March, 2010:

to use "you" in your writing.

The Issue: The Generalized You vs. the Literal You

Here is a grade-school English myth that plagues the process of many adult writers:

Never use the pronoun you in your writing, especially in formal or serious writing.

Are you ready to see this one busted?

This absolute rule—enforced by many an educator—stems from the fact that there are essentially two ways to use the pronoun you in writing: (1) to address the reader and (2) to refer to the notion of people in general. The first function is useful and often unavoidable, but the second function—which I call “the generalized you“—is vague and often leads to false statements.

The first use of you is straightforward and quite literal: you means the person reading the writing. This is what I call “the literal you” or “the reader you.” This usage is useful, and often necessary if you (yes, you—the person reading this article) are writing a letter, or if you want your writing to speak to your reader(s). The pronoun, you, here is accurate and correct. The generalized you, on the other hand, is inaccurate. More often than not, it imposes assumptions on the reader.

What do I mean when I say the generalized you “imposes assumptions on the reader”? Consider the following statement, which I recall from a past student paper:

When you are pregnant, every aspect of life changes.

Now, there is an understanding here that you means any woman who becomes pregnant. Still, the reader—especially if male—does a double-take, if only for a moment. The reader sees you there, which of course makes him think, “Oh, that’s me.” And then, right there is the notion of the person known as you—in this case, the male reader—becoming pregnant. Unless we are talking about the protagonist in the Governator’s movie, Junior, I am pretty sure that the male reader knows that this sentence does not—and cannot—apply to him. The reader, just for a moment, is left confused. For that brief moment, his thoughts turn against the writer, since he wonders if the sentence could have been better written with him in mind. The writer may win him back in the sentences that follow, but she definitely loses a point or two in the rhetorical game simply through making the reader slip.

Those are the kinds of instances writers want to avoid. Admittedly, writers cannot control readers’ negative reactions completely, although writers do try to minimize it. With that goal in mind, good writers proofread carefully—and multiple times—to avoid typos in their finished product. They work hard to make sure that their arguments or explanations never contradict themselves. They make sure not to use words incorrectly. Such compositional pitfalls inhibit the flow of the writer’s ideas into the reader’s mind. We want to keep things smooth for our readers, and the generalized you—unless used with extreme care and appropriateness—disrupts the reader’s flow, just as typos or misspellings do.

Still, if negative reader reaction from being misidentified was the only issue with the generalized you, then I expect English teachers would consider letting it be. But there’s more to it than that. The use of the pronoun you to mean “people in general” is vague, and more often than not, it’s the result of lazy writing—and lazy thinking. Let’s return to the sample sentence. The student was writing a paper on effective methods by which social programs can assist single mothers. This particular paragraph was dealing with young, single mothers, who had become pregnant for the first time. That’s pretty specific—a far cry from you.

Many English teachers suggest a generic, cure-all solution to the generalized you: just replace it with the noun, one. That approach would leave us with this:

When one is pregnant, every aspect of life changes.

"One" is not the noun you are looking for.

Ugh. While one here is a step up from the generalized you in the sense that the sentence no longer imposes the prospect of pregnancy on the reader, it is unnatural and comes across as fabricated and pretentious. When teaching this concept to students, I jokingly refer to this use of the noun one as “Jedi-talk.” I mean, really!—Do we speak with sentences like, “One must learn the ways of the Force, young Padawan,” or, “The Force is strong with this one”? Of course not. (And, if you ever encounter a man who speaks that way, do not let him make funny, mystical gestures with his fingers as he speaks to you.) So, if overusing one represents an unrealistic, fabricated style, why write this way? Most readers won’t identify with such stodgy, pretentious diction.

Still, avoiding unnatural writing is not the main reason for avoiding one as a replacement for the generalized you. The most substantial reason for avoiding the overuse of one in writing is that one is vague—just as vague, in fact, as the generalized you. The writer can be a great deal more specific by expressing what kind of one she is discussing. With the goal of specific, pinpointed nouns in mind, how can the writer replace one or you with a better noun?

This replacement begins with a question: “Who exactly do I mean by you or one?”

Let’s consider the context of the student’s original statement. The paragraph is about young women who have become pregnant for the first time. So, why not replace you with that? If the student writes what she means, she would end up with something like this:

When a young woman becomes pregnant for the first time, every aspect of life changes.

That’s not perfect, but it is a step in the right direction. The writer could specify further by including the point that the young woman is single:

When a single young woman becomes pregnant for the first time, every aspect of her life changes.

Or, how about this one?—

When a single young woman of any income becomes pregnant for the first time, every aspect of her life changes. This is especially true of low-income single mothers.

In this last revision, the writer uses a specific noun—that is, any single young woman who becomes pregnant—to make a transition into the next part of the discussion: low-income single mothers and pregnancy. See how that works? Specific words set the writer up for even more possibilities.

The possibilities seem endless, once we move away from vague one-size-fits-all language like you or one, and begin using pinpointed, specific nouns. I have other issues with the sentence, but it is well on its way. Now we have a sentence that does not impose false assumptions on the reader. Moreover, it is more accurate than the you version, and it makes for a more interesting (and convincing) read.

I mentioned earlier that the generalized you represents lazy writing. I stand by that assertion, in the vast majority of cases. (The rare exception represents a stylized use of the generalized you, but I suggest it only for advanced writers who have a strong sense of their audience.) The generalized you is lazy writing—and thinking—in the sense that it allows the writer an easy escape from discussing specific people in sentences. Think about it. A writer who uses you in every sentence does not have to consider that one paragraph discusses a young, low-income single mother, while a later paragraph addresses the situation of a thirty-eight-year-old mother who has become pregnant for a third (and unexpected) time. It’s easier just to say you in one sentence and you in the next, but it does little to let the reader know what is going on in each sentence.

To use the generalized you—or even its weak replacement, one—is to become a one-trick pony; that is, the writer uses the same writing technique time and again to avoid close consideration of her content. In the reader’s eyes, this small three-letter word appears to be the only way the writer knows to discuss people, when she should spice up her writing with a variety of techniques. It serves the writer—by making life convenient for her—but it inconveniences her reader, who must make sense of what is meant by you in each sentence.

Why Teachers Forbid You in Student Writing: Two Reasons

If the literal you is acceptable—and even preferable in some cases—why not teach students to avoid only the generalized you? Well, at the college level, I do teach this. But why do grade-school teachers ban all uses of the pronoun you in writing? Why do they teach it as an absolute?

Once again, let’s pay a visit to little Billy and his all-knowing English teacher, Mrs. Humperdinkle. Little Billy continues writing his essay on Disney World. He is starting to understand coordinating conjunctions (especially and), and he is using them frequently in his writing.

As his new introduction, Billy writes,

Have you ever been to Disney World? I went there this summer, and it was the most fun time of my life. My uncle John told me that he does not like Disney World. I cannot understand why you would not want to go there. You get to go on fun rides and see great shows. It has a huge haunted house. It will really scare you, but it will make you laugh too.

Do you see the issue here? Billy cannot differentiate between the literal you (which he uses to pose a question to the reader in his opening sentence) and the generalized you (which he uses later in the sentence, multiple times). He uses you in the ways he hears it used in spoken conversation, and he has not yet learned to differentiate between the ways that even he uses it.

If Mrs. Humperdinkle tried to explain the notion of the generalized you to Billy, chances are, he would not get it. He would still use you both in the accurate, literal way, and he would use it the wrong way: to express the notion of people in general.

So, choosing the lesser evil, Mrs. Humperdinkle teaches Billy simply to avoid all uses of you. In the same way that she would say, “Never touch the stove,” to a child who is just as likely to start a house fire as he is to cook a pan of stir-fry, Mrs. Humperdinkle warns, “Never use you in writing.” This zero-tolerance approach solves the issue for Billy, forcing him to use precise nouns in his writing. Here is the new version of his paper, with all traces of you purged from the prose:

I went to Disney World this summer, and it was the most fun time of my life. My Uncle John told me that he does not like Disney World. I cannot understand why Uncle John would not want to go there. He would get to go on fun rides and see great shows. It has a huge haunted house. It really scares people, but it makes them laugh too.

That’s a step in the right direction, although little Billy still has a lot to learn. Mrs. Humperdinkle is correct, at this point in Billy’s development, to have him eschew all uses of you in his formal prose.

There is a second reason that Mrs. Humperdinkle tells little Billy to avoid using you in his writing: she wants to teach Billy to focus on his subject matter. Most children Billy’s age are just beginning to consider the world objectively—that is, considering the world separately from considering themselves. When Billy thinks of Disney World, he is not thinking that it is important because of its impact on American culture and consumerism. He is not even thinking it is important because of what it means to other children. Heck, in Billy’s self-oriented mind, Disney World is not important because it is big, nor because of its many rides. Disney World is important, in Billy’s view, because Billy went there and he had fun. For Billy, it’s all about Billy.

Mrs. Humperdinkle wants to encourage Billy to grow beyond this kind of thinking. With that developmental goal in mind, she encourages Billy to write in such a way that the focus is directed, not so much towards himself or his reader, but towards Disney World itself. Teachers often ask students to avoid using the personal pronoun, I, in their writing for this same reason. Writing without the pronoun you (or, in some cases without the first-person pronoun, I) forces children to focus their thoughts on the subject. How people write reflects how they think; by the same token, people’s thinking is influenced by the rules they are given for writing.

In this sense, prohibiting the use of you or I in elementary-school writing is as much a thinking exercise as it is a writing practice. Later, when Billy has learned to focus on his subject matter, he can begin to address the reader, both for stylistic and practical purposes. So long as life experience and thoughtful teachers inform his development, Billy will learn when to address his reader, and how to differentiate between the literal you and the generalized you.

Unfortunately, things do not always turn out that way. What happens if no one ever tells Billy that avoiding all uses of you is merely a temporary, developmental exercise? What happens if Billy tries to continue writing this way into adulthood? What kind of writer will he become? How will he perceive writing? We will explore such issues in the next section.

Novice Adult Writers and the Pronoun, You

Most college freshmen (and other new writers) I encounter fall into two categories, regarding their use of the pronoun you in writing:

Category One: Those in Category One use you almost everywhere they mention other people in their writing, and most instances are the generalized you. If I had to draw a number out of the air, I would say that about seven out of ten freshmen write this way.

Category Two: Students in Category Two just avoid you altogether because they have a Mrs. Humperdinkle from their past who told them never to use you. They often use the word one to discuss people. This group, in my experience, includes about two out of ten students.

The remaining one out of ten is that rare student writer who knows how to use the literal you, but to avoid the generalized you. Chances are, these students had a Mrs. Humperdinkle who told them to avoid you, but then they had a later teacher (probably in high school) who taught them some advanced writing techniques. I applaud such high-school teachers, and I always delight in hearing about them.

Taking care of the students in Category Two is easy: I just show them how to use you, and they feel liberated and eager to write.

As for those in Category One—well, things aren’t so easy for them. And I know, because when I was a freshman, I belonged to this category.

Writing with the generalized you is a terrible habit to break. Even if the student is aware of the issue, she is so accustomed to expressing the notion of any person with the pronoun you, that she defaults to that reference point. (And, if you—my reader—think about it, a great many sentences involve people. The student, then, has been thinking of people in terms of you quite frequently, and for many years.)

Although knowledge is the first step, this is not an issue I can solve simply by teaching these generalized-you writers how to replace you with a specific noun. The lesson this article teaches is the equivalent of teaching a 467-pound man how to use a home-fitness machine. He may know all the finer points of triceps-extensions and leg-curls, but the only way for him to lose weight is for him to use the machine—which requires time, effort, and a smidgen (or more) of pain. He has to undergo a degree of personal struggle and sacrifice to progress.

So it goes with writing. The 467-pound writer is the one who slides sluggishly through the prose, describing everyone as you—whether a 43-year-old male transmission mechanic or a 22-year-old female marketing student. These generalized-you writers will simply have to revise until they have replaced their many cases of you with vivid, pinpointed nouns. At first, it’s hard, but as the writer continues to work, it gets easier, in the same way that life gets easier for the 467-pound man (who will soon weigh 350 pounds, and whose body will acclimate to physical work as he continues to lose weight and progress). Whether it’s a physical workout or a compositional one, Day One is always the hardest.

The best advice from here is simple: Stick with it.

Replacing the Generalized You: A Working Method

Does the generalized you plague your writing? Have English teachers told you time and again to avoid it, but have yet to provide you with a working method? Are you struggling?

Worry no more, dear reader. Here is a method that works, but it will still require some effort on your part. Trust me: it’s worth every effort you put into it.

Here is the method:

Step 1: Write as you normally write. Don’t worry a bit about the generalized you. If that’s what ends up on the paper, fine. It’s not the end of the world—and certainly not the end of your paper. This is a process, and you are only on the first step.

Step 2: Look over your writing, and highlight all instances of the pronoun you. I suggest finding them yourself, without the use of a word processing find feature. However, after you have found all instances you can locate, you can use a find feature to double-check your search. No matter how you find the instances of you, use the highlight feature to place a color highlight over every appearance of you. (I prefer red or yellow for highlighting, since they stand out to the eye and still allow for the black-font text to remain clear.) Also, don’t forget other forms of you, like your (possessive form of you) and you’re (contraction for you + are). When I speak in these steps of the word, you, I am also speaking of these forms.

Step 3: Go through the highlighted instances of you, and un-highlight the cases in which you use you to address your reader. Those are cases of the literal you, and in most cases, you can keep them. This is especially true if you are writing an e-mail or letter, or if you are writing an expository essay that teaches the reader how to perform some practice or process. Using the literal you in such pieces is often necessary and preferable. (Note: These articles on writing are that kind of expository writing—that is, they explain some idea or practice, in this case, writing techniques. You will notice that I use the pronoun you quite frequently, since I am addressing you, my reader, the one with whom I share these techniques and practices.)

Step 4: Make notes on what you mean by each use of the generalized you. All that remains highlighted are cases of the generalized you. Consider each highlighted generalized-you instance in order, and don’t be afraid to spend time on each of them. Use the comment feature in your word-processing program to note the people you mean to identify with you. I’ll bet you know who they are. Just take a moment for each to write it out, in a comment bubble. (Note: This is the essential step of the process. With practice, you will be able to simply replace the generalized you in your writing with the person you intend. With further practice, even that step will disappear when you simply write the noun you intend from the start. But for now, break it down into steps.)

Step 5: Use the information in each note or comment to replace the generalized you in the sentence. This may require a few adjustments to the sentence—and to the language from the comment—so make sure to look at the whole sentence after you have replaced you with the intended person. Read it aloud to make sure it sounds natural and clear.

After you go through these steps, read your prose. Compare it to older prose, where you used the generalized you. Notice that it sounds more professional, more scholarly—more like the prose you might read in an acclaimed nonfiction book. Know that you are headed in the right direction, and that soon this level of specificity and clarity will typify your writing.

There you have it: identifying and replacing the generalized you. Now, give it a try.

Are There Times to Avoid You Completely?

We have looked at how the generalized you can hurt our writing, and how in many writing situations the literal you is not only unavoidable, but also preferred. There’s no way around it: sometimes we just have to talk to our readers.

But are there times when we should not address readers directly? Are there forms of writing or writing situations where addressing the reader as you should always be avoided?

Well, I do not like thinking in terms of always. However, as a rule, we should avoid addressing the reader directly when doing so is unnecessary or excessive. One example is scientific writing, where the purpose is to express the data and findings from research, and not to speak to the reader directly. When writers address their readers as you, they are seeking to pull their readers into the discussion—perhaps inviting readers to access their own memories and to use those life experiences as touchstones for understanding the points made in the writing. This is effective if you are trying to convince your audience of your position on a controversy or debate. (That’s what we call “persuasive writing.”) It’s also productive, as I mentioned earlier, in expository or explanatory writing, where the goal is to make the reader understand some concept, process, or practice. These are reader-focused forms of writing, so addressing the reader is helpful and necessary.

If the focus is the information itself, there is often a specialized audience. If a biologist writes a paper on the formation of DNA from RNA, chances are, the audience will be made up of other biologists. The writer, in a sense, knows who you is (a circle of specialists within the scientific community), so the people understood to be you never need to be mentioned. The goal is to express as much of the data as possible, as efficiently as possible. Simply put, scientific writing is not about you; it’s about the findings. The same is true for statistical research, mathematical research, and any writing in which new research is presented to a specialized academic audience.¹

Still, I would like to see even this change. Writers—before they are columnists, political writers, scientists, or mathematicians—are people, with all the everyday tendencies and practices that most humans share. I think that the best writers are those who can stay on point, while infusing the prose with passion and personality. Very few people, scholars and scientists included, enjoy reading streams of data in the form of sentences. They may enjoy the ideas themselves, but the writing is dry. At the end of the day, all of us prefer to read writing that keeps it real.

My point, in writing this article, is not to have you use the pronoun you in every sentence or essay that you compose. My goal, dear reader, is to counter the pseudo-rule that you should never use the pronoun you in any of your writing. Those who try to follow that rule will struggle to write, and even after that struggle, a great deal of their writing will be unnatural and pretentious—and consequently, ineffective.

One final warning: Although I do hope you feel free to use the literal you in your writing, dear reader, be careful not to overuse it. (Remember what they say about too much of a good thing?) There is a point where addressing the reader excessively shifts too much focus onto the reader, and away from the subject matter. I cannot give you any clear-cut maximum frequency for addressing the reader with the pronoun, you. It varies according to the writing situation, the audience, and the discipline in which the writer composes. Some forms, like letters and e-mails, will involve many instances of the pronoun, you. Others, like college essays on Shakespeare’s sonnets, will involve very few—if any—cases where the writer needs to address the reader.

The best rule I can give you is to be aware of your purpose for the writing. Does addressing the reader help achieve that purpose? If so, you will probably end up using you with some frequency. If using you does not lend itself to the purpose of your writing, then why use it? I think that this is a good rule of thumb for knowing when (and when not) to address the reader.

Next up: Sentence Fragments

Next up in our exploration of grade-school English myths: “Never write sentence fragments.” Here is a link to that article:

• Myths We Learn in Grade-School English: Never Write Sentence Fragments

Notes:

1. Some writing—like that of the celebrated astrophysicist and spokesperson for science, Neil DeGrasse Tyson—is intended to share the worlds of science with the general public. Such writers address their readers quite frequently. Although it is about science in a general sense, this form of writing is not what I mean when I say, “scientific writing” or “academic writing.” (If you need an example of an effective writer, look no further than Neil DeGrasse Tyson’s essays and books. While a book on astrophysics may not be the first place you go for an entertaining read, trust me when I say that Tyson’s writing will change that perspective. He is an equally effective public speaker, and you can access many of his talks on sites like Youtube.)

Christopher Altman, a community-college composition specialist, is passionate about bringing the art of effective writing to average, everyday Americans. He has published work in the field of medieval literature, and has authored a book on advertising language entitled, Telling the Truth to Deceive: How Advertisers Manipulate the English Language. Mr. Altman is an assistant professor of English at Onondaga Community College in Syracuse, New York.