Gender in English

A system of grammatical gender, whereby every noun was treated as either masculine, feminine or neuter, existed in Old English, but fell out of use during the Middle English period. Modern English retains features relating to natural gender, namely the use of certain nouns and pronouns (such as he and she) to refer specifically to persons or animals of one or other genders and certain others (such as it) for sexless objects – although feminine pronouns are sometimes used when referring to ships (and more uncommonly some airplanes and analogous machinery) and nation states.

Some aspects of gender usage in English have been influenced by the movement towards a preference for gender-neutral language. This applies in particular to avoidance of the default use of the masculine he when referring to a person of unspecified genders, usually using the neuter they as a third-person singular, and avoidance of the use of certain feminine forms of nouns (such as authoress and poetess). Increasingly, the "male" form of such nouns is used for both genders.

Old English had a system of grammatical gender similar to that of modern German, with three genders: masculine, feminine, neuter. Determiners and attributive adjectives showed gender inflection in agreement with the noun they modified. Also the nouns themselves followed different declension patterns depending on their gender. Moreover, the third-person personal pronouns, as well as interrogative and relative pronouns, were chosen according to the grammatical gender of their antecedent.

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