Teaching the gender

HOW TEACHING FOREIGN STUDENTS CAN LEAD TO QUESTIONING ONE'S CULTURAL IDENTITY

When I was requested to participate in the conference celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Language Department at Makerere University (on August 22nd, 2014), a lot of memories came to my mind, as I spent  there 8 academic years in the 1980s, teaching French as a foreign language to students, quite often beginners. I remembered a problem I met regularly, and which puzzled me quite often.

Why is this word masculine or feminine?

When you teach French to total beginners, you bring in a basic vocabulary, and you ask your students to learn :

            le bureau, la table, le stylo, la salle, le livre, la porte, la chaise

And always, unless they dared not, the students, feeling confused, would ask: WHY ?? why LE here, and LA there??

Then, in a very masterly tone, you tell them that we use LE when nouns are masculine, and LA when nouns are feminine. But it does not solve the problem at all. Because immediately comes again the question WHY?? What is masculine about STYLO? the phallic shape? but what about LIVRE? what is feminine about TABLE? the long legs? but what about PORTE?

At first I would attempt explanations which do not work, skirt the problem, show authority: it is like that, learn it, full stop.

But still it makes you think, ask yourself questions you never considered before. Because for a native speaker it is so obvious. A book is masculine, a chair is feminine. You are taught that from P1, or even before at home. When a toddler, uttering your first words, you were corrected : No, say “une table”, not “un table”, And you did.

But for foreign students, it could be a discouraging mystery. They want to understand, they have an idea about masculine and feminine in life, they try to make the connection, and feel frustrated. I know – and I was confirmed when talking to several of you – that this issue makes many students hate learning French, and often drop it. So, what is to be done?

The gender of nouns in the French language

Let’s go back to some basics of French.

In French, there are 2 genders, called “Masculine” and “Feminine”. We don’t have NEUTER. In France, one has to choose one’s side: no middle way.

The gender of the noun is very important, because it affects determiners (articles, demonstrative, possessives, etc.), pronouns, adjectives (which agree with the noun, unlike in English), the verb sometimes when used with an  auxiliary.

     Le stylo est vert. Il est posé sur la table.

     La règle est verte. Elle est posée sur la table.

“Masculine” and “Feminine” refer (at least metaphorically) to a reality in nature: the sexual differentiation among individuals of a same species. But what about nouns referring to realities with no gender connotation – no sexual differentiation? Are there any rules,is there any way to understand or explain the distribution into genders?

Let’s consider some examples.

Names of animals

Sometimes, the noun changes for male and female. It applies to a few familiar animals: pets and farm animals, game. Obviously, this differentiation goes back far into the past, to the Middle Ages, and refers to the daily life of the time.

   Un chien, une chienne – un chat, une chatte –

   Un taureau ou un bœuf, une vache – un  cheval  ,une jument,

    une poule-un coq, un lapin,    une lapine

   Un cerf, une biche -- un sanglier, une laie -- un loup, une louve – un lion, une lionne

But for all other species, more than 98%, there is only one word, either masculine or feminine – randomly -, and you have to add “male” or “femelle” to stress the difference:

     un pigeon, une souris, une girafe, un aigle, un hippopotame, une antilope

     LE perroquet, le marabout                    LA cigogne, la pintade
     LE pigeon, le paon                               LA colombe, la grue couronnée
     LE capitaine, le tilapia                           LA carpe, la morue
     LE ver de terre, le batracien                  LA limace, la grenouille
     LE scorpion, le hanneton                       LA fourmi, la cigale,

Names of countries :

Even countries are either Masculine or Feminine.

   LE Canada        LA France                       LE Kenya               LA Tanzanie
   LE Maroc          LA Tunisie                      LE Pakistan           LA Birmanie
   LE Honduras     LA Guyane                      LE Soudan             LA Guinée

But the same country can be both:

   LE Royaume Uni                                      LA Grande Bretagne           

Apparently, there is a differentiation. When the name of the country (in French) ends with –e, the country is feminine, if not, it is masculine (with the exception at least of Mexico - LE Mexique – don’t ask me why).

But is Uganda more masculine than France ?

A few interesting or  funny cases:

 The same reality can have 2 names nouns of a different gender

Just to mention 2 cases of such homonymy.. There are so many others:

   Un cartable, une serviette – un tube, une durite

In the military field:

Nouns, as expected, are masculine:

   Un capitaine, un sergent, un officier, un soldat, un artilleur, un sapeur,

But you also find

   une sentinelle (sentry), une estafette (courier), une ordonnance (orderly, batman)

Why ? Though not heroic, those positions have never been a gay preserve.

Sexual organs

We have so many names for them in French. But interestingly enough, the nouns for the male organ are either masculine or feminine

   Un v…, une b…, un b…, la v…, le z…, la p…, etc.

And the same applies to the female organ :

   Un v…, une c…, une m…, la p…, le c…, le m…, la p…, etc.

Decency forbids me to be more explicit, but you have them in mind, and many more.

In conclusion

There is nothing like any explanation to be given, nothing like a guide line to help the learner.

Nouns in French are “masculine” or “feminine” just at random, irrationally- May be the blame can be put on the ancient Latin speakers, from whom we inherited. But they had a neuter, which, unlike in English or German, we abandoned and distributed the neuter nouns into our two Masculine and Feminine categories in an incomprehensible way.

The reality of the language

Classes of nouns

In a dramatic Cartesian move, let us abandon our beliefs, criticize them, and look at the language itself, without any prejudice or the traditional categories.

In French, there are 2 classes of nouns .The only characteristic which actually differentiates them is that each class uses a different set of words, or paradigm (determiners -articles, interrogative, possessives, etc.-, pronouns -personal, possessive, etc.-) they go or agree with.

One class will use le, un, mon, ce, il, celui-ci, or agree as beau, vert, écrit, etc.

One class will use la, une, ma, cette,elle, celle-ci, or agree as belle, verte, écrite, etc.

The other way round, a noun belongs to this or that class according to whether it fits with le, un, mon, etc.  paradigm, or la, une, ma, etc. paradigm.

I use here the term of class of noun which is the one used for describing Bantu languages, where there are usually more than 2. In Kiswahili for instance, you can find the m-/wa- class (mtu, watu – mzee, wazee), the ki-/vi class (kitabu/vitabu), the ji-/ma- class (jicho/macho), and several other classes,where each commands agreements:

   Mzee wangu mzuri           Wazee wangu wazuri           (my elder(s) is/are fine)

   Kitabu changu kizuri       Vitabu vyangu vizuri            (my book(s) is/are nice)

   Jicho langu zuri               Macho yangu mazuri            (my eye(s) is/are good)

In spite of the fact that we have a prefix in Kiswahili and a detached determiner in French, the systems are quite similar. Thus, the category of class of nouns to describe the French language too looks relevant.

In French, it will also imply the agreement of the adjectives or verbal participles

Which nouns belong to which class?

Now, if the go back to consider  the question, is it 100% randomly? Not really.

It happens that most nouns with a male gender connotation belong to one class (aka “masculine”), together with so many more nouns without any gender connotation at all. And most nouns with a female gender connotation belong to the other class.(aka “feminine”). It applies in about 99% of cases, but not always, as we mentioned earlier.

In both classes of nouns, those with gender connotation are a small minority. Yet, the whole class of nouns is usually, traditionally named, in French grammars, after that small part of it.

In fact, it is a kind of metonymy which is not acknowledged. Taken for granted. Ideological, in fact.

Naming the classes of nouns

Talking in terms of classes of nouns, as described above, should imply to abandon the use of the words “masculine” and “feminine”, as confusing and irrelevant to describe the reality they refer to.  What to replace them by?

Let us discard A and B, or 1 and 2, etc. as they imply a hierarchy, an order, a superiority of one over the other.

In a previous note of blog  (see “Et ta soeure ? – Elle bat le beur.” - ) I proposed  to name one class of noun # (hash) and the other class of nouns * (star).

Why ? (1) Those signs, though not in the alphabet, are now found in each and every handset keyboard. (2) There is no hierarchy between them. (3) As in French we say UN dièse (#) et UNE étoile (*), each can easily symbolize the class it belongs to.

Anyway, this is just a proposal, with a pinch of salt. But talking of classes of nouns (and NO LONGER about “masculine” and “feminine”) could make things easier when teaching foreigners. Especially when it corresponds to a reality they are used to in their own vernacular languages. They will not get confused if you refer them to what they know. They will not ask any longer the “WHY?” question: you have to know which class a noun belongs to. Period.

But in France, proposing to drop Masculine and Feminine from Grammar cannot even be suggested. I don’t know who would dare utter such a change, as this idea is a mere abomination.

Why such a resistance ?

For centuries these categories (Masculine/Feminine) have been and are still imposed on French speakers. We drink them from the mother’s breast.

They are self imposed. A form of alienation, as we are not conscious of it. We take it as a matter of fact. A kind of accepted servitude, as La Boetie would say..

That nouns are either masculine or feminine is as obvious as the sun is bright and the night is dark. At school, we learn that rule : “le masculin l’emporte sur le feminin” – the masculine prevails over the feminine … And indeed, in French, you have :

   Paul est beau. Jeanne est belle.

   Jeanne, Sophie, Marie, Dorothée, Agnès, … (+ 50 girls), sont belles.

   Jeanne, Sophie, Paul, Marie, Dorothée, Agnès… (+ 50 girls), sont beaux..

However numerous the feminine nouns may be, the agreement will be masculine if there is but one noun of this case in the list. That is what the language says about the reality of life.

Those categories (M/F) imply – and spread – certain ideas about gender differences, and their respective roles – not so much in the language as in the society. Saying # prevails over * is meaningless. But the“masculine prevails over the feminine” tells a lot.

Language is not in a vacuum, it is the language of a society.

It is informed by the values and uses of that society. Social, ideological, religious values. It embodies the “UNCONSCIOUS” of the society. As a native speaker, one thinks through the values one is unconsciously imposed upon by the language.

A language is a “vision of the world”. Then, what one sees around comes as self evident, when the truth is that one sees the world through the particular lenses of one’s own language (or languages).

As the French philosopher Louis Althusser puts it : “Ce que je pense n’est que l’effet de ce que j’impense.” (what I think is…)

Thus teaching a language is also teaching those values enshrined in the language itself.

Teaching a language to native speakers is a way of socializing them into the society, by transmitting those values. It is part of community or citizen building.

Teaching a foreign language is a way to help the learner to discover a different world, or a world seen from a different perspective. To discover some values which are not his – and that he is invited to share, or at least feel, be sensitive to, if he wants to be fluent.

 (All those statements after all are commonplaces).

The point I wanted to make here is that grammar, too, participates in transmitting values.

Anyone would think that grammar is just ideologically neutral, but this is not true, as the topic we explored today demonstrates.

Grammar is not a scientific discourse about a language. It does not objectively describe an object called a language, as an entomologist would describe an insect.

Grammar enunciates a way the language should be looked at – not necessarily as it is. It is ideological. It is an interpretation of the language. It is the way a society looks at its own language, as it expresses its explicit or implicit values. Grammar is a mirror displaying not the image of a language, but the image that a society has of itself. A kind of selfie.

Then, teaching grammar contributes to strengthening this image, to transmitting values and representations. It is meant for the native speakers, for the strengthening of the social cohesion and transmission. In a kind of inner bondage.

 But also teaching a foreign language can give the opportunity to break the illusion, to have a distanciated view. The teacher of a foreign language is not locked in the ideological circle. He can have a look at the language from the outside. He does not have to adhere to the image the native speakers have of the language he teaches. I would even say: he must not.

Freud showed that an outsider is necessary to allow one to dilute one’s fantasies and cope positively with the reality. This is the meaning of psychoanalysis. The same idea can be applied to the teacher of a foreign language. If he has a critical eye, if he remains an outsider, looking from the outside, he will be in a position to point to the discrepancies between a language and the idea the native speakers have of their own language. And then help the latter out of some illusions.

You teach a foreign language. The language does not belong to you. You have to teach it as it is. As the speakers speak it. But when teaching your students, you don’’t have to adopt submissively the image the native speakers have of their own language. It may be deceitful. Allow yourself to have original approaches. Dare. Use unhesitatingly  the similarities with the languages your students speak, if it helps them, as I said earlier. Be critical with the grammar and methods coming from the native speakers, they are meant for their own use.

Gender and societal changes

Life is change and movement. Societies change a lot, more and more and especially these days, in so many areas. Among other major changes in the last 50 years, in France and in the Western world at large : the gender equality issue.

The language is conservative, it changes more slowly than societies. But yet, it is affected. How does the French language adjust to the progress of gender equality?

The changes in French

As any other language, French changes, according to what the native speakers do with it. Some new words appear, some are no longer used. All sorts of influences play their part.

There are also the prescribers, those with some authority to propose changes.

Stephane Mallarmé assigned this task to the poets : “Donner un sens plus pur aux mots de la tribu” (give a clearer meaning to the tribe’s words). Additionally, France is may be the only country in the world where the language is political and ruled by the law. The National Assembly debates on language issues.

So, how are the societal evolutions (gender equality) being translated into the language, and grammar ? Let’s take an example.

The names of jobs and positions

Women have had gradually access to many – most - jobs which had always been men’s monopolies or preserves. Most of them have “masculine names”, without any feminine equivalent, which is very much resented by women in these positions.

   Un ingénieur, un professeur, un soudeur, un charpentier, un bijoutier, un pasteur,
   un maçon, un auteur, un écrivain

Yet there are many cases, in French, when names of jobs have a feminine equivalent :

   Un infirmier     Une infirmière               Un danseur           Une danseuse
   Un instituteur   Une institutrice            Un marchand        Une marchande
   Un postier        Une postière                  Un paysan             Une paysanne

Une sage-femme (midwife) does not have a masculine form.

But in many cases, the corresponding feminine form does not refer to a woman in charge but to « the wife of »  :

   Le boulanger    la boulangère                 Le général             la générale

   L’ambassadeur l’ambassadrice               Le maire                la mairesse (horrible)

Some have got a very different meaning, always derogatory:

   Un entraîneur  une entraîneuse             Un professionnel  une professionnelle

   Un rapporteur une rapporteuse            Un maître             une maîtresse

There have been attempts : Madame le Maire, Madame le Ministre – with the use of feminine agreements.

But that was not enough for some feminist activists.

A grammatical nonsense : adding a final -e

We are taught in Primary school that you turn an adjective into feminine by adding a final –e. This is a big simplification, as the reality is much more complex. But it produces a fantasy somewhere at the back of the minds: final –e = feminine..

Thus a trend (somehow officialized) to add a final –e to nouns of jobs or positions when one refers to a woman :

une écrivaine, une auteure, une procureure

(mind that you find it only with prestigious jobs : une fraiseure, une facteure, une soudeure are nowhere to be read)

As a consequence, many writers and journalists use these forms, to sound women lib friendly, or gender correct.

Personally it hurts my ears and my feeling of the language. As a false note in a sweet and familiar music. The addition of this final –e is pure fetishism.

It is nothing but a myth. And a nonsense, considering the history and uses governing the life of the language Final –e is very common with masculine nouns, while many feminine nouns do not have a final –e. The rules to turn adjectives and nouns into feminine are much more complex than a simple addition of –e (-eur / -euse, -teur / -trice, etc.).

   instituteur       institutrice                      directeur              directrice

   coiffeur           coiffeuse                       chanteur               chanteuse

   romancier        romancière                   poète                     poétesse           

In fact, un prieur / une prieure  is the only existing case in French of a final –eur becoming –eure when the position is occupied by a woman. Not very modern or exciting.

All that reveals some unconscious ideas in the society. The final –e becomes an emblem, a mark of identity. A kind of flag telling that this position has been conquered. It is.ostentatious. Grammar is also a ground where fantasies can grow and flourish.

I believe this is short - sighted and does not help  much the fight for gender equality, or rather against gender inequality. Another evolution is much more interesting.

Using epicene nouns

Some nouns and names are both masculine and feminine – or the masculine noun and the feminine noun are exactly similar : un enfant, une enfant whether boy or girl. Some first or Christian names are used for both boys and girls  : Claude, Dominique, Camille.

It has a name in grammar: “Epicene nouns” , which an English dictionary defines as: “denoting a noun that may refer to a male or a female, such as teacher as opposed to businessman or shepherd”.

It gets more and more frequently used : la ministre, la deputé.

The noun, originally masculine, is treated as feminine (using the determiners, agreements, etc. proper to feminine nouns) when it refers to a woman. We can have then :

   Ce grand écrivain est un excellent romancier.

   Cette grande écrivain est une excellente romancière.

It breaks a very strong rule : it introduces an agreement according to the meaning, to the referent, and no longer according to the grammar or the signifier.

So, how about considering all nouns as epicene, and use them as masculine or feminine according to the person they refer to ? It would go a much longer way into abolishing gender inequality than the cosmetic –e.

By the way, the personal pronouns of 1^st and 2^nd person (je, tu and also nous, vous) are epicene. They are either masculine or feminine according to who speaks or is spoken to. So, nihil novi sub sole, it is not something that extraordinary.

Conclusion

The debate is still raging on.  We shall keep you informed of the next developments