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glam-lab / degender-the-web

A Chrome extension that replaces all gendered pronouns with "they/them/their."
GNU Affero General Public License v3.0
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Some pronouns should be replaced with names to reduce ambiguity #64

Open beszel opened 5 years ago

beszel commented 5 years ago

Some sentences only distinguish between two people using their pronouns. For example, it's clear that the sentence "He says potato, she says potahto" refers to two previously identified people. When those pronouns are replaced, the sentence becomes "They say potato, they say potato", introducing ambiguity.

Ambiguity is also introduced when "they" is used in its plural form near its singular form. The sentence "They have many differences, but she can get along with anyone" becomes "They have many differences, but they can get along with anyone".

The ambiguity could be addressed by associating each pronoun with a person to whom it refers. Some pronouns can then be replaced as necessary to make each referent clear. Since this project is meant to familiarize users with the singular "they", it would be counterproductive to replace more pronouns with names than necessary.

ProfJanetDavis commented 5 years ago

It looks like Compromise v12 will help with this: #565 Coreference resolution

ProfJanetDavis commented 5 years ago

This also seems related to #14 in that it involves associating pronouns with named individuals.