fælleskøn

Fælleskøn is a grammatical gender used in Danish to classify a large portion of nouns under a single category, in contrast to intetkøn, the neuter gender. Danish historically distinguished masculine and feminine nouns, but in modern usage many of these have merged into fælleskøn. The distinction matters for articles and adjective agreement.

In singular, nouns of fælleskøn take the indefinite article en; the definite singular is formed by adding the suffix -en (for common nouns). For example, en stol (a chair) becomes stolen (the chair). A neuter noun such as et hus (a house) becomes huset (the house). Plural forms follow standard Danish rules and reflect the noun’s gender in the definite plural.

Common gender covers many everyday nouns, including things, professions, and abstracts. The boundary between fælleskøn and intetkøn is not always straightforward; some nouns with historical feminine or masculine origins are treated as fælleskøn in standard Danish, though vestiges of older gender patterns may appear in dialects or older texts.

In Norwegian, the corresponding term felleskjønn describes a parallel concept: a common gender that merges masculine and feminine nouns in everyday usage. The concept is central to Norwegian grammar and interacts with determiner use and adjective agreement, similar to Danish.

Overall, fælleskøn reflects Danish’s move toward a simpler two-gender system in many areas, while still maintaining distinct neuter forms for a substantial subset of nouns.