In celebration of Woman’s Day I present you
Gender in Polish language
the following information is not thoughtfully researched, it comes from my understanding as a native speaker and bits of information I have found in the last months of commenting on Duolingo
The first idea there is to know about “gender” in Polish is that the idea of it is different than English one.
If I understand English distinction, you have two words for male/female difference- sex and gender. Sex being about biology and gender is about society and identity, also about grammar.
In Poland all biology, society and identity are “PŁEĆ”, with English word “gender/dżender” appearing now and then in different situations , most notably to describe the idea that biology and identity regarding “płeć” are not the same.
The grammar word for “gender” in polish is “rodzaj”, which translates literally to “kind”, “sort”, “genre”, “genus”
Grammatical gender is very important in Polish language, every noun has a gender, and adjectives, personal and possessive pronouns,numerals and quantifiers ,and verb forms in the past tense have to match the gender of the noun. Also durative verbs in participle forms of complex future tense often use gender (f.ex. będziemy robiły/robili) , although you can avoid using it if you need (będziemy robić)
“Rodzaj gramatyczny” is not related to “Płeć”, most of the time. Especially when we discuss things, and animals in general, the gender may be perceived as random. This changes a bit when talking about people, or some animals of specified “płeć” When talking about a person, If you do not know their “płeć”, you may refer to them with some noun like “osoba”(person, rodzaj żeński/feminine, płeć undefined); “człowiek (person, human, man rodzaj męski/masculine, płeć undefined), użytkownik (user, rodzaj męski, płeć male or unknown); and consequently use that rodzaj with all words.
If you talk to a person, you cannot do this. Here grammatical and personal gender are closely related. You need to address a person using “rodzaj” that relates to their “płeć”.
What grammatical genders are there in Polish ?
Depends how you count them,
In singular we have masculine/ rodzaj męski , feminine/ rodzaj żeński and neuter/ rodzaj nijaki,
But can split masculine nouns into animate and not animate, or personal, not personal animate, and not animate
In plural we have masculine personal and all the rest, usually called not masculine personal
Masculine personal are masculine nouns that describe persons, also some always plural nouns,
And groups of people that contain at least one man(masculine person), or at least one person and at least one masculine gender noun ( girl and a dog are the example in every grammar book)
If there are different nouns tor male and female people like student – student/studentka, employee pracownik/pracownica, actor/actress-/actor/aktorka; the plural masculine noun describes a group of people containing at least one male, and plural not masculine personal/feminine describes a group that contains only females.
Not masculine personal is a plural rodzaj that applies to all feminine and neuter nouns, masculine not personal nouns, and most "always plural" nouns. It also describes groups of female persons, groups of animals and groups of inanimate objects.
Which words need grammatical gender?
Most of them. Nouns just have grammatical gender. If they describe people they may be related to the personal gender of that person.
Personal pronouns are almost easy. They have to match grammatical gender of the noun they replace or personal gender of a person they refer to.
Adjectives describe a noun and have to match its case, number and gender. If you describe a person they match their personal gender.
Possessive pronouns have to match twice; my, your(1 person), our , your (2+ people) swój = one’s own work like adjectives, and have to match the noun
jego=his/its, jej=her ich= their – have to match the gender of the owner , but fortunately they do not change with cases or gender of the noun they describe.
Numerals in Polish are complicated. we have numeral for:
masculine personal nouns - dwóch, pięciu feminine nouns- dwie, pięć neuter not personal and masculine not personal nouns- dwa, pięć neuter personal noun (kids), mixed gender persons group , or some always plural nouns- dwoje, pięcioro.
Verbs in past and future tense. In third person – have to match a gender of a subject ( feminine, masculine or neuter in singular, masculine personal, not masculine personal in plural) In first and second person - ( have to match gender of people they refer to – feminine or masculine)
How to guess a gender of the noun?
If new word comes to Polish language now ( for example new country is created ) we usually apply those rules:
- If a noun ends with “a” it is feminine
- If a noun ends with “e” or y it is neuter or always plural
- If it ends with any other vowel it is neuter
- If it ends with consonant it is masculine
Those rules mostly apply to all existing nouns in nominative form, but there are some notable exceptions:
Most Polish neuter nouns end with and –o, -ę, -e
Some masculine nouns end with –a , they usually describe male persons,
Most common nouns like that are mężczyzna-man and tata-dad
Endings – owca and – ista are usually masculine
-um ending nouns of Latin origin like gimnazjum, liceum, muzeum- are neuter
There are some feminine nouns ending with soft consonants
-ść is more often feminine than masculine ending (especially if the noun describes idea like miłość=love radość=joy, prędkość=speed)
ń ć, ś, ź, ż, sz, cz - you can toss a coin, or check a dictionary, it might be feminine or masculine
All the rules disappear if you do not know the NOMINATIVE, case endings can end with vowels, or consonants, or can be Ø-=(delete vowel from the end ).
Resource: https://forum.duolingo.com/comment/14133935
Author: https://www.duolingo.com/profile/immery