On 11/10/06, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
Oxford Style Manual: "Though common in speech it is still substandard usage, and should be avoided in formal writing: Necessity may in time establish 'they' as an accepted non-gender-specific singular pronoun in English, but this has yet to happen."
It is yet to happen in the US. There is no shortage of evidence of it's use in British English and even more so in Australian english.
Good writers will avoid imposing one form or the other, and look for alternatives. Had you read further in paragraph 5.204 you would have seen, "What is wanted, in short, is a kind of invisible gender neutrality. There are many ways to achieve such language, but it takes though and often some hard work"
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And while the grammer fantics continue to play their games those of us who understand that langaue is a tool will continue to use the singular they.