European languages have genders???

From my understanding, most European languages have grammatical genders.

Then how do they decide genders for new words and new concepts?

For example, "computer", "email", "mobile phone", "MP3 player", "navigation system" and etc...
How do native speakers of those gender-exist languages decide the genders of such newly invented words?

<< How do native speakers of those gender-exist languages decide the genders of such newly invented words? >>

-- This is a very naive question...

None of those concepts, and none of their translations in European languages, are "newly invented words".
In French for instance:
- "téléphone" has been around for about 150 years, and is masculine because all the words ending with "-phone" have been masculine for centuries.
- "MP3 player" is "lecteur MP3", "lecteur", like all words in "-eur" (like "ordinateur" for "computer"), is masculine and it's not going to change.
- "système de navigation" is also masculine, as has been "système" for over a thousand years...

Would you integrate "computer", "email", "mobile phone", "MP3 player", "navigation system" unchanged into your own language?

Then how did they decide the gender of telephone 150 years ago?

What about elevators, escalators, TV, LCD screens, air conditioners?
They all came out in the 20th century. How did they decide their genders at the first place?

<< What about elevators, escalators, TV, LCD screens, air conditioners? >>

- This is getting funny...

Words in "-er" or "-or" (in French: "-eur") didn't suddenly appear a few decades ago. They all have been masculine for over 1,500 years.
The French cognate for "screen" is "écran" and has been masc. since the Middle Ages.
Similarly, "télévision" appeared in the 30's but "vision" is as old as the French language is (it is actually much older in French than in English, since it was borrowed from French). TV is consequently feminine like all words in "-ion".

Believe me, there is no problem at all with those pesky genders! Everyone knows intuitively the right one.

Italian:

il Computer masculine
l' e.mail feminine

The other words are not used in English

Genders grow subconsciously, people don't feel comfortable when they use the wrong gender, it doesn't feel natural anymore. Most people have no grammatical insight, yet they won't make mistakes in gender. This and many other facets of natural languages makes me hate conlangs in a sense.

Thousands of years of evolution has given the language a certain soul it shouldn't lose.

But the gender is not inherent to the object. In German a bridge (die Brücke) would be feminine, but in Spanish it would be masculine (el puente). Also, in German, a girl (das Mädchen) is neuter rather than feminine. So saying that everyone "knows intuitively" what gender something should be is not accurate; they know because they have seen or heard it before, or because of affixes or the like.

I also am curious as to how the gender of an object is decided. Even if it was thousands of years ago, it was decided somehow.

The German word for girl is neuter because it's the diminutive of "Magd" which is feminine.

<<So saying that everyone "knows intuitively" what gender something should be is not accurate; they know because they have seen or heard it before, or because of affixes or the like. >>


They know what gender a new word shoud be because of the WORD, not because of the MEANING of the word (unless it is animate). They know the gender of the word "ordinateur" because of the ending "eur". Even if the person is Amish and has never heard of technology before he will still know the gender because the actual meaning of the word is irrelevant.

in Spanish it would be masculine (el puente)

In portuguese, which is a very similar language to Spanish, the bridge is feminine too ( a ponte)

<<Genders grow subconsciously, people don't feel comfortable when they use the wrong gender, it doesn't feel natural anymore. Most people have no grammatical insight, yet they won't make mistakes in gender. >>

Does this work only in your own native language, or would anyone from France, Ialy, Spain, or Portugal automatically have a "feel" for genders in German?

<< Does this work only in your own native language? >>

-- Yes.
But there are sometimes uncertainties with foreign words that have entered French slang and are in daily use. "Job" and "gang" are masculine in European French, and feminine in Canadian French.

A very special case are new products only known under a trade name. For instance the worldwide famous chocolate spread brand Nutella. Though its original Italian name is definitely feminine with its "-ella" ending, everybody in France calls it as a masculine name ("du Nutella"), as illogical as it may be.

There's a peculiar uncertainty about the gender of that brand in the German area:

"Genus – der, die oder das Nutella
Der Artikelgebrauch ist im Deutschen nicht einheitlich. Fast im gesamten deutschen Sprachgebiet ist sowohl „das“ als auch „die“ gebräuchlich.
„Der“ findet sich hingegen fast nur im äußersten Westen Deutschlands sowie in Ostbelgien und Luxemburg. In Südtirol kennt man dagegen nur „die“ Nutella." (Wiki)

"In almost all the German culture area, both "das" (neut.) and "die" (fem.) are in use. On the other hand "der" (masc.) is virtually restricted to the Western rim of Germany as well as Eastern Belgium and Luxembourg. South-Tyrol knows only "die Nutella".

«A very special case are new products only known under a trade name. For instance the worldwide famous chocolate spread brand Nutella. Though its original Italian name is definitely feminine with its "-ella" ending, everybody in France calls it as a masculine name ("du Nutella"), as illogical as it may be.»

I agree that it might seem illogical. And yet, doesn't it follow exactly what you explained earlier? i.e that there are gender patterns that make the gender intuitive? I wonder if there isn't such a pattern in uncountable food trade names:

- du Tonimalt
- du Benco
- du Pepsi
- du Coca-Cola
- du Boursin
- du Toblerone
- du Minute Maid
- du Leerdammer
- du Banga
- du Nesquick
- ...

Due to the '-a' ending, Coca-Cola is feminine in Spanish, Italian, German etc.
But it's masculine in French.

Probably because masculine is definitely default gender in French, more so than in other languages.

Artificial genders are moronic. The English were so intelligent to remove them.