Over many years, our English language has shifted quite reasonably toward gender neutrality. Along with the change have been pronouns like zie, hir or they. As a Turkish American, I am thinking something even simpler.
The Turkish language is gender neutral, so in place of male or female, there is one word, and to the good fortune of English speakers, there is no corresponding meaning in English. That word is “o” and with it let us paint a picture. “Shannon Richards goes to college in San Francisco. O is majoring in literature.” Now we can borrow from the English “s” for Shannon’s possessions. “Os room is simple with a desk, chair, bed and a fish tank that contains os frog Oscar.” The advantage here is that Shannon’s gender can encompass any human being regardless of how one identifies oneself.
O is actually quite versatile. While it is also not used in Turkish, one can use o to define a job or position. We have congressman and congresswoman. Why not have CongressO like our CongressO Kuster? Other examples can be salesO, flightO (a member of flight crew), and yes, Concord MonitorO. In these cases, we can initially capitalize the o for emphasis, but in time, I hope we will use lower case.
A language should not be a museum piece. Words matter, and I believe using o can allow us to have greater freedom of expression. Give it time, and I hope it makes for a richer English language.
OSMAN KAYNAK
Hopkinton