Hebrew Gendering

Fragment of a discussion from User talk:Miekal/LQT
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It really depends on who the scholar is, but yeah, most accept that there are natural language differences which limit things like "what physical gender is a god, if the word itself has a gender".

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?21:22, 22 March 2012

Gender-neutral pronouns are perfect for other-wordly beings like gods. I mean, doesn't "Xe will smite you!" sound much more fitting for a god?

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)21:38, 22 March 2012

no

il'Dictator Mikal21:42, 22 March 2012

yes

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)21:48, 22 March 2012

If it's an otherwordly being, why would you call it anything other than "it"?

Star of David.png Radioactive afikomen Please ignore all my awful pre-2014 comments.22:45, 22 March 2012

Because that's for inanimate objects.

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)01:53, 23 March 2012

it is? we call crabs, 'it', and horses, and eagles, and babies before we know what they are. "What is it?" "it's a girl".

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?02:20, 23 March 2012

And that's terrible.

Why, exactly? Besides, trying to artificially change a language is pretty un-doable. (not a real word, i get).

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?02:40, 23 March 2012

Your chances of changing a language would depend on the language I think. It would obviously be pretty impossible for English because of the large number of speakers but not all languages are so big.

Klingon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:16, 24 March 2012

Actually I was thinking about Batua. It's pretty tightly controlled but not actually "invented".

 

he could create his own like i am.

il'Dictator Mikal19:19, 24 March 2012

My language would be English, but improved.

 

ohh, i'd love to see that. (mind you, i don't think anyone can 'create' a language. some day ask me about espranto)

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:25, 24 March 2012

What changes would you make? just curious. I suspect since this is what started it, "gender" would be gone.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:26, 24 March 2012

Yes, that's the start. The main pronouns would be gender-neutral, but I guess I would also add pronouns to refer to by other features, such as sex, to make things easier. All the words would conform to the same rules (like, to make a word past-tense, you would also use the same suffix).

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)19:34, 24 March 2012

that sounds very constructed and not natural

il'Dictator Mikal19:38, 24 March 2012

Of course.

GodothasArrived (super crazy fun time!)19:39, 24 March 2012

but then its weird and sounds forced

il'Dictator Mikal19:49, 24 March 2012
 
 
 
 

Im creating henai :P but i sdo it at a very slow pace as words i feel lime translating come to me. As for "Language, but improved" thats debatable. removing gender pronouns doesn't "improve it" it just makes the language more gender neutral then it already was.

il'Dictator Mikal19:27, 24 March 2012

No language is 'better" or "improved" any more than a cat is an "improvement" on whatever it evolved from. languages evolve, change to fit the time, the place, the people. As they acquire new words, they might loose some traits, or the other way around.

Having spoken langauges without any gender, as well as languages that gender EVERYTHING, i'm rather happy with english. He for obvious hes, she's for obvious shes, and it for everything else. :_) (though we are hitting a time in society where some things are less obvious, but that's not a problem if we ourselves fucking got over the problems with transgenders, non-genders, etc)

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:40, 24 March 2012
il'Dictator Mikal19:46, 24 March 2012

I don't know german, but in russian it is always based on the sound of the word. In french it is often a case of euphony.

But ask yourself this, do you say "she" to cars, boats, generic gods, etc?

There is a fun linguistic study that shows that in russian, where the gender is defined by the spelling of the word, people will use more feminine sounding adjectives for "female" gendered words, than male, even if describing the same thing. for example "auto" "automobile" "car" "vehicle" are all in some ways the same thing, but are gendered differently in russian. when describing one that has female gender, girly descriptions are more common. not sure what that means... i'm just saying.

Pink mowse.pngGodot What do cats dream about?19:59, 24 March 2012