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Chapter 12 - Grammatical Gender in Modern Germanic Languages

from Part II - Morphology and Agreement Systems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 March 2020

By
Sebastian Kürschner
Edited by
Michael T. Putnam  and
B. Richard Page
Michael T. Putnam
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
B. Richard Page
Affiliation:
Pennsylvania State University
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Summary

Grammatical gender in modern Germanic languages displays strong variation. Some languages retain three adnominal genders (e.g., German, Icelandic), others reduced the system to two genders, usually by a merger of masculine and feminine gender (e.g., Dutch, Swedish). In English and Afrikaans, adnominal gender is completely lost. Pronominal gender, on the other hand, does not always reflect adnominal gender, and is retained in at least three genders in all Germanic languages. The chapter starts from the presentation of lexical gender systems in Germanic languages and dialects, reflecting the relevant assignment criteria. It then turns to pronominal gender systems, showing that mismatches, specifically between adnominal and pronominal genders, can result in a re-organization of gender systems. Since many Germanic languages retain a second class of nouns next to gender, namely declension classes, the interrelation between gender and inflection classes is subject of a final section before conclusions are drawn.

Keywords

genderarticlespronounsdeclension classagreementindividuation hierarchyonymic gender
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Handbook of Germanic Linguistics , pp. 259 - 281
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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