French:Gender
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French |
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French, like many Romance languages, has two genders: masculine and feminine. Both genders help to determine grammatical items such as adjective and article agreement.
| Masculine | Feminine | Masculine (plural) | Feminine (plural) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Definite article | le | la | les | les |
| Indefinite article | un | une | des | des |
| Adjective (-)1 | joli | jolie | jolis | jolies |
| Adjective (-el) | personnel | personnelle | personnels | personnelles |
| Adjective (-er, -et)2 | cher | chère | chers | chères |
| Adjective (-c) | blanc | blanche | blancs | blanches |
| Adjective (-eux) | heureux | heureuse | heureux | heureuses |
- Though the most regularly occurring form of adjective, this is not standard throughout the French language, and should be used only as a guideline.
- The last "e" will take a grave accent, and the rest is formed regularly.
Below are examples listed for each permutation of gender.
| Noun (English) | Noun (French) | Definite | Indefinite | joli | heureux | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Masculine | man | homme | l'homme | un homme | joli homme | homme heureux |
| Feminine | tortoise | tortue | la tortue | une tortue | jolie tortue | tortue heureuse |
| Masculine (plural) | dogs | chiens | les chiens | des chiens | jolis chiens | chiens heureux |
| Feminine (plural) | cows | vaches | les vaches | des vaches | jolies vaches | vaches heureuses |
Certain endings usually come with the same gender with some exceptions, of course (not all exceptions are listed).
| Gender | Examples | Exceptions | |
|---|---|---|---|
| -ée | feminine | l'arrivée - arrival, la cuvée - vintage; | le trophée - trophey |
| -age | masculine | le chômage - unemployment, le courage - courage | exception: la page - page, la rage - rage |
| -ise | feminine | la franchise - franchise/frankness | none |
| -tude | feminine | l'exactitude - exactness, la certitude - certainty | none |
| -ment | masculine | le mouvement - movement, le parlement - parliament | exception: la jument - mare |
| -ité | feminine | la sérénité - serenity, la diversité - diversity | none |
| -tion | feminine | la natation - swimming, la promotion - promotion | none |
| -eur | masculine (in reference to professions, machines and such) | le professeur - professor, teacher | none |
| -eur | feminine (in reference to concepts etc.) | la chaleur - warmth, heat | none |
| -isme | masculine | le réalisme - realism, le nationalisme - nationalism | none |
| -iste | masculine or feminine (depending on sex) | le/la réaliste - realist | none |
| -ie | feminine | la superficie - surface/area | none |
| -eau | masculine | le corbeau - raven | l'eau - water |
| -ance | feminine | la finance - finance | none |
 French pages
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| Introduction · Pronouns · Gender · Verbs |
| Italic Languages | |||||
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| Latino-Faliscan | Faliscan | ||||
 Latin
| Italo-Dalmatian |  Corsican,  Dalmatian,  Istriot,  Italian,  Neapolitan,  Sicilian
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| Eastern Romance |  Moldovan,  Romanian
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| Southern Romance |  Sardian,
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| Western Romance | Pyrenean-Mozarabic | Aragonese, Mozarabic | |||
| Gallo-Iberian | Langues d'oïl | French
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| Occitano-Romance | |||||
| Gallo-Italian | |||||
| Ibero-Romance | West Iberian |  Galician,  Leonese,  Spanish,  Portuguese
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| East Iberian |  Catalan
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| Rhaeto-Romance |  Friulian,  Ladin,  Romansh
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| Oscan | Sabine, South Picene, Oscan | ||||
| Umbrian | Aequian, Marsian, Umbrian, Volscian | ||||
| Vestinian | Vestinian | ||||
