Is the genderless pronoun "they" appropriate and grammatical for a non-binary gender? [duplicate]

I recently had somebody tell me that a mutual friend of ours who is genderqueer prefers that people refer to him/her using the gender-indefinite pronoun they.

In some cases, this almost seems okay:

Kris left their umbrella at our house.

On the other hand, if Kris is sitting right next to you, it feels very odd to say

They (meaning just Kris) would like more cake.

Or even odder,

Kris would like some more cake, can you please pass it to they/them?"

Are these usages grammatically correct? Are they in the process of becoming grammatically correct? Are there more correct alternatives?

I think the reason for your friend's preference is that using either the male or female pronouns implicitly pigeon-holes the person in question as either one or the other. However, all of the examples you give seem to me to be forced, and to shout out loud "Hey, look at how sensitive I'm being! I'm not calling Kris either male or female!"

There are sensible alternatives to all of these examples that do not break any grammatical rules.

"Kris left their umbrella at our house" : Kris left an umbrella at our house (yes, it could technically then be somebody else's umbrella that was left behind, but would you really know?)

"They [Kris] would like more cake." : Kris would like some more cake.

"Kris would like some more cake, can you please pass it to they?" : Could you please pass the cake? Kris would like some more.

While my dictionary (Chambers 1990) does have a secondary definition of "they" as "he or she", it also says that this usage is "with pl. verb", as in "there are lots of people; they are happy". "They is" would not be correct.

I don't know anybody who declares themself to be a non-binary person or genderqueer. In fact, I'm not ashamed to admit I had to look up those terms. But if a person prefers to be not categorized as being one sex or the other, for whatever reason, we should respect their decision. And I believe this is the key issue, if your friend prefers the singular they then use that term whenever they are in your presence.

I'm sure they would be more offended or hurt if you deliberately preferred one gender pronoun, or worse still, used the supposedly politically correct "he or she" as in

He or she would like more cake

Now, how awful would that be?

Themself

^{_{[THIRD PERSON SINGULAR]}} Used instead of ‘himself’ or ‘herself’ to refer to a person of unspecified sex:
I hope no-one else ever finds themself in this position.

They
^_[SINGULAR] Used to refer to a person of unspecified sex: ask a friend if they could help

I nearly forgot.

Is the singular they grammatically correct? Well, yes. Will people object to your using it in speech, I doubt it. We use the singular they in our speech all the time. Would I use it in writing, it depends. If it were a formal letter or paper, probably not. Is the following phrase confusing, insensitive, or ungrammatical?

Kris would like some more cake, can you please pass it to them?

I don't think so, because the sentence begins with the person's first name, which makes it clear you are referring to a friend and to an individual.

^{Sources: Oxford Dictionaries}

There are already several good answers, but just to add a few more cents, I would summarise the situation as:

• Singular they is long-established, and indisputably grammatical, for referring either to a generic person (“If anyone disagrees, they should speak now.”) or persons of unknown gender (“Did you hear, there’s a new hire arriving tomorrow!  I wonder what they’re like?”). Contrary to some other answers, it doesn’t carry any connotations of plurality, lack of individuality, or the like.  (The Wikipedia article gives plenty of examples.)

• When referring to a specific person of known gender, it’s less clear-cut.  For many speakers, it’s ungrammatical in such contexts (not prescriptively, but in the descriptivist sense that they would never say it, and find it jarring to hear/read).  However, this is perhaps changing; some speakers seem to find it OK.  Language has an interesting post on this, with good discussion in comments; Peter Shor’s answer to this question, and its comments, also exhibit speakers from both camps.

• In any case, though, respecting someone’s choice of pronouns is surely worth making a small grammatical stretch for.  Personal experience: I used to be on the side of finding singular they with known referent ungrammatical; I also have a friend who prefers to go by they, and after just a little time using it, it came to feel perfectly normal.  (I’ve found the same thing with Spivak pronouns and similar. I was honestly slightly surprised by how quickly I got accustomed to them; I hadn’t expected it before using them regularly myself.)