Gender in English Grammar

Definition: A grammatical category in which a noun, pronoun, article and adjective is masculine, feminine or neuter. Genders in English are extremely simple, and in any case the gender of a noun only affects its pronoun and possessive adjective.

For example:

• Mary is a doctor. She is a doctor
• Peter is a doctor. He is a doctor.

In nouns
In general there is no distinction between masculine, feminine and neuter in English nouns. However, gender is sometimes shown by different forms or different words.

Different words:

Masculine	Feminine
man father uncle boy husband	woman mother aunt girl wife

Different forms:

Masculine	Feminine
actor prince hero waiter widower	actress princess heroine waitress widow

Some nouns can be used for either a masculine or a feminine subject:

cousin	teenager	teacher	doctor
cook	student	parent	friend
relation	colleague	partner	leader

For example

• Arthur is my teacher. He is my teacher.
• Jane is my teacher. She is my teacher.

It is possible to make the distinction by adding the words "male" or "female".

For example

• a male teacher, a female teacher, etc.