She as pronoun

[Roman1221]

Hello!

There's example from one of the financial book:

"Once the analyst has identified a company's strategy, she can evaluate the perfomance of the business over time"

I don't understand the meaning of "she" in that sentence.
Does it mean, then "analyst" is female?

If it's not clear, male or female, how correctly interpret this?

 

[Tarheel]

Hello!

Here's an example from a book on finance:

"Once the analyst has identified a company's strategy, she can evaluate the performance of the business over time"

I don't understand the meaning of "she" in that sentence. Does it mean the analyst is female?

If it's not clear, male or female, how should I interpret it?

The word "she" is pretty clear to me.

 

[jutfrank]

Does it mean the analyst is female? Possibly (we will need more context to know for sure) but I doubt it.

We often use 'gendered' pronouns in this way when we mean to talk about people generally, regardless of their sex. It doesn't matter at all whether the analyst is male or female. You can equally use he or she. This custom may seem strange to those people whose first language has grammatical gender, and it does show what I think is a deficiency in the English language.

Suffice to say, we do have a clumsy way around this: you can use the plural pronoun they with a singular meaning to say the same thing:

Once the analyst has identified a company's strategy, they can evaluate the perfomance of the business over time.

 

[TheParser]

I don't understand the meaning of "she" in that sentence.

NOT A TEACHER

Roman, traditionally the gender-neutral pronoun has been "he": "A student should complain if he has been treated unfairly."

In the 1960s here in the (United) States, people decided that "he" excluded females. So some people started saying "A student should complain if she or he has been treated unfairly." Then later, many people decided that it would easier to simply say "A student should complain if they have been treated unfairly." This, of course, confuses some English learners who point out that "student" should logically be followed by a singular pronoun. As you know, language is not always logical.

I have found that a few writers feel that although "he" should never be used as a gender-neutral pronoun, it is OK with them to use "she" as a gender-neutral pronoun: "A student should complain if she has (instead of "they have") been treated unfairly." I have found that the few writers who do this feel that since "he" was once the gender-neutral pronoun, then it is only fair that "she" be used as a gender-neutral pronoun now.

 

[GoesStation]

I have found that the [STRIKE]few[/STRIKE] many writers who do this feel that since "he" was once the gender-neutral pronoun, then it is only fair that "she" be used as a gender-neutral pronoun now.

The practice has become extremely common in journalistic English. Writers who follow it generally use he and she randomly.

 

[Roman1221]

Thank you all!
Now it's clear to me.

 

[Tdol]

Some books about teaching, for instance, use she for the teacher and he for a student.

 

[jutfrank]

Some books about teaching, for instance, use she for the teacher and he for a student.

That's a very interesting observation. I've never consciously realised it, but I think I automatically tend to do this too.

 

[emsr2d2]

That's a very interesting observation. I've never consciously realised it, but I think I automatically tend to do this too.

I have never noticed it and I wouldn't do it myself.