KaceyNov 18, 2022
Next time someone complains about singular "they" I'll point them to this 17th century rant against singular "you"
Show threadHen Gymro Heb WladNov 19, 2022

@kacey To be honest, it all started to go wrong when those crazy kids stopped using proper Anglo-Saxon dual pronouns....

https://oldenglish.info/pro3.html

Old English Online - Pronouns

An online educational resource for learning Old English

Show threadDave DonaghyNov 19, 2022

@hengymrohebwlad @kacey

But does “us two” include the speaker and the person being addressed, or the speaker and one other who is not the person being addressed??

Show threadHen Gymro Heb WladNov 19, 2022
@donaghy @kacey No idea. Perhaps the confusion was why the use of these pronouns died out!
Show threadDave DonaghyNov 20, 2022

@hengymrohebwlad @kacey

We have this in English, but I have a sneaking suspicion that there are languages where there are two "we" pronouns, one of reach of those.

I'm actually a thouist myself - I spend way too much time saying "you - I mean all of you, not just you..." and other stuff that adds meaning to the vague "you" that we currently use!

Show threadHen Gymro Heb WladNov 20, 2022

@donaghy @kacey Yes, this seems to be a feature of some indigenous North American languages e.g. Cree and Inuktitut:

https://ecampusontario.pressbooks.pub/essentialsoflinguistics/chapter/6-6-inflectional-morphology-in-some-indigenous-languages/

I wouldn't be surprised if this also happens in Australian Aboriginal languages, which often encode incredibly complex and subtle information about relationships and kinship.

6.5 Inflectional Morphology in Some Indigenous Languages – Essentials of Linguistics

Show threadDave Donaghy

@hengymrohebwlad @kacey

Doesn’t the dual persist in English a tiny little bit? Isn’t “oxen” originally a dual? And although “shoon” is archaic, I think even that persists as a brand name for a shoe shop.

Nov 20, 2022 at 9:27amWeb
Show threadHen Gymro Heb WladNov 20, 2022

@donaghy @kacey Not sure about oxen. Could just be similar plural suffix to "children". English plurals are a mess because of mixed origins, loss of older endings, generalising one example to others, simplification of using "-s" as suffix etc. Some Germanic plurals based on vowel change (umlaut) e.g. goose/geese or mouse/mice. Sometimes no suffix e.g. fish, sheep.

Mind you, Welsh plurals are even worse - different suffixes, umlaut, "singulative" endings etc. Great fun!