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un rosso libro = a book that is red (the marked case; it is especially important to the intended meaning that the book is red, as opposed to some other color) un buon uomo = a good man (the unmarked case) un uomo buono = a man who is good (the marked case; it is especially important to the intended meaning that he is good, the adjective is ...
Many nouns ending in -e preceded by double consonants are also masculine (e.g. un cadre, un arbre, un signe, un meuble). Nonetheless, a noun that seems masculine judging by its ending might actually be feminine e.g., la peau 'the skin', une dent 'a tooth' or vice versa e.g., le coude 'the elbow', un squelette 'a skeleton' are masculine.
The Italian word scimmia ("ape") is feminine, whereas the Spanish word simio is masculine. The French word mer is feminine, but the Spanish cognate mar is generally masculine (except in some poetic contexts and among sea workers [39]), whereas the Catalan cognate mar can be masculine or feminine
However, in many cases the names for baby animals are not diminutives—that is, unlike chaton/chat or chiot/chien, they are not derived from the word for the adult animal: poulain, foal (an adult horse is a cheval); agneau, lamb (an adult sheep is un mouton or either une brebis, a female sheep, or un bélier, a male sheep). French is not ...
Job titles have a masculine and a feminine version in Russian, though in most cases the feminine version is only used in colloquial speech. The masculine form is typically treated as "unmarked", i.e. it does not necessarily imply that the person is male, while the feminine form is "marked" and can only be used when referring to a woman. In some ...
The same can happen in French with the epicene elided singular articles (l'), the definite (les) and indefinite (des) plural articles, and the contractions aux (à + les) and des (de + les) when in contact with the noun, so the adjective takes the task of marking the gender:
French has a T-V distinction in the second person singular. That is, it uses two different sets of pronouns: tu and vous and their various forms. The usage of tu and vous depends on the kind of relationship (formal or informal) that exists between the speaker and the person with whom they are speaking and the age differences between these subjects. [1]
This leads to sentences such as (5a) in English, and (6a) in French. Example of gender-neutral masculine: English (5) a. If anybody comes, tell him. masculine him used to refer to a person of unknown sex b. *If anybody comes, tell her. feminine her is not used to refer to a person of unknown sex Example of collective masculine: French (6) a.