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Must a female noun always have the "ino" suffix?

od Betka, 22. april 2008

Sporočila: 9

Jezik: English

Betka (Prikaži profil) 22. april 2008 20:00:30

I had assumed that females always had an "in" in a noun. You know like virino, knabino and infanino.

But today I stumbled upon the following sentence in a lernu! course: Ŝi estas programisto.
I would expect: Ŝi estas programistino.

So now I'm confused, do I have to use the "in" suffix every time I speak about a woman, or not?

I know that saying "Lisa estas viro" would be incorrect, but would it be incorrect to say "Lisa estas instruisto"?

Matthieu (Prikaži profil) 22. april 2008 20:23:39

Here is the chapter of Plena manlibro de Esperanta gramatiko about this.

You must add the suffix -in- only if the basic word is male (patro, frato, etc.).

But many words are genderless, including suffixes like -ist-, -ul-, -an-, etc.

Thus, programisto can be male or female, and programistino is only female.

By the way, is virprogramisto correct? (I think it is, but does anyone use it?)

richardhall (Prikaži profil) 22. april 2008 20:45:24

My question is, why would it be important to make a clear distinction between male and female programmers? If you're talking about a programisto, and you refer to 'sxi', you're making it clear that the person you're talking about is a female lady of the opposite gender. But *as a programmer*, her sex/gender isn't (or shouldn't be) an issue. She's just a programmer.

RiotNrrd (Prikaži profil) 22. april 2008 20:56:38

The -in suffix is optional in most cases. You can say "programistino", but unless the gender actually makes a difference there's no real reason to.

awake (Prikaži profil) 22. april 2008 22:09:54

RiotNrrd:The -in suffix is optional in most cases. You can say "programistino", but unless the gender actually makes a difference there's no real reason to.
I think you'll find that the ino suffix was more commonly used in Zamenhoff's time as most professions were male dominated and so there would be more of a reason to make a distinction between male and female members of a profession. In today's more gender neutral society, those distinctions simply aren't important. So, you can use the *ino suffix when referring to female members of a profession, or not.

of course, you can imagine situations where you were talking specifically about female programmers, and the *ino suffix would be desirable in those cases. For example, you might be discussing pay disparity among female programmers compared to male programmers with similar qualifications.

And yes, in that case it would also be appropriate to use the vir- prefix. Although, if you are referring to "programistoj" and "programistinoj" the context would probably suffice to make the distinction and the vir prefix would not be necessary. Some would view its omission as sexist however. I personally would probably include it simply on grounds of clarity.

sergejm (Prikaži profil) 23. april 2008 10:04:30

There are some female words, which never have -ino suffix: amazono (amazon), gejŝo (geisha), hetajro.

Dreamlight (Prikaži profil) 03. maj 2008 00:39:33

The necessity of the -in suffix (or infix?) for certain word constructions is the biggest issue that I have with Esperanto. Is a 'partrino' a female 'patro'? Or better (or worse) yet, is a 'virino' a female 'viro'? Preposterous, in my not so humble opinion, except maybe if the patrino or virino in question is transsexual, but that's a different issue altogether. ridego.gif Really, Esperanto really, really could do with importing a few of the appropriate words.

erinja (Prikaži profil) 03. maj 2008 01:33:40

Although words like virino and patrino are formed from the words viro and patro, I think that most Esperanto speakers consider them like roots in their own right. No experienced speaker hears a word like "patrino" and thinks to him/herself "hmmmm, female father". Similarly, you hear "kolumo" (kol/um/o) and you instantly think "collar", not "neck-related item". Some root plus suffix combinations have a fixed meaning. Patrino always means "mother", it never means "female father". "Kolumo" always means collar.

Some root plus suffix combinations do not have a fixed meaning and are heavily dependent on context. Since patrino/fratino/virino/etc are in the former category (fixed meaning) I see no problem at all, and no need to add extra words.

Remember also that if you were to add additional words like "matro", "sororo", "femino" (or whatever), the Esperanto speakers of the future would *still* have to learn the old forms, to be able to read old Esperanto texts. They would have to learn twice as much information. It seems like overkill to me, since today there is no doubt about the meaning of these words, so why replace them?

These words are a tad strange but I am not offended by them. And it's a bit late to go changing them now.

Dreamlight (Prikaži profil) 03. maj 2008 01:45:20

Esperanto speakers already have to learn old forms, as the language has evolved over the years and decades since Zamenhof's original work, including the inclusion of new words that replaced older root plus affix constructions (as well as the resolution of grammatical issues not covered in Zammy's rules). Esperanto is not immune to neologizing, though I do agree that the expanding the base vocabulary should be done only when necessary.

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