They them and their singular or plural

Words like they, them and their are usually taught to students as having a third person plural meaning. But look at the following sentences :

• If someone from the insurance company calls, tell them that they can come and see me tomorrow.
• If a teacher only ever read from the textbooks, their lessons wouldn’t be very interesting.
• I never refuse to mark a student’s work just because they don’t give it in on time.

Here, they, them and their are clearly third person singular. Why?

In these examples, neither he/him/his nor she/her/her is possible because we do not know the sex of the person referred to – it could be either a man or a woman. When this is the case, they/them/their is frequently used as a “neutral” singular pronoun. The following verb, however, remains grammatically plural : RIGHT - they don’t give it in WRONG - they doesn’t give it in.

Sometimes the problem can be avoided by putting the noun referred to in the plural, at which point they is used normally : I never refuse to mark students work just because they dont give it in on time. But when the noun is someone or anyone, this is not an option. The only alternative is to use he or she (often abbreviated to s/he), his or her etc and this can often sound clumsy - If someone from the insurance company calls, tell him or her that he or she can come and see me tomorrow.

This use comes up frequently in the instructions to pairwork activities - Ask your partner if they have ever ridden a camel. Ask your partner about their childhood - and can be pointed out when it occurs. Students can then be given an activity where they have to choose an appropriate reference word to complete a sentence :

• Janet left you a message but I dont know where they/she/he put it.
• Ive no idea who left the message. I didnt see her/him /them.
• David has lost his/her/their keys again.
• Look! Somebody has lost her/his/their keys.
• We need to advertise for a new Marketing Manager. He /She/ They will have to be available immediately.
• The new Marketing Manager arrived yesterday. His /Her /Their name is Annette.

Instead of giving the options, the exercise could be made slightly more difficult by simply leaving a blank for the students to complete.

For a good discussion of the historical use of singular they – including its use by writers such as Shakespeare and Jane Austen - see the Wikipedia.

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Fall Off or Fall Down

This is the first in a new series Language Snippets. It will focus on "small" areas of the language which are not always explicitly covered by textbooks, but which often puzzle learners. Teachers whose mother tongue is not English may find the section interesting for their own language improvement, while both they and native speaker teachers will find it a useful source of explanations and exercises for use with their students. Let us know if you have any suggestions for areas to be included.

The word used after the verb fall depends on the previous position of the person or object that falls or the direction of the fall. Look at the following examples :

The bottle fell off the table. / My purse fell out of my bag.

In both cases the preposition after fall is the opposite of the preposition describing the previous position :

The bottle was on the table. It fell off. / My purse was in my bag. It fell out.

Down is used when the direction of the fall is specified, or to mean “fell to the ground” :

I fell down the stairs.

My keys fell down the drain.

A tree fell down during the storm.

To mean “fall to the ground” or “fall from a vertical to a horizontal position” you can also use fall over :

John fell over and hurt his knee./ A tree fell over in the storm.

Check your understanding with this exercise. What’s the missing preposition?

1. I fell …….. my bike and grazed both my elbows.
2. As I opened the book , an old letter fell …………….. it
3. I fell …………. the lake while I was fishing and got soaking wet.
4. I’ve never seen anyone so embarrassed as David when his trousers fell ….. !
5. The fire started because a candle fell …………. on the desk and some papers caught fire.
6. A bird had fallen …….. the chimney and the room was full of soot.
7. The room was so dark I couldn’t see anything, and I fell ………. the cat.


Answers :

1. off 2. out of 3. into 4. down 5. over 6. down 7. over

Acknowledgement

Photo by Cris. Provided under Creative Commons Licence via flickr.

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