Personal Pronouns and Gender Neutrality
Personal pronouns ("he", "she") help avoid repetition when referring to the user or to another subject.
However, presuming the gender of the user is not politically correct and has to be avoided.
In This Article
General
Non-native English writers need to be especially attentive because some languages, such as Bulgarian or German, stipulate gender for all nouns (with small exceptions). In these languages, personal pronoun usage depends on the gender of the noun it replaces, which makes it easy to wrongfully carry the rule over to English.
Guidelines
- Use the gender-neutral "they"/"their"/"theirs" instead of "he"/"him"/"his" or "she"/"her"/"hers", or "he or she"/"him or her"/"his or hers".
- If impossible to use "their", rephrase the sentence and eliminate the use of the pronoun. Repeating words is tolerable in technical literature if it helps avoid confusion.
- Avoid the unnecessary gendering of the language.
| Not so good | Much better |
|---|---|
| After opening the dialog box, the user needs to select his preferences. | After opening the dialog box, you need to select your preferences. or After opening the dialog box, the user needs to select their preferences. or After opening the dialog box, users need to select their preferences. |
| Provide the email of the person that you want to invite and select his or her IdP. | Provide the email of the person that you want to invite and select their IdP. |
Select the user and set his DisplayName. |
Select the user account and set its DisplayName. |