The Day of 'They': APA 7 Tackles Bias-Free Language

In October 2019, the American Psychological Association (APA) dropped the 7th edition of the APA Publication Manual, replacing the 6th edition published in the dark days of 2009. Among other changes (check those colorful tabs), the new edition embraces some cultural linguistic priorities, most notably the shift away from gender-specific pronouns.

The Day of They is upon us. APA 7 suggests using “they” as the default singular pronoun unless you are sure of a sole author’s gender identification. This begs a fair question: how can we ever be sure? Perhaps the author’s name is Dr. Richard Fightmaster, and Dr. Fightmaster is wearing a Brooks Brother suit in Dr. Fightmaster’s faculty profile picture. Unless the subject’s preferred pronouns are listed there, or you have close friends in common, or repeated web searches turn up a private blog, you still won’t know the gender identification. And now you have spent ten very-well-intentioned-but-precious minutes trying to do the right thing by Dr. Fightmaster. Kind of like I just did trying to craft a complex sentence without a pronoun.

Alternatively, scholars can eliminate “he” and “she” altogether in favor of “they.” This is the cleanest solution, but let’s be honest. As writers and grammarians, the number dysphoria is real. “They performed concept analysis” means, in our brains and in the perception of our potential readers, that multiple authors performed concept analysis. Using “they” as code for a single author is going to create a little puzzle in our head.

So what do we do?

We deal. It is OK if this is hard. Citing material from websites with no author is hard. Multi-variate regressions are hard. So are co-authorship, travel reimbursements, and locating your major professor over the summer. I am sure journals, major professors, non-binary authors, and the world will give us grace while we overcome the itch to effect number agreement. Because it is just an itch, and it will pass. The momentary distraction of number dysphoria is meaningless compared to the pain of gender dysphoria, and the respect we owe the scholars we cite.

Dr. Fightmaster worked hard on that concept analysis, and they should be able to see themself in our in-text citation.