This is such a cool idea. What other info could it be? Careers, hobbies, economic status, lifelong ambitions? Orientation, single/taken/etc status? Insect-style role in the hive (worker/drone etc)?
If human languages are based on primitive monkey-brain ideas of whether or not the person we’re talking about is a potential mate, then what different considerations might an alien race make?
Maybe they have two drastically different body types that need to pair off to defend from predators. Maybe their civilization depends on cultivating plants that grow best when sung to, and a range of different vocal tones per household is best. Maybe some are nocturnal and some are diurnal.
What else??
pronouns are based on age and they change throughout an individual’s life
*translated from alien*
Hello everybody! This is Xarthaborf, he’s-”
“Actually, it’s she now.”
“Oh my god! You finally turned 500! Congrats!”
XD Fantastic, I love it!
I’ve read through the suggestions and I’m a little surprised I’m the only one thinking of this:
Pronouns based on proximity.
What’s better at saying “that one” than saying exactly where they are? Different pronouns for if they’re 5 feet away vs. 20 feet away. Did you turn your back on somebody in the middle of a conversation? They have different pronouns now.
After a while, humans try to maintain the same distance from others when conversing (lol try doing that while walking together) so their translators don’t freak out on them.
I presume there might be a completely different set of nuanced ‘pronouns’ when describing inanimate objects, which makes everything even more confusing to the humans.
How useful.
#You know how you can describe a chess board with b7 or e5 and everybody knows what that means? I’m imagining something similar Except each position has a different set of pronouns Or at least a different pre- or suffix from each other Maybe children use pronouns without the -fixes until they can understand the nuance Human translator tech is still rough And doesn’t understand the nuance So occasionally it’ll run into a prefix or suffix it doesn’t know And just leave it there Iks-them Or they-rith Because it’s not gendered pronouns
That would be fascinating. I imagine the humans would have quite a time wrapping their brains around it! There’s probably a “position unknown/unspecified” pronoun that the humans want to use all the time (like “they”), but the aliens insist that nope it sounds wrong to use just that one.
“Why did you say ‘iks’ when rith is right in front of you? Do we need to break out the children’s educational materials and start from the beginning?”
Okay, but based on relationship proximity.
Different pronouns depending on whether you’re talking about a parent, a sibling, partner, a lover, a friend, an aquaintance, a coworker… imagine the drama potential.
People switching up to friend or lover pronouns too early in a relationship and getting rejected.
Stranger pronouns being literally only okay if you’re using them to describe somebody you just met and will never see again, because any closer degree of relationship than that will have its own pronouns, and not using them is a calculated insult.
Specific pronouns to refer to mortal enemies that pretty much nobody ever uses outside of works of fiction, because using them to describe somebody is like openly admitting that you’re probably planning to kill that person.
This concept possibly getting watered down though as time goes on. Like how swear words like ‘damn’ and ‘hell’ have kind of lost their power over the years, young people start using mortal enemy pronouns to refer to like, people who are mildly annoying, or public figures they don’t like (both of which previously had their own pronouns). Older generations getting really offended by this.
Separate pronouns for fictional characters.
A classic sitcom trope is somebody assuming they’re being referred to with certain pronouns that suggest dramatic changes in their relationship with the person talking about them, only for them to find out at the end of the episode that the person was actually referring to somebody else.
Everybody knowing the moment shit has gone down because “I just saw Skrith and Jarn in the cafeteria this morning. I know you said friend seemed okay last night, but you won’t believe which pronouns friend used to refer to enemy-of-friend!”
Actually, pronouns denoting other people’s relationships to people in relation to you. You might not know X that well, but they’re your friend Y’s close friend, so you can either use aquaintance or friend-of-friend pronouns.
Sibling, parent, child, cousin, etc. pronouns originally only being used for blood family or adopted children, but gradually getting used to refer to any relationship that fills that role in your life. “Oh no, child isn’t actually a relative, but I looked after child while child’s parents were on research trips, and friends were okay with child using parent pronouns for me if child wanted to.”
Human translation devices really not being able to keep up with this, because how the fuck is the software supposed to know how close you are to this person? Humans who actually try and learn the language not faring much better, because not only are there a lot of pronouns to learn, but the nuances of when exactly you’re meant to change are very culturally specific.
Aliens meanwhile being kind of horrified that most humans will use the same two or three pronouns to refer to everyone they encounter. Do they all hate each other? Or, conversely, are they all super close? What is wrong with these people?
They end up just straight up creating a new pronoun meaning ‘member of X species’ for all other species to use to refer to them, because the alternative is having fistfights break out on ships because the humans don’t understand why it’s so fucking offensive to refer to a coworker with aquaintance pronouns.
