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From: olivier@austin.ibm.com (Olivier Cremel)
Subject: Re: International Language.
Originator: olivier@nice.austin.ibm.com
Sender: news@austin.ibm.com (News id)
Message-ID: <D27y0M.x9v@austin.ibm.com>
Date: Wed, 11 Jan 1995 02:09:58 GMT
Reply-To: olivier@glasnost.austin.ibm.com
References:  <D25xyH.Io1@indirect.com>
Organization: Bull HN - Austin
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.lang.translation:600 sci.lang:34149


In article <D25xyH.Io1@indirect.com>, stevemac@bud.indirect.com (Pascal MacProgrammer) writes:
> Not so very long ago, d.rogers@irl.cri.nz (Don Rogers) said...
> 
> >It puzzles me why so many people who post in this group think that English 
> >does not have unnatural gender. At least in New Zealand cars, ships, countries 
> >etc are still referred to as "she". Surely that is not "natural gender"?
> 
>   I'll stand by what I said about "natural gender" in English and 
> Esperanto, call this phenomenon of referring to ships and such as "she" a 
> "poetic usage", and as we all know, licensed poets can write however they 
> dern well please -- that's what the license is for.

You are confusing gender and sex. A common enough mistake in PC Amerika.
I can assure you than I don't think "ma chaise" (my chair) is any more
female than "mon tabouret" (my stool) is male.

Let me put it this way. Imagine you have a language with 5 declensions
A, B, C, D, E. And it just so happens that male names follow declension A,
and female names follow declension B, so we may as just call A, masculine,
and B, feminine. Now what do we do with C, D and E. Well why not call then
neutral type I, neutral type II, neutral type III. Although a neutral
person does not exist, it's a quite logical step to name those declensions
that way when you've named A and B, masculine and feminine.

Things become more complicated if some male names follow A while others
follow C, then we'll have masculine type I, masculine type II, feminine,
neutral type I, neutral type II.

I won't go on, if haven't made my point now, I never will.

-- 
Olivier.
=============================================================================
			"Tel cuide se chauffer, s'art"
