Re: gender in English

On Wed, 6 Sep 2000, SMITH,MARCUS ANTHONY wrote:

> On Wed, 6 Sep 2000, Muke Tever wrote:
>
> > You might say nouns and adjectives are zero-marked for gender in English
> > (yes, except on pronouns), but it's definitely there, even if it's only
> > natural gender and not grammatical gender.   Frex:
>
> Another point to think about: the gender we typically assign to
> personifications and anthropomophisms often corresponds to the Old English
> gender. For example, Death is a male; in children's stories dogs are
> usually male, cats female. And the Moon has a man in it, not a woman.
> Makes sense if English has gender for all its nouns, but is much more
> lenient in enforcing them.
<wry g>  I hadn't known that.  I tend to think of Death as female, but I
can't tell you why.  In Korean folklore the moon has two rabbits in it.
=^p  I'm not aware of any gender-associations for the rabbits, though.

YHL