Congress has cut federal funding for public media — a $3.4 million loss for LAist. We count on readers like you to protect our nonprofit newsroom. Become a monthly member and sustain local journalism.
Germany debates how to form gender-neutral words out of its gendered language

HANOVER, Germany — How do you pronounce a word with an asterisk or a colon in the middle? And what's the German word for inclusivity? These are just two questions businesses and organizations in Europe's largest economy have been asking themselves as the country tries to advance gender equality.
In Germany, the debate about gender-neutral and inclusive language is complicated by grammar. Just as in many other languages, gender in German isn't denoted by personal pronouns alone. German nouns that refer to people have traditionally been masculine or feminine. So, a male citizen is a Bürger and a female citizen is a Bürgerin. But in the plural, the masculine is traditionally used by default — a point that's been contentious at least as far back as the second wave of feminism in the 1960s.
In 2018, a new federal law stipulated that all forms of ID — from birth certificates to passports — must include three options: male, female and diverse, all of which can even be left blank.
Since then, gender-neutral language has become more commonplace. German airline Lufthansa recently ditched the phrase "ladies and gentlemen," German scholars are preparing a gender-neutral edition of the Bible and in some cities — like Hanover — there's an official directive about using gender-neutral words.
Known for speaking Hochdeutsch — considered the most standard variant of German — Hanoverians have been encouraged by city hall to use gender-sensitive language for almost two decades, avoiding the generic masculine whenever possible.
In 2019, Hanover became the first state capital to mandate the use of gender-neutral language in all official communication, from emails to brochures and posters. It deployed what's known as the "gender star," an asterisk placed within a noun to indicate it refers to men, women and nonbinary people alike. For instance, the word for all citizens became Bürger*innen.
Annika Schach, who was the city's communications director at the time, says the new language guidelines have had a mixed reception, but she believes that the generic masculine is passé.
"Using gender-neutral language or the gender star has less to do with wanting to change the world, and more to do with reality," Shach says. "Society is not only made up of men, but women, intersex and nonbinary people too and the language we use must reflect this."
But Schach's message has not reached everyone in Hanover. Hendrik, a lawyer who wouldn't give his last name for fear of getting in trouble with his employer, says he can't stand the gender star or any other punctuation marks — such as a colon or an underscore — that are sometimes used to denote multiple genders instead of an asterisk.
"Once you start addressing the third gender, it's not long until you're required to address a fourth or fifth and, for me as a lawyer, this gets too complex linguistically," Hendrik argues. "Legal texts are not there to serve such grievances. There are more important issues in this world."
He's not the only one who takes issue with gender-neutral language. When Germany's Merriam-Webster equivalent, the Duden dictionary, started adding the feminine versions of nouns to its online edition and changing the definitions of masculine nouns to refer only to men instead of everyone, a small but vocal citizen-led group called Verein Deutsche Sprache, launched a petition to "save the German language from Duden."
Oliver Baer, a retired engineer who is one of the signatories and on the group's board, says, "Gender mainstreaming appears like a diversion or even like a very selfish, childish need to attract attention."
Baer argues that language does nothing to fix societal inequities and he can't abide what he views as jargon. "Women are being called persons with a menstruation background," Baer says incredulously. "Of course, one can do this sort of thing, but that's more cabaret than anything else."
Gabriele Diewald, a linguistics professor at the University of Hanover, disagrees. "The generic masculine is not a grammatical must," she says. "Claims to the contrary are deliberate attempts to continue marginalizing women and other genders."
Diewald remarks that while gender-neutral language upsets the tabloid press, other media organizations have encouraged its acceptance.
One of them is Germany's nightly prime-time television news show, ZDF heute journal. Its anchor, Claus Kleber, was one of the first news hosts to adopt gender-neutral language. Speaking from the city of Mainz, Kleber says: "You get reluctant and rare praise for it, but you get a lot and vehement opposition to it."
Kleber even articulates the gender star or colon from time to time, which is pronounced by pausing briefly mid-word by way of a glottal stop. But he says he doesn't judge those who don't use gender-neutral language, nor does he use it religiously.
"I speak to 4 to 5 million people every evening and they want to be respected," Kleber says. "There are those on one side of this issue and those on the other side of it, and I want to signal to both sides I am not excluding anybody."
Back in Hanover, Kerstin Krominga who works in the performing arts, says it's painfully ironic to see how divided the nation is over an effort to recognize society is not made up of binary opposites.
She says she's disturbed by how ugly the debate has become. "I'm all for inclusive language, but I encounter a lot of aggression when I use it. Either that or I'm dismissed as being too niche."
But Krominga says she won't be deterred from using language that addresses everyone rather than just men.
Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
As Editor-in-Chief of our newsroom, I’m extremely proud of the work our top-notch journalists are doing here at LAist. We’re doing more hard-hitting watchdog journalism than ever before — powerful reporting on the economy, elections, climate and the homelessness crisis that is making a difference in your lives. At the same time, it’s never been more difficult to maintain a paywall-free, independent news source that informs, inspires, and engages everyone.
Simply put, we cannot do this essential work without your help. Federal funding for public media has been clawed back by Congress and that means LAist has lost $3.4 million in federal funding over the next two years. So we’re asking for your help. LAist has been there for you and we’re asking you to be here for us.
We rely on donations from readers like you to stay independent, which keeps our nonprofit newsroom strong and accountable to you.
No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, press freedom is at the core of keeping our nation free and fair. And as the landscape of free press changes, LAist will remain a voice you know and trust, but the amount of reader support we receive will help determine how strong of a newsroom we are going forward to cover the important news from our community.
Please take action today to support your trusted source for local news with a donation that makes sense for your budget.
Thank you for your generous support and believing in independent news.

-
USC says it’s reviewing the letter also sent to eight other prestigious schools nationwide. California's governor vowed that any California universities that sign will lose state funding.
-
Scientists say La Niña is likely, but that doesn’t necessarily mean a dry winter in Southern California.
-
According to a grand jury report the contractor took advantage of strained relations and political pressures to “force” the city to pay hundreds of millions of dollars to settle disputes.
-
Administrators say the bargaining units should be dismissed, or that they have no standing. One campus is going after the federal agency in charge of union activity.
-
The landslide is not connected to the greater Portuguese Bend landslide, city officials said.
-
Nom. Nom. Nom. The event destroyed the internet when it was first announced — and sold out in minutes.