I agree. English is so much better off without genders.
Why doesn't English have Masculine and Feminine genders?
If you're going to add genders into English, why stop at masculine, feminine, and neuter. I think we should split up neuter into several subgenders:
neuter-human (masc/fem not specified, or mixed groups, etc.)
neuter-animate (animals)
neuter-semianimate (plants)
neuter-nonconcrete (concepts)
neuter-inanimate-unchanging (stars, mountains, etc,)
neuter-inanimate-changable (clouds, rivers, etc.)
neuter-other
etc.
Of course, all adjectives and pronouns, and maybe prepositions, verbs, etc. would have to agree with these. While we're at it, perhaps a bunch of numbers (one, two, few, several, many, uncountable, zero, negative, uncountable), and dozens of cases could be added, so that a noun would have thousands of forms. There'd be lots of irregularities for all these. :)
neuter-human (masc/fem not specified, or mixed groups, etc.)
neuter-animate (animals)
neuter-semianimate (plants)
neuter-nonconcrete (concepts)
neuter-inanimate-unchanging (stars, mountains, etc,)
neuter-inanimate-changable (clouds, rivers, etc.)
neuter-other
etc.
Of course, all adjectives and pronouns, and maybe prepositions, verbs, etc. would have to agree with these. While we're at it, perhaps a bunch of numbers (one, two, few, several, many, uncountable, zero, negative, uncountable), and dozens of cases could be added, so that a noun would have thousands of forms. There'd be lots of irregularities for all these. :)
Seriously...
But I think Masculine, Feminine, Personal, and Non-Personal (Neuter) would be okay.
Very few words would class as Masculine (such would be words obviously like 'man', 'father', 'husband', etc)
Feminine, the same ('Mother', 'sister', 'girlfriend', etc)
Then there's Personal (like 'person', 'police[whatever]', etc. These could be either masc or fem or both--the gender is 'Personal' so it includes both male and female)
Last, All other nouns, which would prob account for about 98-99% of all other nouns in English. Due to this, it's not that big of a change. Hardly noticeable...
But I think Masculine, Feminine, Personal, and Non-Personal (Neuter) would be okay.
Very few words would class as Masculine (such would be words obviously like 'man', 'father', 'husband', etc)
Feminine, the same ('Mother', 'sister', 'girlfriend', etc)
Then there's Personal (like 'person', 'police[whatever]', etc. These could be either masc or fem or both--the gender is 'Personal' so it includes both male and female)
Last, All other nouns, which would prob account for about 98-99% of all other nouns in English. Due to this, it's not that big of a change. Hardly noticeable...
A question for guest's proposal, would we then create new articles and new ways to write adjectives and/or verbs? I think that if adjectives and articles don't change it's useless to create genders.
Well, it'd be silly to have articles or adjectives change for gender if 98-99% of nouns all fall into a single category, which is what guest proposed.
I'm not clear on what guest's proposal actually is, though. What makes it different from my own masculine/feminine/neuter proposal early in the thread?
- Kef
I'm not clear on what guest's proposal actually is, though. What makes it different from my own masculine/feminine/neuter proposal early in the thread?
- Kef
<<Last, All other nouns, which would prob account for about 98-99% of all other nouns in English. Due to this, it's not that big of a change. Hardly noticeable... >>
Nothing says that nouns should be logically classified into the 3, 4, or 'n' genders that we create. You could have feminine 'boulder', personal 'trees', and non-personal 'mother', for example. This would solve the problem of 99% of nouns being assigned to the non-personal gender.
If you want to have more gender fun, perhaps the gender of a noun and its modifying adjectives, articles, and perhaps prepositions, verbs, adverbs, etc. might vary, depending on the meaning or position. Example, 'mother' might be feminine when the subject or object, but personal when the object of certain prepositions, and non-personal when in a dependent contrary-to-fact or hypothetical clause (which would use the subjunctive mood in some languages). Such shenanigans would bring English more in line with the spirit of typical gender systems. :)
Nothing says that nouns should be logically classified into the 3, 4, or 'n' genders that we create. You could have feminine 'boulder', personal 'trees', and non-personal 'mother', for example. This would solve the problem of 99% of nouns being assigned to the non-personal gender.
If you want to have more gender fun, perhaps the gender of a noun and its modifying adjectives, articles, and perhaps prepositions, verbs, adverbs, etc. might vary, depending on the meaning or position. Example, 'mother' might be feminine when the subject or object, but personal when the object of certain prepositions, and non-personal when in a dependent contrary-to-fact or hypothetical clause (which would use the subjunctive mood in some languages). Such shenanigans would bring English more in line with the spirit of typical gender systems. :)
<<neuter-inanimate-unchanging (stars, mountains, etc,)>>
Even stars and mountains change: stars will be bore, live and die and become black holes or brown dwarfes and mountains will be washed to the sea.
To add some ridiculous genders: inflect all of the nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc. to body size, colour of the hair or eyes, sexual habits, time of the day, year, weather, or whether you've got a flash like scar on your forehead. If you go with inflection by colour of the skin, form of the hair or haircut or racial origin, then we all become ... linguistic racists!
Even stars and mountains change: stars will be bore, live and die and become black holes or brown dwarfes and mountains will be washed to the sea.
To add some ridiculous genders: inflect all of the nouns, verbs, adjectives, etc. to body size, colour of the hair or eyes, sexual habits, time of the day, year, weather, or whether you've got a flash like scar on your forehead. If you go with inflection by colour of the skin, form of the hair or haircut or racial origin, then we all become ... linguistic racists!
<<neuter-inanimate-unchanging (stars, mountains, etc,)>>
Correction:
... stars will be born, live and die and become black holes or brown dwarfes and mountains will be washed to the sea.
If you go on with inflection by colour of the skin, form of the hair or haircut or racial origin, then we all become ... linguistic racists!
Correction:
... stars will be born, live and die and become black holes or brown dwarfes and mountains will be washed to the sea.
If you go on with inflection by colour of the skin, form of the hair or haircut or racial origin, then we all become ... linguistic racists!
<< Nothing says that nouns should be logically classified into the 3, 4, or 'n' genders that we create. You could have feminine 'boulder', personal 'trees', and non-personal 'mother', for example. This would solve the problem of 99% of nouns being assigned to the non-personal gender. >>
But that's pointless complexity. It serves very little function. Yes, many languages are exactly like that (including Spanish, a language I study), but that doesn't mean that adding such a system would have any practical benefit.
(I nearly wrote "it serves no function" rather than "very little function". But I changed it because gender can be used to disambiguate which noun you're talking about when you're talking about a masculine thing and a feminine thing. But if you're talking about two masculine things or two feminine things, then it's no help. That sort of problem can be solved in other ways without adding all the complexity of grammatical gender, so I still think it's largely pointless.)
- Kef
But that's pointless complexity. It serves very little function. Yes, many languages are exactly like that (including Spanish, a language I study), but that doesn't mean that adding such a system would have any practical benefit.
(I nearly wrote "it serves no function" rather than "very little function". But I changed it because gender can be used to disambiguate which noun you're talking about when you're talking about a masculine thing and a feminine thing. But if you're talking about two masculine things or two feminine things, then it's no help. That sort of problem can be solved in other ways without adding all the complexity of grammatical gender, so I still think it's largely pointless.)
- Kef
<<A question for guest's proposal, would we then create new articles and new ways to write adjectives and/or verbs? I think that if adjectives and articles don't change it's useless to create genders. >>
<<I'm not clear on what guest's proposal actually is, though. What makes it different from my own masculine/feminine/neuter proposal early in the thread? >>
--This is the original 'guest'--
Well, since the uproar in English over gender seems to be fueled by having to use the masculine as a default (unless otherwise specified) as in 'Each police officer must wear his (/her) gun when on patrol', a Personal gender would satisfy this for both his/her.
It's not necessary to create Masc, Fem, Personal, Non-Personal articles--'the' would still be used for all. However, for third person sing., demonstratives and perhaps relative pronouns yes.
How to create it, and from where, I cannot answer at this time.
Here's an example off the top of my head solely for demonstration purposes. This form is NOT what I am proposing...
'thee' as Personal demonstrative/pronoun for masc & fem, taken from Old English 'thee' (masc) and 'theeo' (fem). Making this pronoun analogous to 'who', whose forms come originally from the masculine but are no longer associated with gender, the forms of 'thee' would be:
Nominative - 'thee'
Object - 'tham'
Possessive - 'thas', just like 'who', 'whom', whose'.
The above sentence would then read:
'Each police officer must wear thas gun when on patrol'
where the word "thas" can be thought of as meaning "that one's" and refer to both gender.
Like I said, I am not proposing this form, but this shows how a Personal pronoun could effectively function in Modern English.
<<I'm not clear on what guest's proposal actually is, though. What makes it different from my own masculine/feminine/neuter proposal early in the thread? >>
--This is the original 'guest'--
Well, since the uproar in English over gender seems to be fueled by having to use the masculine as a default (unless otherwise specified) as in 'Each police officer must wear his (/her) gun when on patrol', a Personal gender would satisfy this for both his/her.
It's not necessary to create Masc, Fem, Personal, Non-Personal articles--'the' would still be used for all. However, for third person sing., demonstratives and perhaps relative pronouns yes.
How to create it, and from where, I cannot answer at this time.
Here's an example off the top of my head solely for demonstration purposes. This form is NOT what I am proposing...
'thee' as Personal demonstrative/pronoun for masc & fem, taken from Old English 'thee' (masc) and 'theeo' (fem). Making this pronoun analogous to 'who', whose forms come originally from the masculine but are no longer associated with gender, the forms of 'thee' would be:
Nominative - 'thee'
Object - 'tham'
Possessive - 'thas', just like 'who', 'whom', whose'.
The above sentence would then read:
'Each police officer must wear thas gun when on patrol'
where the word "thas" can be thought of as meaning "that one's" and refer to both gender.
Like I said, I am not proposing this form, but this shows how a Personal pronoun could effectively function in Modern English.
<<guest, you do realize that just such a word exists - "they" - do you ? >>
"They" is being used to fill the gap, but it's illogical and make-shift at best.
I believe we can and should do better...
"They" is being used to fill the gap, but it's illogical and make-shift at best.
I believe we can and should do better...
<<Even stars and mountains change: stars will be bore, live and die and become black holes or brown dwarfes and mountains will be washed to the sea.>>
Apparently, if the Big-Bang fans are right, there are no concrete unchanging things. The "inanimate-unchanging" gender would apply to things that are relatively unchanging, ignoring such fine points as variable stars, Seyfert Galaxies (microvariability), etc.
<<But that's pointless complexity. It serves very little function. Yes, many languages are exactly like that (including Spanish, a language I study), but that doesn't mean that adding such a system would have any practical benefit.>>
But isn't that the whole point? No longer will folks from langauges with complex morphology look down with disdain on English and call it a pidgin or creole langauge. Here's our chance to endow English with the messiest gender system on the planet. :)
<<Well, since the uproar in English over gender seems to be fueled by having to use the masculine as a default (unless otherwise specified) as in 'Each police officer must wear his (/her) gun when on patrol', a Personal gender would satisfy this for both his/her.>>
On the other hand, if you just want to solve this problem, just start using the singular 'they/them/their/thers", as suggested by Travis.
Apparently, if the Big-Bang fans are right, there are no concrete unchanging things. The "inanimate-unchanging" gender would apply to things that are relatively unchanging, ignoring such fine points as variable stars, Seyfert Galaxies (microvariability), etc.
<<But that's pointless complexity. It serves very little function. Yes, many languages are exactly like that (including Spanish, a language I study), but that doesn't mean that adding such a system would have any practical benefit.>>
But isn't that the whole point? No longer will folks from langauges with complex morphology look down with disdain on English and call it a pidgin or creole langauge. Here's our chance to endow English with the messiest gender system on the planet. :)
<<Well, since the uproar in English over gender seems to be fueled by having to use the masculine as a default (unless otherwise specified) as in 'Each police officer must wear his (/her) gun when on patrol', a Personal gender would satisfy this for both his/her.>>
On the other hand, if you just want to solve this problem, just start using the singular 'they/them/their/thers", as suggested by Travis.