Grammatical genders

Question

Hi. I'm from Germany and in our language we have to differ between grammatical genders and real genders. For example: Das Mädchen (the girl) is grammatically handled as "it", although we know a girl will always be female. Another example: Der Baum (the three) is grammatical masculine, although it has no real gender at all.
That is all clear, but what me confuses is that in English there is only one article - the.
the girl, the tree, e. g.
So no genderfication at all. But recently, i've seen a youtube video where a man catched a fish. I've wondered why he said "Wow, this is a big one. Don't let HIM jump back in the water" instead of "Don't let IT jump...".
Furthermorde, Madonna sings in Frozen: "Love is a bird, SHE needs to fly." instead of "IT needs to fly".

So, how does the man know wether the fish is male or female?
And how can madonna that love is female by using "she"?
So that confuses me. I always thought there is no grammatical gender in english at all. So how do i know if i have to say: There is dog. It/He runs fast.
In German we know that by using the article
der - grammatical male
die - grammatical female
das - grammatical it
and has nothing to do with the real gender
but in English theres just "the"

please help me with your knowledge
thanks in advance

Ruslana · Accepted Answer

Hi,

I have no answer to your question, but since your native language is German, I thought you might be interested in the German version of our site as well (English for German speakers):
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Cheers!

Shawn79 · Answer

Hello! I've studied German for several years and have traveled through much of Germany a few times. I'm a Germanophile!

So, yes, I understand your question perfectly.

When it comes to animals, pets for example, if it's a male you can refer to it as "he", if it's a female you can refer to it as "she". I usually refer to animals I don't know as "it" although people often assume a gender for certain animals. For example people often say "he" for dogs

and "she" for cats

. Once they are corrected and know the actual sexual gender, they will use the appropriate pronoun (he or she). In the case of the fish, it was just that person's choice to call it "him".

Inanimate objects, like boats and cars

are sometimes called "she" especially by their male owners. But there's no rule to this. It's usually done when an item is dear to someone. In the old TV show Knight Rider, the talking car was a "he". Madonna, as would probably most people, thought of "love"

as more feminine when personified. She chose to call it "she" for style. This was not a grammatical requirement.

Generally though, unless it's a human being or an animal of known gender, you can call everything else just "it".

Anonymous · Answer

thank you, that helps me a lot =)
Grüße aus Deutschland

Fivejedjon · Answer

It's interesting that although English is fundamentally a Germanic language, the sun is male and the moon female, when they are personified, in the Romance way. The 1962 German pop song 'Lady Sunshine and Mr Moon' sounds very odd to English ears.

Enoon · Answer

Gender is a grammar concept, *** is biological. Gender does not correspond to ***. English does give a tip of the hat to grammatical gender with different forms for some nouns, but the distinction is based on ***, so it's not the same—executor/executrix, actor/actress, waiter/waitress, etc—and nothing around them inflects along with them. (These forms are frowned upon by many as unnecessary and sexist, but I think "waitress", at least, is going to persist. Tthey're pushing "server" as the unisex version). We do have one adjective that actually inflects, blond/blonde, but it's about ***, again.

BarbaraPA · Answer

Thinking about it as "http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/personification" rather than grammatical gender might help.

Shawn79 · Answer

enoonGender is a grammar concept, *** is biological. Gender does not correspond to ***.

This may have been true prior to the 1960's but I am correct by today's definitions casually and medically speaking, gender is synonymous with biological ***, in addition to its meaning as a concept of grammar.

From Dictionary.com, example sentences:

Regardless of gender or religion, the country worked tirelessly as a unit to change their history.
She's almost always treated as a spokeswoman for her gender and her race.

From American Heritage Medical Dictionary:

gender n. The *** of an individual, male or female, based on reproductive anatomy.
Sexual identity, especially in relation to society or culture.

From Collins Dictionary:

gender n. "(informal) the state of being male, female, or neuter"
Synonyms: ***
Example: A person's gender is the fact that they are male or female.

From Online Etymology Dictionary:

gender c.1300, from O.Fr. gendre, from stem of L. genus (gen. generis) "kind, sort, gender," also "***" (see genus); used to translate from Gk. Aristotle's grammatical term genos. As *** took on erotic qualities in 20c., gender came to be used for "*** of a human being," often in feminist writing with reference to social attributes as much as biological qualities; this sense first attested 1963. Gender-bender is first attested 1980, with reference to pop star David Bowie.

Clive · Answer

Hi,

I sometimes wonder if one day we will say
Tom and Mary had gender last night
instead of
Tom and Mary had *** last night.

I have too much time on my hands.

Clive

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