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Lack of Noun Gender in English | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 65 of 126 19 December 2013 at 6:41pm | IP Logged | |||||
This has to be one of the strangest observations of English grammar I've seen in a long time. It would seem that English has four grammatical genders: feminine, masculine, neutral and common. This is more than German. When I look up nouns in an English dictionary, I don't see gender markings, unlike French, Spanish or German dictionaries. Why is this so? 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4707 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 66 of 126 19 December 2013 at 7:10pm | IP Logged | |||||
which is done how exactly when the most gender-specific languages are the least biased? and the most biased ones are Chinese and other some-such languages where gender distinctions aren't made?
There are also studies claiming the opposite. It doesn't matter whether there are studies, but whether they are right or not based on the available evidence. So far, it doesn't seem to be so. I'm all for improving sexism in linguistics, but hammering on it this way is the equivalent of trying to hammer a nail into a wall in which it's already fastened. You're only going to break the wall, not make things better. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 67 of 126 19 December 2013 at 7:52pm | IP Logged | |||||
Where am I hammering on anything? I just think we should recognize the sexist origins of some grammatical gender-related things. I don't say anyone who uses them is sexist, apart from specific cases like insisting to use "he" as gender-neutral.
There's no such correlation. Especially the languages without the distinction are a varied group (all IE have at least some distinction). Finnish doesn't have it and Finland is one of the least sexist countries. My impression is that a lack of gender-specific pronouns tends to feed what already exists, ie either male superiority or equality. Apart from Hungarian there are few gender-neutral languages whose countries aren't noted for either of these things? One specific example why words matter: back in the 90's, "non-traditional orientation" appeared in Russian as a playful euphemism for LGBT. (well, not the T part really) It sounded maybe frivolous but overall positive. Now with these stupid laws there's the idea that "non-traditional" means it's threatening our traditions and moral values. I'm not saying that the euphemism is more guilty than Putin, but if there was no such euphemism, the idea would make less sense to the general folks, much like it makes no sense to foreigners who don't know the context. Putin didn't invent the "non-traditional orientation" wording, it's existed for 15+ years and now it's been twisted by him. Also note how often people refer to the language to prove a point, claiming that if the distinction exists even in the language, it must be very important in the real world (because most of the time it's so). But really, let's go back to English and personification. Mark asked: is "he" ever used in a similar vein to how a country or a ship can be "she"? When is "he" preferred? Edited by Serpent on 19 December 2013 at 7:55pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5056 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 68 of 126 19 December 2013 at 8:04pm | IP Logged | |||||
When I look up words in a Spanish dictionary, I don't see transcriptions, unlike English. Why is this so? Does it mean Spanish words are not pronounced? The reason is simple: genders are almost always evident in English, because they are sex-based. To Serpent. I agree that languages contain influence of the male-dominated society. And I agree that genders influence our perception of items and notions. Russians usually associate death with an old woman, that's because "death" is feminine in Russian. But I don't understand how languages promote sexism. And men are already discriminated in many ways in Russia for example. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 69 of 126 19 December 2013 at 8:29pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Are men discriminated for their gender though? If you think so, let's discuss this by PM because it's way too offtopic.
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| schoenewaelder Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5560 days ago 759 posts - 1197 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 70 of 126 19 December 2013 at 8:43pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Personally, I'm offended that my gender is always lumped in with the common or garden default gender, and the ladies get a special one all for themselves.
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| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6597 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 71 of 126 19 December 2013 at 9:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
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But then feminists are on your side :-)
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| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5430 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 72 of 126 20 December 2013 at 1:48am | IP Logged | |||||
I'm about to give up on this. I have not participated in the debate on sexism and gender that is raging here, but I wonder if it hasn't contaminated this discussion about grammatical gender in English .To my utter disbelief I'm reading that this poster is saying that English has three or four grammatical genders. When I read Das Buch, Le livre, El libro, Ein Buch, Un livre, Un libro, etc., I see grammatical gender markings in the determinant articles that have nothing to do with sex. On the other hand, in The book, and A book, where is the gender indicated? According to the theory here,despite the absence of any markings, the gender of English nouns is evident because it is sex-based. Then "book" has a sex that everybody knows. This is astonishing and flies in the face of everything that has been said about gtammatical gender in English. Here is a little point. Because English does not have grammmatical gender but sex-based personnification when referring to human beings and some living beings, it's interesting to see how possessive adjectives are used in English. If wife, daughter and girl are feminine and husband, son and boy masculine by sex, why can we say: his wife, his daughter, his girl or her husband, her son and her boy? Here the possessive adjective has to agree with the gender of the referent and not with the gender of the adjacent noun. In languages with grammatical gender, the possessive adjectives must agree with the adjacent noun. So, in French one says sa femme, sa fille, sa jeune fille or son mari, son fils and son jeune homme. As I have said on various occasions, the problem of mastering grammatical gender is not as simple as choosing LE or LA in French or EL or LA in Spanish. The real complication is the series of morphological adjustments that must be made phonetically and in spelling to render accurately the system of gender agreement. This is precisely why grammatical gender is a huge barrier for speakers of English in languages like French or Spanish. And this is why speakers of Spanish have a relatively easy time learning grammatical gender in French. The various pronoun and possessive adjective inflections in English are nothing compared to the complexities of grammatical gender agreement in French. Plus, there is, as we know, even a push in English to make some of these markings gender-free or non-sexist. In this regard, it is relatively easy to make English (biological) gender-free by modifying the pronouns and possessive adjectives. The results may be a bit strange but it's quite easily done. But if you take a language like French, there are no gender-neutral forms. Whereas the movement in English is to desex language, in French (and in Spanish), users are forced to feminize the language in order to show equality between the sexes. This has introduced some horribly awkward spellings. For example, in English we have "all students" refers to both male and female students. But in French we would have to say: Tous les étudiants et toutes les étudiantes Or, here is a hybrid solution that is somewhat common: Tou/t/e/s les étudiant/e/s Call it what you want, English does not have grammatical gender comparable to that of languages like French or Spanish. Edited by s_allard on 20 December 2013 at 1:55am 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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