I have been trying to catch up with the "Group Project" threads and I didn't want to take away from the thread with a dumb newbie question so I thought I would ask this here instead.

With all the new words being thrown out to me, and their are a lot of new words being thrown out which is fantastic, I have been wondering about their uses.

For instance, the basic pattern that the group seems to be sticking with is:

lamhnán – m. bloated person <--or some form close to this

My question is about the "m." Now I know it means that it is a masculine noun, but can it be used to describe a female? Or does the m. and f. indicate this word is for male or female usage only?

When learning about nouns, the standard speel the learning materials give is that "in Irish nouns generally associated with men are masculine and nouns generally associated with females are feminine."

Also, how wold I use this word to describe myself? While I think of the word bladder with "lamhnán" lets say it is meaning a bloated person...

Is lamhnán mé...or...Tá mé lamhnánach...maybe?

Very interesting question Do chinniúint. I often wonder about how masculine nouns are used in association with females, and vice-versa. For example, my pseudonym, Mac Léinn, can apply either to a female or male student. Although I'm not certain to the answers of your questions, part of the answer may lie in how we use the word cailín. As you know, it's a masculine noun but means girl in Irish. I think the rules of lenition, etc. are governed by the gender of the noun, for example an cailín but not an chailín.

Gender in languages generally refer to grammatical gender, not biological sex. Telling it can be easy if there are structural differences (such as suffixes like ín in Irish). However, even there it is not always clear, as cailín is often held to be feminine, but masculine in the genitive. This may be due to its history. there is 'cailleach', a hag, so some sort of root pertaining to women may be going on there; thus cailín is a little female, I suppose (corrections welcome here!)

-ín denotes masculinity in gender, but is no longer an activly free morpheme in the speech of the Gaeltacht (so I read). From Ó Siadhail's Learning Irish, we see some sort of reanalysis of nouns into simpler gender sectioning -mostly slender end -female etc is going on.

The ubiquoty of gender over so many languages makes it interesting, as speakers seem to view nouns as often of one gender or another. I've read of nouns been refered to as sé/sí obliquely.

SO, it's not always hard and dry, but I guess flexibility of usage requires not having distinct forms for every entity that is sexed, although, it would not surprise me if there are/were such languages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_gender

I have a fair grasp of the differences between grammatical gender and biological gender in languages, what I am sort of curious about is whether or not Irish places such emphisis on genders as other languages do.

For instance, in Spanish, if I am talking about a male and I start using words like "alta, baja, doctora, programadora" then I am seriously in the wrong because Spanish differs when it comes to gender in terms of adjectives and nouns. I have to use the words "alto, bajo, doctor, programador" when talking about a man.

Adjectives aside for the moment what about the nouns?

Here is what was added to the "group project" list:

puntán - m stocky person

Now lets say I am talking about some and I want to say they are a stocky person.

The noun puntán means stocky person, but can I only use this word when talking about a man? Or can I use this word to describe a woman also? Are words like these gender biased? I know there have been several other feminine words that have been listed that mean something along these lines, but would I have to use a feminine word to descibe a woman as being "stocky"?

Or can I say things like:

Is puntán é. (He's a stocky fellow)
Is puntán í. (She's a stocky gal."

Because if I want to say He/She is stocky...wouldn't I have to use an adjective and say something like "Tá sé/sí...?

If a word's definition uses "person" instead of "man/boy" or "woman/girl" then such a word could be equally applicable to anyone.

Mar shampla:

Is mac léinn é
is mac léinn í

Both are correct.

But if the word's definition indicates "man/boy" or "woman/girl" then I don't think the word can be applied to both males and females. Mar shampla:

Sinéid f thin frail woman
Is sinéid í is correct.
but is sinéid é would not be correct.

"The noun puntán means stocky person, but can I only use this word when talking about a man? Or can I use this word to describe a woman also? Are words like these gender biased? "

No

Let me put it this way -when used attributativly (damn you, multisyllabic word) gender is not important. The quality of been 'puntawnish' is now been mixed into our perception of the human referent, we see them as Person (a) x Quality (b) =type of person (ab). The quality they possess does not have gender. (Maybe this is why adjectives are neutur until sexed by the noun)

I would say that gender here acts out when we need to make a distinction (such as amadán vs. oinseach), but there might just be a lot of false positves -óinsiúil is silly, so óinseach is feminine from a morphological view as it may be derived from an adjective and is ending in -ach, but has a female human referent. What I said above about messy mixing of mental and morpholological logic might be going on at all sorts of places.

Gender may act out when natives really want something to be of one gender, such as a profession

As for adding an adjective, the adjective would not be needed, except for adding more detail, as the noun is quiet qualitative in its origin.

So, my position is that sometimes what you say might happen; generally it does not (why?: coz abstract quality is not given gender in Irish); when it does, it is a conscious attitudiinal stance taken by a speaker at some point; and can be reanalysed as needs be.

Someone else might want to wade in

The majority of nouns indicating profession, etc. are of masculine gender but can refer to either sex. If it's necessary to specify that the subject is female, one can usually add "mná" to the noun:

dochtúir = doctor (either sex)
dochtrúir mná = a doctor who is a woman

Now, what does "dochtúir ban" mean? ;-)

mac léinn = student (either sex)

I don't think I've ever run into "mac léinn mná", but it makes perfect sense as "a woman student", even though it literally means "a son of learning of a woman"!

Whoa! I just googled "mac léinn mná" and found one instance of it:

Beidh an Coiste Gnímh Cearta Ban comhdhéanta de Chathaoirleach an Choiste Gnímh Cearta Ban agus 7 mac léinn mná eile tofa ag an gComhdháil Ban...
(... and one other woman student chosen by....)

BTW, in discussions like this, it's useful to recall that the word "gender" originally and properly refers to a grammatical category, while "sex" refers to XX and XY, etc.

quote:

Now, what does "dochtúir ban" mean?

Caithfidh go bhfuil a fhios agat, a Dennis, gur gynecologist atá i gceist. (It means 'gynecologist' according to O'Dónaill's dictionary.)

There are also a whole bunch of words for women professionals that start with 'ban'. I didn't put them into the group project.

bandochtúir
bangharda
banlaoch
bandoirseoir
bandraíodóir
bandraoi
baneachlach
banéarlamh
baneitleoir
banfhathach

and many more.

quote:

bandochtúir
bangharda ...

Ní dóigh liom go n-úsáidtear an chuid is mó díobh seo anois. Bhíodh "banaltra" (nurse) sách coitianta lá den saol, ach anois tá sé thar a bheith neamh-PC. Maidir le "baneitleoir", ceapaim go mbeadh sé chomh passé le "aviatrix".