Comments on: Gender issues (with nouns)

By: Josephine

Josephine — Tue, 10 Aug 2010 20:28:25 +0000

Hi Benny, I have just read your article on genders. You have encouraged me greatly — I mean, I can recognise a Spanish gender by reading/writing it, but I had my first conversation with a native online friend just yesterday, and I got everything muddled up! It was so embarrassing! However, she was really kind about it and so patient with me, so I guess it wasn't too bad.

I guess I just wanted to share that anecdote

By: Puneet

Puneet — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 23:20:38 +0000

Bwnny, and tips for recognizing gender in German?

By: Jay

Jay — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 01:18:32 +0000

Yes, and like you already mentioned, words from the same language family (eg romance languages, german languages, slavic languages) tend to have the same “root” and the same gender as well.

So once you know the gender in french, you can apply it to spanish/italian, … most of the time.

By: Jay

Jay — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 01:18:09 +0000

Yes, and like you already mentioned, words from the same language family (eg romance languages, german languages, slavic languages) tend to have the same “root” and the same gender as well.

So once you know the gender in french, you can apply it to spanish/italian, … most of the time.

By: Sean Rasmussen

Sean Rasmussen — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 00:34:24 +0000

If you have an iPhone or iPod Touch, I can suggest an inexpensive app
that I've recently made; it helps you 'internalize' the 'rules' of identifying the gender of 95% of french nouns.

www.reflexarium.com

Regards,
Sean

By: Rick Standton

Rick Standton — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 01:56:43 +0000

Agreed.

Telling a director in public in Spanish that I was very aroused by the next project has made me never forget the difference between “excitado” and “emocionado.”

By: ALicia

ALicia — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 23:24:40 +0000

I love the pic.

By: Li(n)keable 08 November - Lexiophiles

Li(n)keable 08 November - Lexiophiles — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 10:04:10 +0000

[...] Gender issues (with nouns) [...]

By: Benny the Irish polyglot

Benny the Irish polyglot — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:52:48 +0000

Precisely why I don't like “friend”. I want to know if they are going out on a date, or if the cousin they are going to introduce me to is female so I can potentially ask her out

By: troy

troy — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:30:29 +0000

Or in my field “error correcting codes” It's a cute (geeky) idea, but I'm not sure how much water the argument holds in reality….in what conversation would you confuse a bridge with a comb?!

I actually like the ambiguity of “friend” in English. You can be quite coy about your plans by saying “I'm going out with a friend” and no one will know if it is a date or not!

By: Benny the Irish polyglot

Benny the Irish polyglot — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:56:43 +0000

In engineering we call that redundancy – it's handy when any electronic device (computer, mobile phone, etc.) needs to send information, it repeats certain segments so that if any of it is damaged along the way the actual information itself is still intact. Being a geek myself, I agree with your friend's analysis I find English to be lacking when we say “friend” or “cousin” and it's not clear what gender that person is; other languages have more core information in sentences. I quite like it that way

By: troy

troy — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:24:14 +0000

It's unfortunate that this concept is called “gender”…there'd be so much less frustration if it were just called “type-1″ and “type-2″ words or something. Then you wouldn't feel weird that bridges are “feminine” (ponte) and combs are “masculine” (pente).

I once met a guy that had an interesting take on genders. I was complaining about how the gender adds no information content, so why have it at all? But he responded in true geek fashion–they DO have information content: suppose you're talking on a noisy phone line and hear “blah blah O P-???-NTE blah blah” Were they talking about a comb or a bridge? Well, if you hear the “o” you know they are talking about a comb!

By: Terry Selder

Terry Selder — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:46:01 +0000

In Spanish, the appropriate article mostly comes naturally, I think. Especially if you learn the words with adjectives. I love the repeating vowels in for example “vuestra hermana bonita”. I am fluent in Danish (I am Dutchman, living in Denmark), and I haven't experienced the word gender as a problem either. I think that is because the definite article is used as an affix. For example:
Hus = house. Huset = The house. Mand = man. Manden = The man.
It becomes part of the word in Danish, Swedish and Norwegian.

Now I am learning Finnish, I don't have to deal with articles and word genders, as Finnish doesn't have them. Even hän can mean both he or she. But all that hardly makes Finnish more accessible! Without grammar, you are getting nowhere, as a simple mistake can change the meaning of the sentence because of the absence of prepositions and the presence of 14 cases.

Good luck with your project, Benny!

Best wishes from a fellow non-drinker!

Terry

By: Geoff

Geoff — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:32:49 +0000

Thanks for the tips on gender Ben. I look forward to trying that when I learn my next language. You’re right in thinking that a lot of the learning that is necessary when taking on a new language can be hindered by HOW you think about the language and the best way of learning it rather than the flesh and bones of the language itself. You’ve helped me to start meta-thinking, but was wondering if you had any tips on coming to understand the way that different cases are used in languages. Like Terry above, I’m learning a Finno-Ugric language (Estonian in my case) and the use of cases such as genitive and partitive is reasonably foreign to my English speaking brain (apart of course from the use of genitive to denote ownership eg. Ben’s blog) . There are rules about this of course, and perhaps my Estonian course hasn’t delved into this topic deeply enough yet, but I just wondered if you had experience with this and how you got it sorted out in your own speedy fashion.

By: Geoff

Geoff — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 19:32:00 +0000

By: splogsplog

splogsplog — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:32:43 +0000

I agree that making mistakes IN PUBLIC is vital. Whenever I have made mistakes when studying on my own or with close friends, I might notice them, but rarely learn from them. However, make a mistake in public, and have it pointed out – well, the embarrassment shocks my brain into never making that mistake again.

By: Balint

Balint — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:55:30 +0000

You're right, I got you wrong. This blog (and your methods) are about speed and efficiency. I, personally, don't find it boring to listen/watch/read things many times and I agree that knowing the rules can't hurt. Sometimes I flick through grammar books, just to reinforce my knowledge. To be honest, I don't think that one should choose only one method and stick with it. I enjoy experiencing with new approaches, and that is why I usually take your advise, knowing that you are an experienced person in the language learning field. But I also think that combining different techniques from different experienced language learners could be the best way to go.

By the way: genders. I took your advice about word memorization, and when I meet a new word in Spanish I want to memorize, I make up a story in my mind and if it the word is masculine, I imagine that the weather is bad, and if it is feminine, the weather is nice and warm, therefore link the gender to the weather of the environment of the memory. Works for me.

PS: Nice design!

By: Benny the Irish polyglot

Benny the Irish polyglot — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:21:27 +0000

By the way, hope you like my new comment interface!! I know the other one let you edit posts afterwards, but this one is more social with other sites. Let me know what you think of it

By: benny

benny — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:01:14 +0000

Thanks for your stimulating comment as always Bailint! As you know, I am definitely not a fan of the pure-input method I would rather study the rules (for an entire half an hour (!!!)), then actually speak with people and get it wrong once and then never get it wrong again after being corrected. The whole point is that I don’t stop and ponder, I just speak. Once you learn the rules, and apply them a couple of times it does become natural and you can even abandon the rules themselves. The pure input method may require a lot of repetition and it has no emotional value in it (the embarrassment of using the word wrong in the field is huge motivation for me to remember the right way permanently).
The pure input method starkly conflicts with my immersion method of two-way communication. Pure input may get the job done, but it is not at all compatible with a blog called “Fluent in 3 months“. I’m about efficiency and SPEED. Getting out there and making mistakes is the quickest way to fluency, and I still find the pure input method to be a good way for timid people to just avoid making mistakes, which is crucial to making progress and getting used to actually speaking the language quickly. I don’t doubt that hearing it thousands of times will help it sink in, but I’m much too impatient to listen to something thousands of times before it becoming part of my knowledge. Frankly, life is too short
Then again I won’t be pushing this too much (with regards noun genders), this is a minor post with just a handy mentality adjustment for beginner learners I thought I should mention
I’m glad you are taking both my advice and the input method equally under consideration. I’m sure it gives you good perspective. However my experience tells me to avoid it and stick with communication as a means of improving my level; the whole purpose of learning languages in the first place!

By: benny

benny — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:01:00 +0000