# Gender changer



## 涼宮

Good afternoon everyone 

Perhaps a silly question but I prefer to be sure, Is there any way to change the gender of a noun to make it agree with the person in Polish?

What I mean is, for instance in English if you want to specify the sex you use ''female or masculine'' like My female teacher/female dog, etc , just when you want to be specific. For instance the word uczeń is masculine, but if I wanted to say a _female_ pupil, is there any suffix, preffix or something that could allow me to change the gender? Or is it like English by attaching the word female/masculine to the noun?

Thank you in Advance


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## BezierCurve

Hello. I understand we're talking mostly about professions, functions people have etc.

There are a few productive suffixes you can apply to the male version of a noun to get a female version out of it. Sometimes you'd also have to change the stem a bit, as you can see below.

A few rules for the most popular ones:

-r > -rka, (aktor > aktorka)
-rz > -rka, (kucharz > kucharka)
-ca > -czyni (wychowawca > wychowawczyni)
-ik > -iczka (kierownik > kierowniczka)

I guess there are a few more.

However, there is an ongoing debate whether to do it with names of some functions and professions or not (like psycholog, prezes. -g > -żka, -s > -ska). I'm affraid there's no easy way around except for learning them by heart. 

Anyway, you should be understood with no problems if you apply the rules above.


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## 涼宮

Thank you very much! But then, How would be the female version of uczeń? I did not see anything related to e or ń that allows me to change the gender.

Thanks again


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## BezierCurve

That's uczennica. That -eń ending won't occur too often though. 

Also, for those nouns I mentioned before (psycholog, prezes, dyrektor) when you decide to keep the same form for females you treat it in sentences as a female noun (i.e. applying gender to adjectives, numerals, verbs etc.), so:

Zdenerwowany dyrektor wyszedł z budynku.

but:

Zdenerwowana dyrektor wyszła z budynku.

EDIT: Also, there might be a few exceptions to that rules. Like "mistrz" > "mistrzyni", "czarownik" > "czarownica". But there won't be many of them.

AND: You don't change the gender in degrees, like "magister", "doktor", "profesor" etc., although you'll probably find loads of these in colloquial speech (among students, for example).

AND: You don't declinate female nouns that take the masculine form (like dyrektor), so:

Powiedziałem o tym [panu] dyrektorowi. (male) 

but:

Powiedziałem o tym [pani] dyrektor. (female)


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## 涼宮

Dziękuję bardzo


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## Ben Jamin

BezierCurve said:


> Also, for those nouns I mentioned before (psycholog, prezes, dyrektor) when you decide to keep the same form for females you treat it in sentences as a female noun (i.e. applying gender to adjectives, numerals, verbs etc.), so:
> 
> Zdenerwowany dyrektor wyszedł z budynku.
> 
> but:
> 
> Zdenerwowana dyrektor wyszła z budynku.


 
Where did you find these rules?
An adjective has naturally the same gender as the noun denoting the person and not as the person.

If you look at the masculine nouns:
You say: "Ten człowiek jest nieszczęsną ofiarą wypadku"
You do not say "Ten człowiek jest nieszczęsnym ofiarą wypadku"
Not either: "Ten człowiek jest nieszczęsnym ofiara wypadku".

Why should one say "polska polityk" about a woman, but not "NN (mężczyzna) jest ważnym przeszkodą w tej sprawie"?


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## BezierCurve

I'm not sure what you're asking about.



> An adjective has naturally the same gender as the noun denoting the person and not as the person.


 
The problem is, when you're talking for example about a female "dyrektor" you have to break this rule. Also, the examples you gave are inadequate to what I wrote.

EDIT: Of course you may try explaining using "rodzaj przemieszany" and "rzeczowniki dwurodzajowe". But will that really help?


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## jazyk

> An adjective has naturally the same gender as the noun denoting the person and not as the person.


That's what I always thought as well, but this isn't true for Polish, at least according to the Polish news I've been reading. Look at this thread, where we talked about it.


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## POLSKAdoBOJU

Na przykładzie języka francuskiego proponuję: *la* doktor,* la* policjant,* la* dyrektor,* la* ginekolog.*  *

Oczywiście wyraz 'la' będzie odmienny przez przypadki, podobnie do przyimka wskazującego 'ta,' 
np. _Widziałem *lę* policjant na drodze_ albo potocznie _*lą* policjant_
_Rozmawiałem z kolegą o *lej *doktor_, itp...


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## Ben Jamin

jazyk said:


> That's what I always thought as well, but this isn't true for Polish, at least according to the Polish news I've been reading. Look at this thread, where we talked about it.


 Polish news are often written in terrible Polish. Please, do not learn Polish form news, specially online news.


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