A Contrastive Analysis of Generic Pronouns in the Holy Quran and Bible

Abstract

Generic pronouns (henceforth GPs) are usually perceived as a common-gender pronoun, an epicene pronoun, and a gender-neutral pronoun.  Some authors and linguists alike refer to these pronouns as the pronouns that refer to a person who may be female as well as male. Some other opined GPs as referents that exclude or marginalize women which in turn lead to the appearance of new neologisms such as s/he, han, and he/she. As an essential topic of concern in the study of language which is worthy investigated, the present study is intended to contrast the Holy Quran and Bible as far as these pronouns are concerned to find out if they share some of these GPs or if they are different. A qualitative approach of contrasting is adopted for collecting and analyzing the required data. The researcher adopted four procedures (description, selection, contrast, and prediction) in the analysis of the study. The results show that the GP is used both the New International Version (henceforth NIV) and the Holy Quran to avoid gender bias. The generic definite personal pronouns “you, we, and they” are found in the Holy Quran and Bible with a bit relative difference. The study comes up with the fact that there are not only the four known GPs found along with the research but there are other generic definite pronouns since they have the generic referents functions.