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HelpI've just realized something! (m)
in reply to a message by Sabrina Fair
English is the only major language (that I know) that doesn't have gender specific nouns!
I mean German, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, all Slavic languages (Russian, Czech, Croatian, Polish....) have them, but not English. Maybe this is why compared to other languages English has so many unisex names? Will have to look into it more!
I know I have a hard time with some word-names you find unisex.
I mean German, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, all Slavic languages (Russian, Czech, Croatian, Polish....) have them, but not English. Maybe this is why compared to other languages English has so many unisex names? Will have to look into it more!
I know I have a hard time with some word-names you find unisex.
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Enlish and Japanese don't. Romance languages and most Germanic languages do, however.
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And Hungarian, didn't know about Japanese
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Yeah, my Mexican exchange student attended a class of English-speaking students learning Spanish, and asked why we learn it with the article and the noun (example: el chico--the boy, la chica--the girl) instead of just "boy" or "girl." I said it was so we know what the gender is. And she said, "But isn't it obvious?" I guess it never occurred to her that we don't have the concept in English so what is intuitive to her is something we have to be taught and consciously try to learn.
ETA: Fixed typo
ETA: Fixed typo
This message was edited 7/20/2009, 4:25 PM
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I love that German has genders. It makes the language much more vivid for me, but it also makes learning Spanish hard because I want to apply the German genders to the Spanish words. :-/ But at least I get some funny English mistakes from my friends out of it.
"Oh, the train is here. I can see her already!"
"My printer doesn't work. He is broken."
He, the printer. LOL.
"Oh, the train is here. I can see her already!"
"My printer doesn't work. He is broken."
He, the printer. LOL.
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If those were the examples used maybe she was confused by those particular ones, since boy, man, husband, brother all represent a male person and girl, woman, wife, sister... all are female persons.
It's even harder when your language has one gender for a noun and then you learn a new language and they have a different gender. Spanish and Croatian are close in this, but German sometimes killed me:-(
It's even harder when your language has one gender for a noun and then you learn a new language and they have a different gender. Spanish and Croatian are close in this, but German sometimes killed me:-(
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Yep
I've always thought that was weird too. The only words used in English that have gender are ones taken from French (fiancé/fiancée, for example). It's hard to get used to the idea of words having genders when you take another language. I don't really see the point of having them for non-person nouns. Like... why is a chair female?
The only thing in English that comes even remotely close to being gender-esque is the word "guy." When you say, "Look at that guy," you're referring to a male, but if you refer to a group of people collectively as "guys," they could be all male, all female, or a mix of both.
The unisex name theory is an interesting one.
I've always thought that was weird too. The only words used in English that have gender are ones taken from French (fiancé/fiancée, for example). It's hard to get used to the idea of words having genders when you take another language. I don't really see the point of having them for non-person nouns. Like... why is a chair female?
The only thing in English that comes even remotely close to being gender-esque is the word "guy." When you say, "Look at that guy," you're referring to a male, but if you refer to a group of people collectively as "guys," they could be all male, all female, or a mix of both.
The unisex name theory is an interesting one.
This message was edited 7/20/2009, 2:31 PM
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That would make sense, about the unisex word names.
Jeez, why do languages have gendered nouns in the first place? It's so baffling.
Jeez, why do languages have gendered nouns in the first place? It's so baffling.
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It's even weirder when the actual word doesn't agree with the gender. In Irish, the word for girl, cáilín, is a masculine noun. Does that make any sense to you? I've always found it really weird, but it's because all nouns that end with -ín are masculine, no exceptions made.
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Really?
I've never heard of that happening! In Croatian even if a noun ends in -a (usually female), but it's a word for a male person (Can't think of example) it would still be male. But then we're big on the 'exception from the rule' thing, lol.
I've never heard of that happening! In Croatian even if a noun ends in -a (usually female), but it's a word for a male person (Can't think of example) it would still be male. But then we're big on the 'exception from the rule' thing, lol.
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LOL
I agree it's very baffling, but I can't imagine not knowing what gender something is instinctively. Like when people give male names to 'female' things or call everything IT (I always want to say he for a car or she for a chair)...
You think that's baffling, try having seven cases and change word forms of nouns, adjectives, numbers for all seven of them, LOL!
I agree it's very baffling, but I can't imagine not knowing what gender something is instinctively. Like when people give male names to 'female' things or call everything IT (I always want to say he for a car or she for a chair)...
You think that's baffling, try having seven cases and change word forms of nouns, adjectives, numbers for all seven of them, LOL!
This message was edited 7/20/2009, 2:42 PM
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I never noticed that! interesting :)
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