Work Text:
“No understand,” Rocky says. “Why leader of mission is less important than engineer, question?”
“He’s not,” I say. “If anything, he’s more important. He’s the commander.”
“Then why leader is called ‘he,’ question? ‘He’ mean person no is important.”
“Wait, woah woah woah woah! That’s not what ‘he’ means.” The translator must have made a mistake.
The program I used to give Rocky a voice isn’t a simple text to speech program. It doesn’t just use the words I’ve manually recorded; sometimes it adds new words to the database based on context. The words “he” and “she” were picked up by the translator at some point as we discussed people, but apparently the word Rocky uses that the translator recorded as “he” doesn’t actually mean “he.”
“No, question?”
“No. It means the person is male. ‘She’ means they’re female.”
“Small egg and large egg, question?”
Small eggs means small gametes, which means male. Large eggs means female for the same reason. Sex and gender are mostly foreign concepts to Rocky, because Eridians don’t have males and females, but he can understand the difference in gamete sizes easily, so that’s the point of reference we use for sex.
“Yes. Where did the translator get the idea that a word for a less important person should be translated as ‘he?’”
“Because first individual we talk about is Stratt. Stratt, mission leader on Earth, is ‘she.’ You call Stratt ‘she.’ Stratt is very important, so I call Stratt ‘she.’ My word ‘she’ mean more important or same important as person talking. My word ‘he’ mean less important.
“Oh,” I say. “Your pronouns are status based. I guess that makes sense.”
I had thought that Rocky was just taking his cues from me and had come up with separate words because I was using separate words. Turns out, the words that I was thinking meant “he” and “she” this whole time don’t actually mean “he” and “she,” and the words Rocky probably thought were higher and lower status pronouns in my language aren’t actually higher and lower status pronouns. I should have realized a miscommunication like this would happen sooner or later. With an overly eager translation machine, this kind of thing is inevitable.
“But for human language, ‘she’ mean large egg and ‘he’ mean small egg.”
“Well, in my human language, that’s what they mean. I think there are some languages that are more like your language, where they have pronouns based on importance rather than sex, but my language, English, isn’t like that.”
“Okay, understand.”
Now I understand why he’s been calling most of the Eridians he’s talked about “she.” He was just showing them respect.
“Okay,” I say. Now that we know about the misunderstanding, it’s not that big of a deal anymore. I’ll just remember that when Rocky says the words that the translator has been translating as he and she, he means something different than he and she, and he’ll just remember that when I say he and she I’m not talking about status.
But this means Rocky thought I was talking about status every time I talked about anyone. “Wait a minute,” I say. “Did you think Narender wasn’t as important as Lokken, because of the pronouns I used?”
“Yes. Narender is not less important, question?”
“No, he and Lokken are equally important.”
“All your students also equal, question?”
“Yes, of course! Why did you think that – I mean what did you think my reason was for calling my students different pronouns?”
“Think large egg students must have important parents, be very important. Usually teacher no call student ‘she.’ Thought you have special students. You need bring some students more respect.”
“Oh, no no no no. No, that’s not how it was at all. All my students are equal. I’m not supposed to treat anyone differently than anyone else.”
“Oh. Understand now. Good. Human teaching very fair.”
“Yeah. Look, I really hope you don’t see the word ‘he’ as an insult, because I’ve been thinking of you as ‘he’ this whole time.”
“I know this. You say ‘he’ when talk to thinking machine. Is okay. ‘He’ no is insult. Is recognize importance of self. You call me ‘he’ is okay, even if he mean less important, because you more important. Know more science.”
Oh no. “No, that is completely not true,” I say. “You can make xenonite and do complex math in your head – I mean your brain – and remember my language perfectly. I wouldn’t disrespect you, ever.”
“Is okay. I understand. ‘He’ no is disrespect. Is small egg pronoun. But why you choose small egg pronoun, question?”
“Well, for a couple of reasons. For one thing, I’m a ‘he’ myself. And for another thing, this is embarrassing because it shouldn’t be this way, but sometimes using ‘he’ can also mean a person has higher status.” Yeah, I know, when you put it that way, defaulting to “he” for Rocky does seem a bit sexist. Not really sure if defaulting to “she” would have been any better though, except that it would have worked out so that it made Rocky happier.
“No understand,” Rocky says.
“For most of human history in most places, male humans have had higher status than female humans.”
“Why, question?”
“Males are stronger than females. They used to use their extra strength to make women do what they wanted. Some of us still do that. It’s bad. But people in a lot of places try to make sure women – I mean female humans – are treated fairly, which is how a woman like Stratt was able to be chosen as the person in charge.”
“Stratt in charge show humans more fair than before, question?”
“Exactly.”
“Good. Now understand. ‘He’ no mean less important. You call me same pronoun as you. Is good. Thank.”
“Um, yeah. Sorry about the misunderstanding.”
“No apology. Translator no is perfect.”
“Yep. It’s really not.”
“Now you tell about small egg mission leader.”
“Yeah, right. So, anyway, Yao was the commander…”