Timeline for How do speakers of gendered languages experience English [non-gendered] nouns?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
8 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Oct 26 at 7:45 | comment | added | Roger V. | @VladimirFГероямслава some German words have clear gender markers, like "-chen" suffix, but there is no general way to distinguish the gender. Same in French: -ette, -esse, -ée mark feminine, -ment is always masculine, but there's no general rule - e.g. "chose" and "maison" are both feminine. Besides, it is counterintuitive when a word has gender different from the one's native language, even if clearly marker - e.g., I have a difficulty with spiders - "araignée" (fem) | |
| Oct 26 at 7:22 | comment | added | Vladimir F Героям слава | @AndyB In that case it makes a good sense, no? BTW, these diminutives are neuter in Slavic languages as well. Whíle dívka and holka are feminine (all meaning a girl), děvče is neuter, precisely because it is a diminutive. | |
| Oct 25 at 6:20 | comment | added | AndyB | @Pere It doesn't make sense that Mädchen is neuter gender, but at least it's predictable: all diminutives in German are neuter. | |
| Oct 24 at 20:28 | comment | added | Pere | As a native speaker of Catalan (a romance gendered language) having studied English (non gendered) and some German (gendered), I can confirm that the gender issue is easier for me in English than in German. Not having genders is easy, but there are words where genders don't make sense neither in German nor in Catalan, and guessing the German gender is not straightforward. In fact, German has words where genders could make a lot of sense but don't (like Mädchen). | |
| Oct 24 at 12:48 | comment | added | Roger V. | @CharlieB it depends on their native language - in some languages possessives agree with the possessor (like in English, Russian), in others with the possessed (e.g., French, Italian, though a male possessive may be used before a vowel), and sometimes with both (German.) | |
| Oct 24 at 12:43 | comment | added | CharlieB | Another common "marker" I've noticed is using possessive pronouns that agree with the object. So when talking about my wife's family, a learner might say "her aunt" vs "his uncle" when it should actually be "her" for both cases. | |
| Oct 23 at 21:27 | comment | added | emmabee | That's interesting that its more of a small "marker" for someone still learning the language. For English speakers learning a new language, it could be similar to how they might misuse verb tenses or struggle with phrasal verb placement. | |
| Oct 23 at 14:05 | history | answered | Roger V. | CC BY-SA 4.0 |