A new South Dakota policy to stop the use of gender pronouns by public university faculty and staff in official correspondence is also keeping Native American employees from listing their tribal affiliations in a state with a long and violent history of conflict with tribes.

Two University of South Dakota faculty members, Megan Red Shirt-Shaw and her husband, John Little, have long included their gender pronouns and tribal affiliations in their work email signature blocks. But both received written warnings from the university in March that doing so violated a policy adopted in December by the South Dakota Board of Regents.

“I was told that I had 5 days to remove my tribal affiliation and pronouns,” Little said in an email to The Associated Press. “I believe the exact wording was that I had ‘5 days to correct the behavior.’ If my tribal affiliation and pronouns were not removed after the 5 days, then administrators would meet and make a decision whether I would be suspended (with or without pay) and/or immediately terminated.”

The policy is billed by the board as a simple branding and communications policy. It came only months after Republican Gov. Kristi Noem sent a letter to the regents that railed against “liberal ideologies” on college campuses and called for the board to ban drag shows on campus and “remove all references to preferred pronouns in school materials,” among other things.

    • Railcar8095@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      Those are gender pronouns with extra steps. \s

      The tittle butchers the fact. They are not forbidden the use of pronouns, but to list their preferred ones (i.e, Dr Fuckwit (she/her).

      When something is this stupid (university banning the preferred pronoums) , why not display it in all it’s stupid glory?

      • person420@lemmynsfw.com
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        5 months ago

        What’s really stupid is that I know a few women with traditionally male sounding names (Ryan, Alex, etc) who add their pronouns because they are sick of people assuming they’re male, but fuck them right?

    • intensely_human@lemm.ee
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      5 months ago

      They can only call each other their names.

      Jim said Jim and Larry were gonna go to the store. So Jim says to Larry, “Hey Larry, what’s on your mind?” and Larry says “Nothing, Jim. Just wondering what time Larry and Jim’d get there at this pace”. Jim checks Jim’s watch and says “Jim and Larry’ve been walking about - what - ten minutes?”.

      Jim stops a second, deep in thought. Jim scratches Jim’s chin as Jim thinks. “About two I’d say”

      “Alright” says Larry “Let Larry and Jim get moving then”

      “Yes let Larry and Jim”

      (no first person plural pronouns either)

    • Drivebyhaiku@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      That would turn those effectively into pronouns. I guess you are supposed to just hum through the pronouns or leave a marked silence?