French/Grammar/Nouns

Grammar

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French

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Gender of nouns · Genre des noms

In French, all nouns have a grammatical gender; that is, they are either masculin (m) or feminin (f).

Most nouns that express people or animals have both a masculine and a feminine form. For example, the two words for "the actor" in French are l'acteur (m) and l'actrice (f). The two words for "the cat" are le chat (m) and la chatte (f).

However, there are some nouns that talk about people or animals whose gender are fixed, regardless of the actual gender of the person or animal. For example, la personne (f) (the person) is always feminine, even when it's talking about your uncle! Le professeur (m) (the professor) is always masculine, even when it's talking about your female professor/teacher!

The nouns that express things without an obvious gender (e.g., objects and abstract concepts) have only one form. This form can be masculine or feminine. For example, la voiture (the car) can only be feminine; le stylo (the pen) can only be masculine.

Examples
Masculine		Common endings used with masculine nouns
le cheval	the horse	-age	le fromage		the cheese
le chien	the dog	-r	le professeur		the teacher
le livre	the book	-t	le chat		the cat
le bruit	the noise	-isme	le capitalisme		capitalism
Feminine		Common endings used with feminine nouns
la colombe	the dove	-ie	la boulangerie		the bakery
la chemise	the shirt	-ion	la nation		the nation
la maison	the house	-ite/-ité	la fraternité		brotherhood
la liberté	liberty	-nce	la balance		the scales
		-lle	la fille		the girl
		-nne	l’indienne		the Indian

Irregularities and exceptions

There are three nouns in French where gender is altered when put in the plural form:

amour (un amour passionné → des amours passionnées)

orgue

délice

There are many exceptions to gender rules in French which can only be learned. There are even words that are spelled the same, but have a different meaning when masculine or feminine; for example, le livre (m) means the book, but la livre (f) means the pound. Some words that appear to be masculine (like le photo, which is actually short for la photographie) are in fact feminine, and vice versa. Then there are some that just don't make sense; la foi is feminine and means a belief, whereas le foie means liver.

Plurals

Irregular plurals

Grammar

Adjectives · Adverbs · Articles · Nouns · Prepositions · Pronouns · Sentences · Verbs (Tenses and moods · Conjugations)

French : Lessons · Vocabulary · Grammar · Appendices · Texts