Moria: you didn’t learn the sign for girl?
Perhaps that’s what Handy was referring to in her discussion about gender in SL.
In general, Lawrence is right in that a linguist would indeed assign ‘gender’ specificity to nouns. From a linguistic standpoint the term ‘gender’ has the meaning of “kind”, and there are (in English) debatably sixteen such mutually exclusive catagories usually called ‘Gender Classes.’
In terms of the more familiar connotation of ‘gender’ assigning sexuality, only a relative few languages embed or affix the assignment in the noun (Spanish, French, German, and Latin being the ones that spring most readily to mind), with most preferring to make the direct assignment through the pronoun. It should be noted that there is a raging debate concerning whether gender assignment in nouns is by design or simply arbitrary.
Interestingly, both sides like to compare the ‘three class’ cases (Latin and German, which assign masculine, feminine, and neuter) and the ‘two class’ cases (French and Spanish, which assign masculine and feminine, but not neuter) with Dutch, which although technically a case of ‘two class’ assignment, assigns only common and neuter, rather than masculine and feminine. (Ye may draw yer own conclusions on the whys and wherefores, as I’m sure many of you smart alecks will.)
Using the pronoun to make the assignment of ‘catagory’ seems to make the most sense, though some have taken the idea a tad overboard. The Cherokee pronoun system is so complex that it actually makes distinctions between “you and I,” “another person and I,” several other people and I," and “you, one or more other persons, and I,” rather than simply saying “we” and allowing the context to refine the meaning.
Dr. Watson
“Etymology is a kind of tyranny, leading you places you may not want to go.”
ramorris points out that spoken Mandarin does not distinguish between he and she (or it, for that matter).
Lawrence points out that English is indeed ‘gendered,’ but that we don’t notice it since most nouns are gendered logically (masculine for males, feminine for females, neuter for most objects).
The interesting confluence of these observations - and the frustrating thing for a native English speaker conversing with a Chinese ESL student or recent immigrant - can be found in the way (most, until they’ve practiced enough, which is A LOT) Chinese confuse masculine and feminine WITH RESPECT TO SPECIFIC HUMAN INDIVIDUALS BEING REFERENCED, which individuals might even be present at the conversation. When assigning a pronoun to a person, the Chinese speaker seems equally likely to say “he” as “she” regardless of the individual’s actual (or apparent) gender. More confusing, a given PERSON being spoken of often ‘switches’ from him to her, or he to she, (even multiple times) IN THE SAME SENTENCE. It, on the other hand, seems to cause little confusion (at least for inanimate objects).
I am often puzzled by how the morphologies of all the languages I have some vague knowledge of have broken down. Spanish and French both have much simpler conjugations and declensions than Latin and Greek.
While I don’t mean to suggest that any complexity is lost, it seems odd that grammar was a more complicated issue in antiquity than in our modern era.
So far, the best explanation I’ve heard is the one about different languages dropping morphological complexity as they merge. I think English has been through more merging than any other single language.
Perhaps a lurking linguist could provide a more circumspect answer?
In Tagalog (i bring it up a lot in these linguistic discussions, because that’s the onlyother language besides Spanish which i’ve had instruction in), there are no pronouns that are separate for he and she. There is also no pronoun for “it” either. My relatives will often confuse he and she. For instance, my Grandmother was talking about my uncle, and she said “She is visiting your aunty in Hawaii”. I never really understood that until I read up on Tagalog.
The Chinese also have a hell of a time learning English, because in Chinese languages, tense is only marked when it cannot be distinguished from Context.
It’s worth the risk of burning, to have a second chance…
I have nothing to contribute here. I’d just like to point out that Ramorris is right about nouns not being gendered in Mandarin and to say I was really hoping to get to be the one to say that.
–John, the OTHER Chinese student with only one semester’s training.
Yeah, but arguably not as hard a time as the average English speaker seems to have learning “Chinese.” (Learning Chinese is like learning European - which language do you mean?) At least you can learn tenses (declination?) from a book - it’s DANG HARD to train your ear to hear tones if you haven’t been broadly exposed to them before about age 7 (up to age 15 for those gifted in “language”).
Also, “Yesterday I go to the store” or “I want to shopping” still make enough sense in English to get the meaning across. Mixing tones in Mandarin usually results in pure gibberish - or worse.