1st Edition

The Routledge Handbook of Pronouns

Edited By Laura L. Paterson Copyright 2023
522 Pages 25 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

522 Pages 25 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

This original volume provides the first state-of-the-art overview of research on pronouns in the 21st century. With its dedicated sections on grammar, history, and change, language learning/acquisition, cognition and comprehension, power, politics, and identity, The Routledge Handbook of Pronouns shows that contemporary interest in pronouns and gender represents just the tip of the iceberg.... Read more

1 The little words that mean a lot

Laura L. Paterson

 

PART 1: HISTORY AND CHANGE

2 Variation in pronoun typologies

Heather Bliss, Richard Compton and Dennis Ryan Storoshenko

3 A history of personal pronouns in Standard English

Mikko Laitinen

4 On the alleged stability of pronouns: The influence of language contact and social intervention

Peter Siemund

5 Grammaticalization as a process for pronoun change

Gunther De Voglaer

6 The future of pronouns in the online/offline nexus

Brian King and Archie Crowley

 

PART 2: PROCESSING AND CATEGORISATION

7 Pronouns in the brain

Joanna Porkert, Hanneke Loerts, Anja Schüppert and Merel Keijzer

8 Pronouns and aphasia

Eleni Peristeri

9 Pronoun comprehension

Jennifer E. Arnold

10 Personal pronouns and noun phrases as shifters in Southeast Asian languages

Dwi Noverini Djenar

11 Alternative pronominal items: Noncanonical pronouns in Chinese, Vietnamese, and Afrikaans

Chenchen Song, Li Nguyen and Theresa Biberauer

 

PART 3: ACQUISITION AND LANGUAGE LEARNING

12 How children acquire L1 pronouns

Petra Hendriks

13 Bilingual acquisition: More object pronouns at once

Katrin Schmitz

14 Deixis in the manual modality: Insights from diverse signing communication systems

Jenny C. Lu and Diane Lillo-Martin

15 Acquisition of Pronouns in Creole Languages

Dany Adone and Tamirand De Lisser

16 Use of anaphoric reference by second language writers: From empirical data to pedagogy in the classroom

Masumi Narita and Mark Freiermuth

 

PART 4: MAKING PRONOUNS PERSONAL

17 T/V in the 21st century: A case study of French

Kimberley Pager-McClymont, Sarah Eichhorn and Amélie Doche

18 Pronouns as shibboleths: Prescriptive attitudes to case forms

Linda Pillière

19 Identifying who uses first person singular pronouns and the psychological impacts this language may have

Logan C. Delgado and Nicholas S. Holtzman

20 Strategic uses of pronoun drop in economic decision making

Tai-Sen He

21 What does it mean when a computer says I?

Andrew Gargett

 

PART 5: POWER AND POLITICS

22 The role of pronouns in the race debate: George Floyd and BLM protests

Zeynep Cihan Koca-Helvaci

23 'They really eat anything don't they?': Pronoun use in Covid-19-related Anti-Asian racism

Ursula Kania

24 Pronoun use in cross-cultural therapy sessions

Nahed Arafat

25 Politicians’ pronouns: who is 'we'? Negotiating national collectivities in Taiwan’s authoritarian period

Jennifer M. Wei

26 Strategic use of pronouns among Lingua Franca English users in a university project-based learning programme

Satomi Ura and Hiromasa Tanaka

27 Pronoun activism and the power of animacy

Laure Gardelle

 

PART 6: GENDERED PRONOUNS AND BEYOND

28 Epicene pronouns new and old

Charlotte Stormbom

29 Gender-neutrality and clitics

Ashley Reilly-Thornton

30 Gender binaries in constructed languages

Angela Zottola

31 Non-binary singular they

Lex Konnelly, Kirby Conrod and Evan D. Bradley

32 Individuals' pronoun choice: A case study of transgender speakers in Berlin, Germany

Olga Steriopolo and Harley Aussoleil

33 Misgendering in the media

Kat Gupta

Biography

Laura L. Paterson is Senior Lecturer at The Open University, UK, and one of the founding editors of the Journal of Language and Discrimination.

In this thought-provoking book, the authors explore the profound role of pronouns in how we enact our identities and relationships through language. With remarkable insights, they illuminate in detail the often-overlooked functions that pronouns serve in construing the multifaceted aspects of the human experience.

Michele Zappavigna, Associate Professor of Digital Communication, University of New South Wales, Australia

No stone is left unturned in The Routledge Handbook of Pronouns, with inspiring contributions by world-leading scholars, offering innovative analyses from all angles. Highly recommended for linguists, psychologists, neuroscientists, students, teachers and a general readership.

Lucía Loureiro-Porto, Associate Professor in English, University of the Balearic Islands, Spain

A welcome wealth of resources for the study of pronouns, the small giants in language processing. A must-read for seasoned scholars as well as for aspiring ones.

Luis H. González, Professor of Spanish and Linguistics, Wake Forest University, USA