genderandnumber

Gender and number are core grammatical categories in many languages that affect how words relate to one another in a sentence. Gender refers to a classification of nouns that often influences pronouns, articles, and adjectives, while number indicates whether nouns and related words refer to one item or multiple items. In many languages, nouns are assigned gender (commonly masculine, feminine, and sometimes neuter) and are marked for singular or plural, with some languages also using a dual form for two items.

Grammatical gender can be independent of natural gender. A noun for a non-lemale object may be masculine or feminine, and the gender often determines the form of other words that modify or refer to it. Number typically governs agreement with determiners, adjectives, pronouns, and verb forms. For example, in languages with gendered adjectives, an adjective will have a form that matches the noun’s gender and number.

The way gender and number are realized varies by language family. In Spanish, adjectives and definite articles agree with the noun in gender and number: el niño alto (the tall boy) vs la niña alta (the tall girl); and los niños altos vs las niñas altas for plurals. In languages such as Arabic and Hebrew, both gender and number can affect verb conjugation, noun forms, and adjective endings. Slavic languages generally mark three gender categories (masculine, feminine, neuter) and distinguish singular, plural, and often past-tense agreement with gender.

Languages with little or no grammatical gender, such as English, typically do not inflect adjectives by gender, and many nouns have the same form across genders. English still uses gendered pronouns in some cases and marks number with plural endings or pronoun forms.

Understanding gender and number helps explain agreement patterns, pronoun systems, and how languages structure noun phrases and sentence syntax.