G'day legends, and welcome to another episode of the Australians teach English Podcast, the podcast by language learners with language learners for language learners. My name is Glen and today I'm talking to youse guys out there out in podcast land. And to help youse guys understand what it is that we're talking about. I have my co host Oriana, welcome back to the show =riana.
Hello. How are you, Glen?
I'm well, thank you very much getting better all the time. Well, what about yourself?
I'm great. I think I'm great. Not as good as I want you, but okay.
What about youse guys over there in Argentina?
Well, Argentina is always a disaster. So we're just riding a bike in hell or something.
Youse guys have been suffering from the hottest temperature on record in February and then youse guys have suffered from the coldest temperature.
Yeah. Wild climate change. Yeah. It was a horrible experience. They're having I don't know, 40 degrees. And we have a lot of humidity. Humidity. Yeah. here and it was just horrible. Horrible. Yeah, yeah.
Youse guys have been suffering. So...
Yeah, it was the worst experience that I had with climate.
Yeah. So what are we talking about today, on today's show that I've given you a little bit of a heads up a little bit of bit of a clue. What do you think we're going to be talking about?
Climate change. No.
When I say youse guys, what or what word am I use? Again? That's a bit strange to you.
Youse?
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
I never heard that. But I understood that. Just
intuitively. Yeah. Okay. Yes. So today, we're talking about youse. And we're also talking about pronouns. And some of the debates that happen about this use of language, sort of all over the world, as well. In Australia, we have this word use, we're in actually, in different parts of the English speaking world, there is a form of use, it is very informal, and it's considered quite uneducated. But you will hear it a lot in Australia, and maybe Scotland and Ireland, which is probably where this form of use actually came from. So where do you want? Why do you think people use news?
Maybe because you don't have a word for that?
Correct?
That can be an issue.
Yeah. So in English, in English, we don't have a word for the second person plural. Whereas in almost every other language there is, in Spanish, what do you have for that?
Um, maybe ustedes? That's...
Yes. So in Latin America, you have instead is and then in, in, in Spain, and in very formal Spanish, you have vosotros. So like estais, como estais, but you know, but in a lot of different Spanish speaking countries, you would have como estan ustedes?, which is actually you know, fulfilling the role of what that does, but in English, we don't have the second person plural. We can't say you as in a plural, so then people say youse instead. But English wasn't always like this though.
Did you have a word for that before and...?
We had thee and thou have you ever read it? Have you ever read any Shakespeare?
No. I read Shakespeare but in Spanish so
Actually, I'm really curious as to how that's translated.
Yeah, I was really young so I don't remember that much. But I would like to read them in English. So I can just compare.
Yamaha actually try and get a Spanish translation actually. See how the and our written and the these basically word are this the second person singular Have a second person plural, roughly, but they fell out of favor for various reasons, because it was seen as a status thing, so it was used as quite a quite a classist way. So then English for some reason adapted BCU and only adapted the singular form of this and, and dropped all the others, whereas most languages still do have second person literals. But English is a little bit of an exception with this in the world. So, you can even use, even though it's you can debate about whether it's, you know, correct English or not, I'm not prescriptivist. So, I would say, "Well, you know, people use it, so therefore it exists". So, you and use along to a special category of language elements, do you know, do you know what they belong to?
No, no, not actually.
They belong to pronouns.
Okay.
Well, they don't belong to pronouns, they are pronouns. And so this is that a category of language elements that exist in all languages around the world. But in English, pronouns have been getting a lot of attention. And not necessarily positive attention. What do you mean? Have you have you been? Have you been following any of this debate?
Yeah, yeah, so a little bit here, it's, it's going on with the same thing. With LGBT community, and all this mess about pronouns?
Exactly.
We are paying like more attention to it. In fact, I don't even know what a pronoun is.
So pronoun refers to you know, that the subject to that in a sentence basically, so, so I, we, me, they, them, but even words like that can also be used as pronouns as well. So often, what comes out in these debates is when someone, I don't really particularly care what your stance is, on, on, on anything, but I do find it funny when people come out and say, "Well, I'm not going to use pronouns anymore". Because you're telling me what pronouns to use, like, I'm just not going to use pronouns anymore. And so, it is quite funny because you can't actually communicate with any in any sensical manner. Without pronouns, who, who are you actually talking to? You can't actually refer to yourself without any pronouns, either.
Yeah, it's true.
So you can think and this debate, I mean, it does present challenges for English learners. Because pronouns in any language when you are learning any language are particularly difficult. Like, in Spanish, I always get lo, el and la confused when I'm actually. So these are sort of, you know, indirect pronouns, indirect objects, or whatever articles, whatever the hell you want to call them. But they function a little bit differently, but they, they serve the same person purpose, that different English pronouns do, as well. So anyway, this, this has created, like, quite a lot of debate amongst the LGBTQI plus community, about what pronouns to use how to how to refer to people how to talk to people, and, and all the rest. But it is quite an interesting debate. As someone, you know, learning languages and just interested in languages, generally, because in English, we don't have some of the problems that face different communities in other parts of the world. So for example, can you tell us about some of the gendered language that is a problem in Spanish or castellano or is perceived as a problem?
Yeah. Well, I can speak more or less about it, because I'm not really into it. But yeah, it's going it's been a debate because we have like, I don't know in English, this doesn't happen that you don't have a masculine or feminine thing for words. Let's say you have a gender. You say students and it can be as feminine, more I was masculine at the same time. So I think you don't face that issue in language. But in Spanish we do. I'm interested in how is it in French...Because how do they they solve this issue. But here you have the A for masculine and the no sorry, the A for feminine and the O for masculine generally. Well, the community solve, let's say, well, all the society, arrange to use the the E, for, for neutral, let's say for for this inclusive language.
Good. So in Spanish, what we call this?
Inclusive language.
Excellent. Lenguaje inclusivo. Something. Yeah. So in English, we don't face these problems. Because our, our nouns don't have a gender. In the past, we have faced challenges when it comes to people's occupations, people's jobs, for example, for example, we used to have jobs that were like, Chairman. And so then we have to call this person now a chairperson, not a chairman or chairwoman, that a chair or a chair, even though that's probably a little bit informal, as well. So that that's kind of a debate that, that we have had in English, one of our former prime ministers actually referred to a woman who he didn't like, who was the chairperson of, of a committee. He called her chair thing, because he refused to call her the chairperson or chair woman. So he called her chair, being here, atrocious, atrocious stuff. So that is kind of more than the bait that we've had recently in the English language about these kinds of topics. So what are some of the advantages? And what are some of the disadvantages or maybe drawbacks of moving towards a more inclusive language, at least in Spanish? Do you think?
I think that brings some confusion, confusions, while you are learning the language, but I don't know, I can find that I need this disadvantage of it. I sometimes use it, but I usually don't, just because I'm not used to it. But I think it's okay, I don't really have an opinion about that. But I think it's positive that society just starts thinking about how we communicate and how does impact in our daily life.
Yeah, I think that's probably the from, from my perspective, that's probably the most important point. Really, the only the only drawback that I can see and in Spanish is that it does get confused when you start looking at different tenses when the herbs and things like this because like, their -es ending becomes like a subjunctive or, or whatever, or an imperative. So it can change the, the, it already exists as an actual language form. So that that is a legitimate problem. As an as a language learner and makes things more difficult, I think. It makes things difficult to hear. Because if someone is speaking, in inclusive language, you're not necessarily sure what they are actually saying, because you might have learned the word in a different way. Or you might have learned the sentence to sound a bit different. So when someone does say with inclusive language, it doesn't actually register with with what you are hearing. So they are perhaps the negatives from that.
What about human learning English do you think do you think there's challenges for for sort of this, you know, debate about pronouns and and how to refer to people and...
No, as you explain it, it looks like really simple.
It's not.
it's not. Okay, so Well, I misunderstood the whole podcast.
I mean, no, no, not at all. I mean, pronouns pronouns themselves are simple feature of language. But using them is not so easy. Okay. Especially when we have, you know, subject object disagreement, when when we're talking about things done to someone else, or actions regarding someone else, it's not necessarily easy because languages function differently and the way that we conjugate verbs and the way that we construct sentences using the pronouns, and the verbs can differ from language to language. So from my perspective, that is a challenge for for any language learner, regardless of adding something extra on top to, to then learn. But in terms of philosophically, I don't think it really, I don't think it really matters. I used to one of my funny things, like, when when someone would get angry about it, I would call them a blue day, I would just insult a hoe, just insult them in the gender neutral, neutral terms, and that would that would seem to get them even even more angry. Yeah. So so that was, that was my little trick, I didn't particularly care that I saw, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna annoy this going to annoy this person a little a little bit more. That's great. But it does...I mean, my challenge, or I think anybody's challenge is, and, and this is when we are, you know, talking to anyone is, is being respectful to whoever it is that we're talking to. Regardless of whether someone wants to be referred to as a de, or a he or she, it's, it's irrelevant. If you treat people with kindness in the first instance, it's probably not going to matter. And that's whether or not you're a native speaker, or whatever language or if you're not a native speaker, it's your second or third language, I don't think it really matters. As long as in the first instance, you're still treating people kindly and with respect. And I think that's the thing to take in what to keep in mind. When we are....
I think that's such a point. B, we're being respectful with each other, and just respect if A, the other person is telling you hey, those are my pronouns and say, Well, what are you going to do a fight against that?
Exactly. Anyway, yeah. So just and, and I think, you know, you even eat a lot of the English speaking world, this is kind of got out of hand, like with the JK Rowling sort of debate?
Yeah, I'm not into it either. But I'm a huge fan of Harry Potter.
You....I think, I think it is, it is a, you know, this is a bit of a divisive point, with people who are Harry Potter fans, but don't agree with her language, because we have seen that language can do a lot of damage. And not just in the obvious ways, but, you know, certainly when it comes to talking about different groups of people or different races, then the way that we use language, as Re is really important for how those groups feel, and are treated by by everyone else in society, whether it's, it's an immigrant community, or whether it's community within within a country already. Yeah, so when I can when it comes back to us, we often hear this with us guys, US blokes. Us girls, we put together with other plurals and this is why it's slightly incorrect. Because when you say you guys, when the plural is guys, it's not us. But, but you will probably hear it with us. These guys use blokes use girls. Are there any similarities This little thing because Chatto
No, no. Not really. Just because they have a word for it, I think.
Yeah, because you're already I think in most languages, there wouldn't really be an equivalent for this.
No, no, there there isn't. That or I can't think of any.
Exactly like I can think of. I can in Portuguese is for says in in Chinese, it's Neiman inspires Wow, or something like that? No. So all the languages have had an actual equivalent within their own language. One thing that I did miss out on in a previous episode was when I was talking about Tinky die. And I'm kicking myself with this one because I had it I had it right on the tip of my tongue, but during during the recording, I couldn't, I couldn't remember. And of course, dinky tiny dinky di, is la posta. Yeah, but I've also, I've also heard it could also be like, Duda a beluga thing things like this as well. 100% Legal? Also, another one that that it could be. So yeah. If you've heard this. Is there anything else that you want to talk about this subject with Oriana?
No. I think it's okay, for now.
So I think I think we've basically given our points of view on this topic. We're not particularly we're not particularly you know, passionate about it. But no, no, no.
No, we usually agree.
Ya know, which is unusual for an Argentinian someone else?
Yeah, it's true. Well, we usually agree.
When it comes to when it comes to language topics, you know, I think in this in this space, there are positives and some negatives, but, but really, it's all about people's attitude. And that's a good thing when it comes to language than, than anything else, when we're using it day to day. So you've heard, so if you've heard this expression us being used in Australia, then get and if you've heard it, and you found it a little bit strange, then get in touch with us. If your language does actually have something equivalent to this, I'd be really interested to know as well. I know in in in the United States, they have y'all and I think a lot of them would be devastated to know that that is actually a pronoun. So among a lot of the people that campaign against pronouns that are also gonna get also people that say y'all, so anyway, always set all this info is out there might have to stop saying y'all. But yes, we would love to hear from you. So get those comments. In. So from us here at the Australians teach English podcast, podcast by language learners with language learnersfor language learners, it's us saying goodbye. Bye.
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