GENDER

Nina uki Marko Radi

Jelena Kalaba Masa Tadi
Teodora Jovanovi Vera Nikoli
 DEFINITION OF GENDER

Gender is a grammatical category

that refers to a set of nouns, whose
membership in a particular class is
shown by the form of the noun itself
or the form or choice of words that
modify, replace or otherwise refer to
the noun.

Milojevi, Jelisaveta (2000), Word and Words of English.

English Morphology A-Z, Belgrade: Papirus
 a grammatical category

number,

case,

degree,

mood
 .a set of classes of nouns
CLASSES

MASCULINE NEUTER

FEMININE

WARNING! GRAMMATICAL GENDER

BIOLOGICAL GENDER
TIME TENSE
 membership [] shown by the
form of the noun or the choice of
words that modify it.

MARKING

grammatical lexical
(to be continued)
 SUBTOPICS
1.) GRAMMATICAL AND LEXICAL MARKING OF GENDER
IN ENGLISH

2.) GENDER THROUGHOUT THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH

3.) GENDER THROUGH OTHER LANGUAGES

4.) CULTURAL INFLUENCE ON THE ENGLISH

LANGUAGE

5.) FEMINISM IN LANGUAGE

Separate lexemes

Compounding

Derivation (suffixation)
 SEPARATE LEXEMES

Formally unrelated:
- boy/girl
- father/mother
- husband/wife
- stallion/mare
- monk/nun
 COMPOUNDS

Girl/boy boyfriend, girlfriend, cowboy

He/she he-goat, she-goat

Man/maid manservant, maidservant

 DERIVATION
-ess actor/actress, duke/duchess, god/goddess,
lion/lioness, prince/princess
-ette bachelor/bachlorette, usher/usherette,
smurf/smurfette,
-enne comedian/comedienne,

-a sultan/sultana,

-euse masseur/masseuse

-rix executor/executrix,

-ina,ine czar/czarina, hero/heroine

-man/woman chairman/chairwoman,
 PRONOUNS
In addition to nouns which recognize two
genders, pronouns are also gender-sensitive and
they recognize all three: masculine, feminine and
neuter.

However, only the 3rd person singular reflects

gender:
-he, she it (personal)
-his, hers, its (possessive)
-himself, herself, itself (reflexive)
 There are nouns which have different gender
depending on their usage:

Names of countries:
1) Geographical units > it :
Belgium is a small country, but it is
thickly populated.
2) Political or economic units > she :
Germany managed to stabilize her
economy in a comparatively short
period of time

Vessels, machinery, instruments usually

neuter, but if we wish to express affectionate
attitude, she is used
 OLD ENGLISH (450-1150)
the period of full inflection

3 CLASSES OF GENDER

Masculine Neuter

Feminine

-adjectives and determiners in agreement

Albert C.Baugh and Thomas Cable (2013), A History of the English

Language (Sixth Edition), Routledge
 Independence from the natural gender:

se stn (m.) stone

se mna (m.) moon

seo sunne (f.) sun

t mgden (n.) girl

t wif (n.) wife

Compounds:

wifmann (m.) woman

wif (n.) + mann (m.) = wifmann (m.)
 MIDDLE ENGLISH (1150-1450)
The period of leveled inflection

A large part of inflectional system was gone

Tendency to use personal pronouns in accordance

with the natural gender of a noun:

Eta isne hlf (m.), hit is mn lichama.

Eat this bread, it is my body. (lfrics Homilies)

Albert C.Baugh and Thomas Cable (2013), A History of the

English Language (Sixth Edition), Routledge
GRAMMATICAL CATEGORY OF GENDER
IN ENGLISH AND OTHER LANGUAGES
English vs. German

English vs. French

English vs. Serbian

 ENGLISH VS GERMAN

in English there is a very close connection between the

biological sex and the grammatical category of gender
(Milojevi, 2000: 72)
masculine: men, boys and male animals
feminine: women, girls and female animals
neuter: inanimate things, animals whose sex we dont know
and sometimes babies whose sex we dont know (Thomson
&Martinet, 1960: 24)
in German the articles determine the gender of a noun
(attributive gender) as opposed to English where the articles
mark only definiteness
 possessive adjectives: mein/meine/mein (my); dein/deine/dein
(your), sein/seine/sein (his, its), ihr/ihre/ihr (her, their)
possessive pronouns: meiner/meine/meins (mine), deiner, deine,
deins (yours), etc.
demonstrative pronouns: dieser/diese/dieses (this)
relative pronouns: der, die, das (who)
universal pronouns: jeder/jede/jedes (every)
interrogative pronouns: welcher/welche/welches (which)
indefinite pronouns: mancher/manche/manches (some)

Adjectives preceeded by the indefinite or definite article

Ein schner/der schne Junge
Eine schne/die schne Frau hat im Zimmer betreten.
Ein schnes/das schne Mdchen
without article: Schner/schne/schnes Junge hat im Zimmer
betreten.
in German an adjective agrees with a following noun when it is
used attributively; in English adjectives are not marked for
gender, they are not inflectionally suffixed
in both German and English verbs are not marked for gender as
in Serbian (Ona je pevala)
 ENGLISH VS. FRENCH
a/the boy un/le frre , un/lami,
a/the girl une/la femme, une/lorange
a/the house /

in French all nouns are masculine or feminine, there are no neuter nouns as
in English; articles mark nouns for gender
possessive adjectives:
masculine: mon/ton/son pre (my/your/his, her, its father)
feminine: ma/ta/sa mre (my/your/his, her, its mother)
demonstrative adjectives :
masculine: ce livre (this/that book), cet homme (this/that man)
feminine: cette chaise (this/that chair), cette adresse (this/that address)
possessive pronouns:
masculine: (sg) le mien, le tien, le sien, le ntre, le vtre, le leur; (pl) les
miens, les tiens, les siens, les ntres, les vtres, les leurs
feminine: (sg) la mienne, la tienne, la sienne, la ntre, la vtre, la leur; (pl)
les miennes, les tiennes, les siennes, les ntres, les vtres, les leurs
demonstrative pronouns: masculine: (sg) celui, (pl) ceux; feminine: (sg)
celle, (pl) celles
 In French, adjectives agree in gender with the noun they
modify. The feminine form of adjectives usually ends in e
and follows the noun
masculine: un ami intelligent (a smart friend)
feminine: une amie intelligente (a smart friend)
On the other hand, some adjectives such as beau, nouveau
may precede the noun they modify (e.g. un nouveau livre,
une belle maison)
such adjectives are irregular and have both masculine and
feminine form (e.g. vieux-vieille, conservateur-conservatrice,
naturel-naturelle, fier- fire, gentil-gentille)
in terms of past participles, French verbs differentiate between
two forms: masculine and feminine
e.g. Un/le beau garon est entr dans la chambre.
Une/La belle fille est entre dans la chambre.
 ENGLISH VS. SERBIAN
a/the boy (taj) deak (taj) stub
a/the girl (ta) devojica (ta) violina
a/the house (to) dete (to) platno

in Serbian nouns are classified both according to biological sex

(prirodni rod) and grammatical gender (gramatiki rod) and in both
cases are represented by the same formal markedness, the property
which is not typical in English
grammatical gender e.g. stablo/polje (neuter), olovka (feminine ),
hrast- (masculine);
bilogical sex e.g. mae (neuter), devojka (feminine), uitelj-
(masculine)
In English only animate nouns typically have all three genders
(Vuji, 2012: 33)
Serbian doesnt have articles but different attributive words mark
nouns for gender (taj ovek, moja gitara) and demonstrative
pronouns taj, ta, to are usually used by native speakers to determine
the gender of a noun
 in Serbian gender has a distributive character, which means
that other elements which accompany nouns in the context
apart from the nouns themselves are marked for gender
(Vuji, 2012: 33)
e.g. Veliko drvo je stajalo oboreno u sred ume.
in English distributive character of gender may be recognised
only in some pronominal elements or determiners
e.g. The girl stood on her feet and got herself dressed ((Vuji,
2012: 33)
 PERSONAL DUAL GENDER

This class of nouns, which has WHO HE or

SHE pronoun co-reference, includes, for example,
the following: professor, doctor, enemy, singer,
parent, friend...

When referring to the marked sex, the dual

gender nouns can be lexically marked, e.g.
male student/female student.

The dual class on the increase tendency of

English to emphasize equality
GENDER BIAS IN THE USE OF GENDER
SENSITIVE PRONOUNS
Masculine pronouns HE, HIM, HIS are not preferred
to refer to an UNSPECIFIED INDIVIDUAL.

HE OR SHE:
Tell the next person who calls that HE OR SHE can
make an appointment.

THEY:
What happens if someone changes THEIR mind?

Quirk, R. et al. (1985) A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, London:

Longman
 ENGLISH VS SERBIAN
In English there is no ATTRIBUTIVE
GENDER by which nouns are classified
according to the definite articles or attributive
words that precede them as is the case in Serbian
(taj aparat, ta muzika, to pseto...)

different results due to two different cultures

 FEMINISM AND GENDER
Since the 1970s, changes have been made to the
English language for the sake of feminist goals,
that is to eradicate the inequalities which existed
within the language itself. These changes
included:
The use of terms like he and man

The use of they, (in place of he) as a gender-

neutral pronoun

Substituting sexist language especially in job

titles
 He and man are terms which have both gender
-specific and gender-neutral meanings e.g.

He took the bus.

A man stood on the sidewalk.
When a student takes the test, he should write
with a pen.
Man is a primate.

The improper use of these as gender-neutral can

only perpetuate the objectionable idea that men
are the norm for humanity.
 Successful sexist language substitutions:

Ms. instead of Miss or Mrs.

Job titles should be as gender-neutral as possible,

such as flight attendant instead of stewardess

Poet, author, sculptor instead of poetess,

authoress, sculptress