Any Low Saxon noun has any of three genders: masculine, feminine or neuter.
Rest
the cursor on light-blue highlighted
words to see their definition.
Studying the language, you must learn which gender each noun
has. If you have a choice, do not buy dictionaries that do not tell you what
gender nouns have. (Unfortunately, most on-line dictionaries do not do so at
this time.)
In some cases, gender assignment differs between dialects. For
instance, the noun Schapp
(shap) ‘cupboard’, ‘armoir’, is masculine in some
dialects and neuter in other dialects.
In most cases of a noun denoting a human being, gender
assignment coincides with the sex of a person. This also applies where an
animal name implies gender. However, all other nouns have genders as well.
The native speaker does not associate this with actual gender, certainly not
in cases of inanimate objects. In such cases we might as well think in terms
of “noun classes” rather than in terms of “gender.” Or we might think of
“grammatical gender” as separate from “natural gender.” Modern English, like
Afrikaans, is exceptional among West Germanic languages in that it has no
gender for nouns denoting inanimate objects, and in cases of animate objects
it makes distinctions only indirectly, namely when referring to the
mentioned objects with the pronouns “he” (masculine) and “she” (feminine),
while neuter “it” refers to inanimate objects or to animate objects of
unknown sex (e.g. “the baby” = “it”).
Examples:
Masculine:
Mann man
man
Möller möller
miller
Schoh schou
shoe
Bull bul
bull
Dag dag
day
Weg weg
way
Snee sney
snow
Stohl stoul
stool,
chair
Foot vout
foot
Wind wind
wind
Fisch visch
fish
Hęven heven
sky
Arm arm
arm
Pęper peper
pepper
Maand maand
moon,
month
Keerl keyrl
guy
Koken kouken
cake
Jung jung
boy
Appel appel
apple
Pool poul
pool
Feminine:
Fro vrou
woman
Mœhl moel
mill
Bruud bruud
bride
Katt kat
cat
Eek eyk
oak
Nacht nacht
night
Straat staat
street
Eerd’ eyrd’
earth,
soil
Muus muus
mouse
Dœr doer
door
School schoul
school
Bloom bloum
flower
Deern deyrn
girl
Melk melk
milk
Sünn sün
sun
Supp sup
soup
Kark kark
church
Klock klok
bell,
clock
Plumm plum
plum
Koh kou
cow
Neuter:
Kind kind
child
Kalf kalv
kalf
Schaap schaap
sheep
Fleesch vleysch
flesh,
meat
Water water
water
Hart hart
heart
Sult sult
salt
Bedd bed
bed
Wedder wedder
weather
Gras gras
grass
Hoorn hourn
horn
Guld guld
gold
Huus huus
house
Licht licht
light
Land land
land,
country
Schipp schip
ship
Book bouk
book
Seil sayl
sail
Papeer papeyr
paper
Ding ding
thing
In a few cases, what appears to be the same noun has two
genders and different meanings in the same dialect. This is really a matter
of two different nouns that are homophones (i.e. words that sound alike).
For instance, masculine Minsch
(minsch) means ‘human being’ or ‘person’, while
neuter Minsch
(minsch) means ‘woman’ with a pejorative
connotation, perhaps ‘piece of work’ with reference to a woman (or the “B
word” in English).
