A question which just occurred to me

[commodorified]

I am enthusiastically in favour of addressing people as they wish to be addressed, and referring to them by the pronouns, etc, that they prefer, or, if lacking data, using 'they'.

And there has, thankfully, been a lot of discussion of the matter to help me get this right.

So now I am wondering about formal modes of address for general and specific addressing of people whose genders are non-binary.

staranise sensibly points out that when addressing groups, "Honoured Guests" may reasonably be used along with, or instead of, "Ladies and Gentlemen/Mesdames et Messieurs". (ETA anne adds "Amis Distingués")

Suitable substitutes for "Sir", "Madam" "Ma'am", "Mr." "Ms", "M.", "Mmme", and so forth, however, elude me.

Has anyone seen anything good on this?

Comments

[wordweaverlynn]

"Kaiet" — used in fiction by Janet Ganus, as part of the pronoun set kai, kaim, kais, kaiself; Also, "Kaieti" for Gentlemen/Ladies.

Found the link at the Gender-Neutral Pronoun blog.

[adrian_turtle]

For titles used in fiction, I like "Myr" that Tiptree uses for male and female characters. The problem is that a person seeing an entirely unfamiliar title (such as one from fiction they haven't read) won't recognize it as respectful address--it looks like a typo, and might even look mocking.

I sometimes promote, or round up. Using "Doctor" for anybody in an academic or medical context. Though retail is quite a bit harder, because there isn't that sort of context.