Confederacy of a Dunce

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

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For many Americans whose dialect doesn't include the handy pronoun "y'all" or "youse", the phrase "you guys" serves as a very handy second person plural of perhaps a rather informal register. But it also has the interesting property that, at least in this particular form, the word "guy" no longer necessarily refers to men. "You guys" can refer not only to a group of men, or a mixed group of men and women, but even to a group only of women:

I’m not here to make friends with you guys. -- contestant on season 7 of America's Next Top Model engaged in light conversation with some other (female) contestants.

As far as I know, UK English does not have a comparable phrase deployed in similar situations (although of course there's no shortage of ways to express second-person-plural should the need truly arise); the closest equivalent I can think of is "lads" which is obligatorily masculine.* Indeed, I've seen some female UK-ites take offense to being addressed as part of "you guys". This is no surprise, because it seems to me that only this particular use of "guy" permits female reference. (Not just "you guys". "Guys" can also stand alone in this manner when used for second person reference: "Guys, you'll never believe this forwarded email I just got")

For example, it would not sound at all right** to say "a guy" to refer to a female person (assuming one is not making a specific point about masculine appearance or manner, e.g. "one of the guys"). Plural "guys" also doesn't sound right when used to refer to a group ("All the guys were there. Bob, Mike, Tom, Donna, and Louise"). If I start talking about "sexy guys" there is no possibility that I am talking about a group that includes women. In fact, modifying "guys" with any sort of adjective seems to remove women from the equation, even in the pronoun(ish) sense:

"You guys" = can include women.
"You sexy guys" = doesn't include women.
"Sexy guys" = doesn't include women.
"You stupid guys" = doesn't include women.
"You female guys" = doesn't make sense.

Quantification, hmmmm, this seems OK in the female-permitted sense of "you guys", but only when used in the second person. Third person female guys are still a no-no:

"You three guys" = can include women.
"Three guys" = none of whom are women.

Of course this subject has attracted more scholarly attention, and at least to some, "you guys" is a hugely big deal. The excitement practically drips off the page in George Jochnowitz's 1983 article "Another View of You Guys" (appearing in American Speech, 1983) "The rapid spread of you guys through the United States during the last decade [i.e., the 1970s] is the only major change in the prononimal system of English that has occurred since the loss of thou and thee four centuries ago". At the time of writing, (Jochnowitz claimed) "you guys" was the most frequently used second person plural pronoun in the United States, although I'm not sure whether he includes the ambiguous "you" in his count. He also points out that the pronoun is somewhat broken compared to others (you can say "You linguists" but not "you guys linguists"). So, what do you guys think?

* There's a wikipedia entry here which (at the moment) claims that "chaps" is "increasingly used for people of either sex". But I can't think of any cases in which I've actually heard the word "chaps" used in this manner (except perhaps where someone has used it in a weak attempt at comic effect, complete with faux upper class accent).

** All judgments are according to my own intuition only. Your mileage may vary. If so please leave a comment.

*** How can I not mention Guy Fawkes, the etymological grandfather of "you guys"?

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Tuesday, October 09, 2007 4:15:43 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)