Hi, Alexander!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

AH>  many such terms have been replaced by gender-neutral terms 
AH>  ... WRT this example, "police officer".  :-)

ak>  So it would have been proper to ask "Can an English person 
AK>  see in the gloom?" Does it sound well?


          IMHO it's a good start... and a good example of how one must know at least half the answers in order to ask the right questions.

          Personally, I understand what you mean when you say "Englishman".  I grew up when the masculine pronoun was the default in formal grammar & I don't feel slighted if you'd rather not clutter your prose by including my gender in your enquiries.  The word "Englishman" also includes folks of English ancestry
... such as myself... but doesn't have the multiple definitions "English" has.

          The latter may include anybody who speaks English, which I figure is more realistic in this echo.  But others may be sitting on their hands because they were born in e.g. Ireland or Russia or southeast Asia.  Yes, the language originated in England.  What you really want to ask, however, is probably more like "Is it acceptable &/or appropriate to write [blah blah] in English"?  :-)




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+