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Gender Congruency in Romance Languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| vikramkr Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6069 days ago 248 posts - 326 votes  Speaks: English*, Portuguese | Message 1 of 22 21 March 2010 at 7:22am | IP Logged | ||
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When unsure of the gender of a particular French word, I used to resort to using the gender of that word in
Portuguese, hoping it would be the same; I was told by a French speaker that the genders of words in French and Spanish are similar. However, I quickly found this to be inaccurate, and have discontinued the practice. Example: while l'immigration/a imigração share a feminine gender, la voiture/o carro don't share the same gender. Does anyone have any insight regarding the gender of words in Romance languages, and/or any tricks to help one remember them? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tractor Tetraglot Senior Member Norway Joined 5453 days ago 1349 posts - 2292 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, Catalan Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 2 of 22 21 March 2010 at 8:58am | IP Logged | ||
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La voiture and o carro are completely different words with nothing in common except that they both
mean car. Your rule of thumb will only work with pairs of related words; i.e. words that look similar and share the same origin: l'immigration and a imigração; la rue and a rua. Edited by tractor on 21 March 2010 at 8:59am 7 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| MäcØSŸ Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5809 days ago 259 posts - 392 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2 Studies: German | Message 3 of 22 21 March 2010 at 9:11am | IP Logged | ||
That’s because immigration and imigração are cognates, while voiture and carro are not. Unfortunately in these cases you have to learn genders as you would do with non-romance languages. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| vikramkr Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6069 days ago 248 posts - 326 votes Speaks: English*, Portuguese | Message 4 of 22 21 March 2010 at 5:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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Forgive me, that was a poor example! Thanks for the clarification, both of you! Edited by vikramkr on 21 March 2010 at 7:17pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| elvisrules Tetraglot Senior Member BelgiumRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5469 days ago 286 posts - 390 votes Speaks: French, English*, Dutch, Flemish Studies: Lowland Scots, Japanese, German | Message 5 of 22 21 March 2010 at 6:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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A French cognate would be "le char".
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| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 6 of 22 21 March 2010 at 6:50pm | IP Logged | ||
Which we use in Québec French to mean car. To push the reflection further, automovil in Spanish is masculine while it's feminine in French, but it's because it started out as an adjective to coche (m) and voiture (f). Edited by Arekkusu on 21 March 2010 at 6:50pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 6011 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 7 of 22 21 March 2010 at 6:53pm | IP Logged | ||
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Of course, even cognates can diverge. My general rule with guessing in Romance languages is if I know that something's the same in two of them, it's likely it'll be the same in a third.
The other rule of thumb is the general "irregular" one. Only the most common verbs in any language are irregular, because you have to use them frequently to remember the irregularity. This generally holds for changes in vocabulary within language families -- the ones that change most are the most common ones -- French has "parlar", Spanish "hablar" and Portuguese "falar", but we have "l(a) immigration", "la inmigración" and "a imigração" which differ only in terms of an entirely regular and predictable sound change. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5381 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 8 of 22 21 March 2010 at 6:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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La fleur vs. il fiore is another example of divergence. That one is a mystery to me.
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