30. Gender.-The classification of nouns as masculine, feminine, and neuter is based upon the sex of the objects which they name. The classification itself is called Gender. Nouns which name male persons or animals, or objects thought of as male, as man, boy, coachman, banker, etc., are of the Masculine Gender. Nouns which name female persons or animals, or objects thought of as female, as woman, girl, maid-servant, priestess, etc., are of the Feminine Gender. Nouns which apply indifferently to either sex, as child, parent, friend, teacher, and nouns which name animals. without indicating sex, as bird, sheep, buffalo, chicken, cat, deer, etc., are of the Common Gender. Nouns which name objects or ideas which are without sex, as house, street, tree, hour, haste, are of the Neuter Gender. 31. There are three ways by which the different genders of nouns are indicated: (1) by the use of separate words; (2) by the use of prefixes denoting gender; (3) by the use of suffixes denoting gender. (1) Gender denoted by separate words.-The number of word-pairs which have grown up for the purpose of distinguishing the masucline and feminine genders is large, and only a comparatively few examples can be given here. Such words have to be learned mainly by experience or by the aid of the dictionary. (2) Gender indicated by prefixes.-Compounds of this character are not very numerous. (3) Gender indicated by suffixes.-After the method of using different words, as described under (1), this is the most common way of indicating differences of gender. The most frequently used feminine-forming suffix is the syllable -ess, the corresponding masculine suffix being -er. The feminine suffix is added directly to the masculine form, or with some slight modification of it. A few other feminine suffixes survive in single words, although they were formerly of much wider application. Such are the syllable -ster in spinster, originally the feminine of spinner, and the syllable -en in vixen, the feminine of fox. The syllable -ine of heroine is a feminine-forming suf fix, but the whole word was merely borrowed from the French. Likewise, the syllable -trix in such word-pairs as executor, masculine, executrix, feminine; testator, masculine, testatrix, feminine; is used in only a few words derived from Latin. The following is a list of some of the words which form their feminines by adding -ess to the masculines. (a) The syllable -ess is added to the masculine without other change: (b) The syllable -ess is added to the masculine in a slightly changed An interesting development in the modern use of gender permits words which were formerly only masculine to be used as common gender, that is, without any implication of sex. Thus the word doctor may now be used of either a male or female practitioner of medicine, the feminine form doctoress or doctress not being used at all. Likewise the words author, teacher, artist, pianist, and many more, may apply to either a man or a woman. Yet the limits of use are somewhat sharply defined. One may speak of a female writer as an author, but hardly of a female writer of verse as a poet. 32. Personification.-In our definition of gender (30) it was said that objects thought of as males were of the masculine gender, objects thought of as females, of the feminine gender. It thus happens that inanimate objects entirely without sex are given the characteristics of living persons or animals. Thus a ship is often spoken of as she, as is the moon, the sun being usually referred to as though it were a male being. In poetry, especially, it is common to treat inanimate objects, or even ideas, as though they were persons: thus hope, faith, peace, time, night, dawn, and many other words are referred to by he or she. This process of ascribing the characteristics of persons to inanimate objects or ideas is called Personification. The personified words are frequently capitalized like proper nouns, and are referred to by personal pronouns. EXAMPLES: 1. Thou too sail on, O Ship of State! 2. When Duty whispers low, "Thou must," 3. Yet Hope had never lost her youth; She did not look through dimmer eyes; Because he felt so fixed in truth. -TENNYSON, In Memoriam. 4. But sometimes Virtue starves, while Vice is fed. -POPE, Essay on Man. NOTE. A third classification of nouns according to their meaning as Concrete and Abstract is sometimes made by grammarians. According to this classification, names of objects which can be perceived by the senses of hearing, seeing, etc., like ship, house, river, music, etc., are called Concrete Nouns; names of ideas which have existence in thought only, like hope, patience, mercy, etc., and of qualities of objects thought of apart from the objects themselves, like whiteness, warmth, splendor, are called Abstract Nouns. This classification, however, has no grammatical significance, and the attempt to carry it out consistently on logical grounds results in many serious difficulties. 33. Inflection.-Inflection has already been defined (3) as the variations in the form of a word to indicate corresponding variations in meaning. Inflection may be shown in four different ways: (a) By a change in the radical vowel of a word. EXAMPLES: one man, ten men; I sing, I sang; I find, I found. (b) By the addition of a letter or a syllable. EXAMPLES: one house, ten houses; I wish, I wished; smooth, smoother, smoothest; poet, poetess. (c) By the use of several words closely combined so as to form a phrase. EXAMPLES: I go, I shall go, I shall have gone; smooth, more smooth, most smooth. (d) By the use of entirely different words. EXAMPLES: I go, I went; I am, I was; good, better, best. |