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Witness History: Sweden’s pronoun battle

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Sweden’s battle for a gender-neutral personal pronoun

09/08/2022 GMT

Sweden’s pronoun battle

BBC World Service - Witness History, Sweden’s pronoun battle

How campaigners fought to get ‘hen’ included in Swedish dictionaries.

Swedish campaigners, including Nasim Aghili, battled for years to get the gender-neutral personal pronoun ‘hen’ included in Swedish dictionaries. The word was added in 2015.

Sweden has a long history of championing LGBTQ+ rights. But campaigners spent years battling to get the gender-neutral personal pronoun ‘hen’ included in Swedish dictionaries. The word was finally added in 2015. Maddy Savage spoke to Nasim Aghili from the "queer" art collective Ful, which rallied to get the word recognised. This is a Bespoken Media production for the BBC World Service. 

(Photo: Nasim Aghili. Credit: Thomas Straub)

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