beauzée 1767).[6]
| Masculine prevails over feminine | Proximity agreement |
|---|---|
| Ces œillets et ces roses sont beaux. | Ces œillets et ces roses sont belles. |
| Les nombreux filles et garçons. | Les nombreuses filles et garçons. |
Neologisms
Subject pronouns
French only marks gender on the third person singular (cf. 'elle' and 'il'). Up to the 12th century, French knew the neutral subject pronoun 'el'/'al'.[13] Today, 'el' cannot be recuperated from ancient French as it would be pronounced the same as 'elle', the current feminin subject pronoun. In Laurentian French (Canada), 'al' sounds like 'elle' in spoken language.[14] It could, however, be an interesting candidate for the rest of the francophone community.[15] Nevertheless, today, according to the Guide de rédaction inclusive (2021:14) from the Laval University,[10] the Guide de grammaire neutre et inclusive (2021:5) from Divergenres,[1] the Petit dico de français neutre/inclusif (2018) from La vie en Queer,[16] and Wiki Trans (2019),[17] the most widespread subject (neo)pronoun is 'iel'. It was added 2021 to the grand dictionary Le Robert.[18] Next to 'iel', Laurentian French also uses 'ille'.[1][14] In metropolitan France, the 'al' pronoun proposed by the linguist Alpheratz in their book Grammaire du français inclusif (2018) has gained some recognition. The following table presents the main gender neutral subject pronouns found in the French-speaking world.
| Gender neutral subject pronouns | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Dominant usage | iel [jɛl] | ille [ij][14] | al |
| Peripheral usage | ol | ul | ael |
Clitic and tonic pronouns
French distinguishes between clitic and tonic pronouns. A clitic is a word that attaches in a syntactically rigid way to another word to form a prosodic unit with it, lacking prosodic as well as distributional autonomy.[19] Currently, there is no prevailing gender neutral clitic direct object personal pronoun; the most common ones are detailed below.
| Subject | Direct object | Indirect object |
|---|---|---|
| il | le, (l') | lui |
| elle | la, (l') | lui |
| iel | lae [lae]/lo/li/lu, (l') | lui |
| ils | les | leur |
| elles | les | leur |
| iels | les | leur |
Tonic pronouns are also called 'autonomous' because, in opposition to clitics, they form their own prosodic unit and can stand alone in the sentence, hence their distribution isn't as fixed as the clitics' one.[19] There are currently two competing systems:[17][16] one consists in syncretizing (cf. analogical levelling)[20] clitic and tonic pronouns, following the paradigm of standard French 'elle', which equates keeping the gender neutral subject pronoun — be it 'iel', 'ille', 'al' or 'ol', etc. — as such; the other approach, exemplified in the table below with 'iel', supports differentiating (cf. analogical extension)[20] clitics from tonic pronouns, thereby aligning with the paradigm of 'il'.
| clitic subject pronoun | tonic pronoun |
|---|---|
| il | lui |
| elle | elle |
| iel | ellui [ɛllɥi] |
| ils | eux |
| elles | elles |
| iels | elleux [ɛllø] |
Nouns and adjectives
The predominant neutral form, between the analytic and synthetic gender-neutral approach, is denoted in italics in the table. Words such as 'professionnel' and 'professionnelle', which are orally epicene and, thus, indistinguishable in speech, are not included; the use of their shortened doublet form enables inclusivity and gender neutrality in written language.
The distinction between 'analytic gender neutral' versus 'synthetic gender neutral' is usually referred to as 'inclusif' versus 'neutre'.[1] While there is no evidence from psycholinguistic studies suggesting that portmanteau words like 'utilisateurice' cannot be cognitively interpreted as neutral, these forms could technically also be called that way. Since gender neutral forms are inherently inclusive of all genders, there is no reason why they cannot be called that way either. The interchangeability of these terms makes them unsuitable for differentiating these two methods of creating gender neutral/gender inclusive French words. For this reason, the following table distinguishes them based on their morphological properties— blend words being more analytical and non blend words being more synthetic.
The analytic gender neutral forms that originate from Latin '-or' and '-rix' are currently in use, even though they haven't been added to any French dictionary yet. Some podcasts where you can hear them are Les Couilles sur la table, Parler comme jamais and Papatriarcat.
Regarding the neoforms created with the '-aire' suffix (avantages et désavantages par rapport à '-eureuse').
A part from the italic denoted words, most of them are not used. This list represents the suggestions that have been made for neutralizing French and presents the items that have been retained by most blogs, researchers and LGBT communities in the French-speaking world.
| masculine | feminine | analytic gender neutral | synthetic gender neutral | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Endings from Latin '-or' and '-rix' | ||||
| -eur/-euse | enquêteur | enquêteuse | enquêteureuse | enquêtaire |
| -eur/-rice | acteur | actrice | acteurice | actaire |
| -eur/-_resse1 | docteur | doctoresse[21] | docteuresse | doctaire |
| -eur/-_resse2 | enchanteur | enchanteresse | enchanteuresse | enchantaire |
| -e/-esse | maître | maîtresse | maîtré/maîtrè (or maîtræ) | maîtrexe |
| Endings from latin '-ōsus'[22] | ||||
| -eux/-euse | amoureux | amoureuse | amoureuseux | amoureuxe [amuʁøks] |
| Endings with nasal vowels | ||||
| -ain/-aine | écrivain [ekʁivɛ̃] | écrivaine [ekʁivɛn] | écrivainn [ekʁivɛ̃n] | écrivan |
| -ain/-ine | copain | copine | copinn [kɔpɛ̃n], copaine [kɔpɛn] | |
| -in/-ine | cousin [kuzɛ̃] | cousine [kuzin] | cousinn [kuzɛ̃n] | cousaine [kuzɛn] |
| -an/-anne | paysan [pɛizã] | paysanne [pɛizan] | paysann [pɛizãn] | paysaine [pɛizɛn] |
| -ien/-ienne | citoyen [sitwajɛ̃] | citoyenne [sitwajɛn] | citoyenn [sitwajɛ̃n] | citoyan |
| -un/-une | brun [bʁœ̃] | brune [bʁyn] | brunn [bʁœ̃n] | bran |
| -on/-onne | mignon [miɲõ] | mignonne [miɲɔn] | mignonne [miɲõn] | mignan |
| Endings with silent consonant (♂︎) and silent consonant + '-e' (♀︎) | ||||
| -t/-te | pâlot | pâlotte | pâlode, pâlat, pâlasse | |
| -d/-de | grand | grande | grante, granxe, gransse | |
| -iet/iète | inquiet | inquiète | inquiède | |
| -g/gue | oblong | oblongue | oblonc | |
| -c/-che | blanc | blanche | blank | |
| -er/-ière | premier [pʁəmje] | première [pʁəmjɛʁ] | premiérère, premiér [pʁəmjeʁ] | |
| -s/-se | antillais | antillaise | antillaisse | |
| -s/-che | frais | fraîche | fraisse | |
| -s/-sse | bas | basse | base | |
| Endings with a rounded vowel (♂︎) and '-_(l)le' (♀︎) | ||||
| -eau/-elle | jumeau | jumelle | jumelleau, jumeaulle | |
| -ou/-olle | fou | folle | follou, foulle | |
| -aux/-ales | spéciaux | spéciales | spécialaux, spéciaules | |
| -eux/-lle | vieux/vieil | vieille | vieilleux, vieuille | |
| Endings with '-x' (♂︎) and '-[s]' (♀︎) | ||||
| -x/-sse | roux | rousse | rouxe | |
| -x/-ce | doux | douce | douxe | |
| Endings with '-f' (♂︎) and '-ve' (♀︎) | ||||
| -f/-ve | naïf | naïve | naïfive | |
| Some examples of gender neutral nouns from irregular substantives | ||||
| 👑 | roi | reine | roine | |
| 🦸🏽♂️ | héros | héroïne | héroïnos | héroane, héroal |
| 👨👨👧👦 | frère | sœur | frœur, srère | adelphe |
| 👱🏿 | Monsieur | Madame | Monestre | |
Other ressources
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Divergenres (2021): Guide de grammaire neutre et inclusive. Québec. Online at: https://divergenres.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/guide-grammaireinclusive-final.pdf.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Becquelin, Hélène: Langage en tout genre. Argument historique. Université de Neuchâtel. Online at: https://www.unine.ch/epicene/home/pourquoi/argument-historique.html (12.12.2023).
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 MOREAU, Marie-Louise. L’accord de proximité dans l’écriture inclusive. Peut-on utiliser n’importe quel argument ? In : Les discours de référence sur la langue française [en ligne]. Bruxelles : Presses de l’Université Saint-Louis, 2019 (généré le 12 décembre 2023). Disponible sur Internet : <http://books.openedition.org/pusl/26517>. ISBN : 9782802802457. DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/books.pusl.26517.
- ↑ Tibblin, J., Weijer, J. van de, Granfeldt, J., & Gygax, P. (2023). There are more women in joggeur·euses than in joggeurs : On the effects of gender-fair forms on perceived gender ratios in French role nouns. Journal of French Language Studies, 33, 28‑51. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0959269522000217.
- ↑ Heise, E. (2003). Auch einfühlsame Studenten sind Männer: Das generische Maskulinum und die mentale Repräsentation von Personen [Even empathic students are men: The generic masculine and the mental representation of persons]. Verhaltenstherapie & Psychosoziale Praxis, 35(2), 285–291.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Alchimy (2017): « Le masculin l’emporte sur le féminin » : Bien plus qu’une règle de grammaire. Usbek&Rica: "Selon Le Bon Usage de Maurice Grevisse, l'adjectif se met donc au 'genre indifférencié, c'est-à-dire au masculin'."
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 OMPI (2022): Guide de l’OMPI pour un langage inclusif en français. Genève. Online at: https://www.wipo.int/export/sites/www/women-and-ip/fr/docs/guidelines-inclusive-language.pdf.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 Ménard, Jean-Sébastien (2021): Pour un français neutre et une inclusion des personnes non binaires : une entrevue avec Florence Ashley. Longueuil. Online at:https://www.cegepmontpetit.ca/static/uploaded/Files/Cegep/Centre%20de%20reference/Le%20francais%20saffiche/Une-entrevue-avec-Florence-Ashley.pdf (12.12.2023), p. 13, p. 6.
- ↑ Pascal Gygax, Manon Boschard, Geoffrey Cornet, Magali Croci, Natasha Stegmann (2021): Les outils - la (re)féminisation. Langage inclusif. Online at: https://tube.switch.ch/videos/0xwYktNzRp, 00:50.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Université Laval (2021): Guide de rédaction inclusive. Online at: https://www.ulaval.ca/sites/default/files/EDI/Guide_redaction_inclusive_DC_UL.pdf.
- ↑ EPFL (2023): L’accord de proximité. Online at:https://www.epfl.ch/about/equality/fr/langage-inclusif/guide/principes/accord/ (12.12.2023).
- ↑ Anglade, Joseph (1931): Grammaire élémentaire de l'ancien français. Paris: Armand Colin, 157-196. Online at: https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Grammaire_%C3%A9l%C3%A9mentaire_de_l%E2%80%99ancien_fran%C3%A7ais/Chapitre_6.
- ↑ Marchello-Nizia Christiane. Le neutre et l'impersonnel. In: Linx, n°21, 1989. Genre et langage. Actes du colloque tenu à Paris X-Nanterre les 14-15-16 décembre 1988, sous la direction de Eliane Koskas et Danielle Leeman. 173-179. DOI : https://doi.org/10.3406/linx.1989.1139. Online at: www.persee.fr/doc/linx_0246-8743_1989_num_21_1_1139.
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 Florence Ashley (2019): Les personnes non-binaires en français : une perspective concernée et militante. In: H-France Salon 11(14), p. 6.
- ↑ Alpheratz (2018): Genre neutre.TABLEAUX RÉCAPITULATIFS de mots de genre neutre (extraits). Online at: https://www.alpheratz.fr/linguistique/genre-neutre/.
- ↑ 16.0 16.1 La vie en Queer (2018): Petit dico de français neutre/inclusif. Online at: https://lavieenqueer.wordpress.com/2018/07/26/petit-dico-de-francais-neutre-inclusif/.
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 Wiki Trans (2019): Comment parler d'une personne non binaire ? Online at: https://wikitrans.co/2019/12/25/comment-parler-dune-personne-non-binaire/.
- ↑ Radio Télévision Suisse (2021): L'entrée du pronom "iel" dans Le Robert provoque des remous. Online at: https://www.rts.ch/info/monde/12651159-lentree-du-pronom-iel-dans-le-robert-provoque-des-remous.html.
- ↑ 19.0 19.1 Michel Launey, Dominique Levet (2017): La catégorie de la personne. Maison des Sciences des l'Homme Paris Nord. Online at: https://web.ac-reims.fr/casnav/enfants_nouv_arrives/aide_a_la_scolarisation/LGIDF/LGIDF.LA%20PERSONNE.02.03.17.pdf.
- ↑ 20.0 20.1 Campbell, Lyle (1998): Historical Linguistics. An Introduction. First ed. Cambridge/Massachusetts: The MIT Press.
- ↑ Doctoresse Joséphine Tornay. Online at: https://cm-latour.ch/team/josephine-tornay-medecine-interne-generale/. Very common Swiss French denomination for female doctors.
- ↑ CNRTL (2012): -EUX, élément formant. Online at: https://www.cnrtl.fr/definition/-eux.
