Remarks on linguistic markedness of non-binarity

Abstract

This paper reviews grammatical gender and how it is structured and  expressed in Indo-European, Latin, Portuguese, and English. Such review is  introduced by a discussion of the social and historical conditions that give rise  to the claim for a neutral language, that is, a language that does not assume the  world as simply organized in masculine and feminine, but one that includes a  neutral gender. By reviewing how grammatical gender is structured in different  languages, this paper shows how creating a neutral language in English is  relatively simple, while it is relatively complex in Portuguese. In the former,  gender is marked solely by third person singular personal and possessive  pronouns. In the latter, gender is also marked by noun agreement and gender  inflection, in addition to pronominal reference. The creation of a neutral  language in Portuguese, although complex, can be implemented and that will not  ruin the language. Rather, such creation will show how Portuguese, as every  language, has the strength and power to embrace social transformations.