A pronoun is androgynous if it refers to both or neither gender. In English, the pronouns I, me, my, you, your, we, us, our, one, and ones are personal and androgynous. The pronouns it and its are impersonal, and therefore androgynous. The pronouns they, them, and their can be personal or impersonal, but are always androgynous. The pronouns, he, she, him, her, his, and hers are not androgynous--they refer to a specific gender.

Tradition has it that when one wishes to refer to a single, definite person androgynously with a pronoun in the third person, one uses a masculine pronoun. Many people have begun to challenge this tradition, however, to the point that there is no widely accepted standard for referring to a person in this way.

One solution is to use the non-standard pronouns e, het, and hets until they become the standards. E would be used instead of he, she or it (as a subject), het would be used instead of him, her or it (as an object), and hets would be used instead of his, hers, or its.

Example: E gave some of hets money to the child, who in turn gave het some lemonade.

E is pronounced just like the "e" sound in he and she, but het is pronunced with the same "e" sound as in wet so as not to confuse it with hit, heat, hurt, or hate.