I know the safest pronoun to use in Japanese is always 私, but I like the sound
of 僕 and want to know if it would be odd or stupid sounding for me to use it?
I'm a teenage girl and a foreigner(obviously). If used only with friends
casually, is it weird? I've seen this on the web before but opinions seem very
mixed, and a lot is 5+ years old(it seems in my results it least) so I mostly
just want opinions. Thanks for answering!
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2016-07-21T10:59:06.267
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2016-07-21T13:27:15.167
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question
word-choice
Could I use 僕 to refer to myself?
Basically, 僕 is for boys. If you didn't know this, don't use 僕.

However, according to one recent survey, 1.2% of female middle school students
actually use 僕
([source](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%9C%E3%82%AF%E5%B0%91%E5%A5%B3#.E3.83.9C.E3.82.AF.E5.B0.91.E5.A5.B3.E3.81.A8.E7.8F.BE.E5.AE.9F)).
About 20 years ago when I was a middle school student, there was one (and only
one) girl around me who was using 僕 on a daily basis for some reason. After
that, I've met a few people who have gender dysphoria and are using 僕 (or 俺)
despite their feminine appearance.

I'd recommend that you do _not_ use 僕 unless you are very fluent in Japanese
and know what you're really going to do. It is true that a few native female
teenagers (in the real world) use 僕 quite naturally, but a foreign teenager
girl using 僕 would almost certainly sound simply "incorrect."

In fiction, female users of 僕 are not so uncommon, and it's considered as one
of the ways to characterize a person. [This
page](http://dic.pixiv.net/a/%E3%83%9C%E3%82%AF%E3%81%A3%E5%A8%98) has a long
list of female characters who use 僕 in fiction. Many (but not all) of them are
boyish, tomboyish, naive, or have some other outstanding characteristics.
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answer