What this little thread has disclosed is something akin to what I've just
discussed in response to Jonathan's question about the dative. Something
needs to be said quite clearly about grammatical gender early on in the
teaching and learning of any language that has it: namely, that it bears no
consistent or necessary relationship to the gender of creatures--that it is
strictly a GRAMMATICAL category and that the fundamental rules of agreement
require adjectives and pronouns to bear the same gender as the nouns to
which they refer. At the same time one does need to point out that, except
with a few exceptions, English uses the distinct gender pronouns only with
reference to persons (and domestic animals? My experience is that people
refer to a dog or cat of unknown sex usually as "he" or "it").
Consequently, one must distinguish between the gender of a Greek noun that
is masculine, feminine, or neuter, and any putative gender of the person or
thing that is its referent in discourse. And that's a principle that has to
be made quite clear early on.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu OR cconrad@yancey.main.nc.us
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/