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Posted by: Girly Brains on 2010-09-03, 18:48:42
It is possibly because in the absence (in the English language) of a uni-gender pronoun 'she' and 'her' etc. has become the default. In the contexts you cite. Why 'she' and not 'he', I'll venture to speculate on a bit later. It's generally a bit silly and I tend, myself, not to do it (I mean I do a bit, rarely, for sort of rhetorical effect: 'Shall we get her up on the slip, then?' or 'bring her up a point', etc.) - for the lack in English of this uni-gender pronoun, when a pronoun is indeed more appropriate. Preferring instead to use 'it', or 'the vessel' etc. Which sounds much more dispassionate. Less affected. Neater. (And not sad and 'dinosaur' and sexist - in which regard of course, one can always be a bit naughty and provocative and balance the odds a bit saying: 'wow, he's an impressive beast' while regarding a big macho car for example). But to say: 'bring the vessel up a point' (when directing the helm around a headland, say) or even worse: 'Shall we get it up on the slip' would not be appropriate. (Quite bad form in fact!) Slavic languages like Russian, etc. can be less keen on pronouns (and use no articles at all): 'You will bring helm up one point', or 'we will get boat on slip now'. So the issue doesn't arise I suspect. By contrast the French genderise just about everything. Le this and la that etc. As indeed do many languages. But English doesn't, well it doesn't much - one of the few things that make it more simple in fact. And it's generally a complicated language: quite complicated enough already indeed, because it is very old. Without introducing gender pronouns more widely too. (Russians have a real problem with pronouns and articles. But then, I have real problems with Russian, per se! So who's counting?). In fact English has four types of noun: masculine [boy, bull, stallion, grandpa]; feminine [woman, mare, hen, actress]; neuter [letter, house, boat, car], and dual gender [parent, cousin, teacher, horse] etc. So I always think it is going in the wrong direction to apply masculine or feminine pronouns to ones in the neuter category. Certainly as a 'rule' where no rule exists. Progressive linguists, writers or other lovers of language are probably going the other way in fact. As evidenced in the search to find the uni-gender third person pronoun, in order to avoid the use of he, his and him to include both sexes: "Any runner who does not finish will have his application for next year's race reconsidered by the committee. […] In an age when the number of female runners is at least equal to the number of their male counterparts, the use of the masculine pronoun in contexts like this […] is no longer appropriate " ¹ Currently the best we can do to get around this is to either reconstruct the sentence to avoid the offending pronoun altogether; to use both together, or to pluralise them ( " … will have their applications reconsidered … " etc.) So the answer is that they are not. Well not necessarily anyway. Some people just choose to do it because they think it sounds good. In their opinion. As indeed sometimes, it does. Just not all the time. So let's not make things more complicated than they already are, and in the meantime leave it as a matter of context. And opinion. And style. But particularly when a pronoun is appropriate but in the absence of a uni-gender one. BTW, as to why ever it has come to be 'she' and not 'he' when referring to things like boats and cars etc. I suspect much more complicated sociological and historical underlying reasons. For such reasons it has always been mostly men rather than women who have built and driven boats and ships and over the long periods of time spent doing so - largely in the company of other males - and rather as a term of endearment, the feminine came to be the default in a similar manner to the way women (and sometimes men) might say, when confronted with a small, cute furry creature of unknown genetic composition: 'Ah, isn't he cute'. And cars (and other objects of predominantly male focus) simply followed on the tradition. So, who knows, maybe they were just missing their moms. ;)) -|--) Edit: Great subject. See a good discussion of this very issue at: wisegeek.com/ why-are-boats-called-she.htm ________________ ¹ The Times Writer's Guide, Graham King. Harper Collins. Glasgow. © 2001 Estate of Graham King. |
