Nouns and gender

What are nouns?

Nouns are words used to name living creatures, objects, abstract qualities or concepts:

Mann	man	Rock	skirt
Schönheit	beauty	Entwicklung	development

German nouns – three genders

In German, all nouns are classed as having one of three genders: masculine, feminine or neuter and are written with an initial capital letter. In dictionaries, the gender is usually indicated with m for masculine nouns, f for feminine nouns and nt for neuter nouns.

Working out the gender

Often there seems to be no obvious relationship between a noun and its gender in German: Rock ‘skirt’ for instance is masculine, Hose ‘trousers’ is feminine and Kleid ‘dress’ is neuter.

However, there are two main ways that can help you to work out the gender:

•   certain endings indicate the gender

•   some groups of nouns, usually linked by meaning, tend to be masculine or feminine or neuter.

Endings indicating the gender

Masculine endings

The following endings usually indicate that the noun is masculine:

-ant	der Konsonant	consonant
-ast	der Palast	palace
-ich	der Teppich	carpet
-ig	der Honig	honey
-ling	der Liebling	darling
-or	der Motor	engine
-us	der Materialismus	materialism

An exception is das Labor ‘laboratory’.

Feminine endings

The following endings tend to belong to feminine nouns:

-a	die Pizza	pizza
-anz	die Toleranz	tolerance
-ei	die Wäscherei	laundry
-enz	die Intelligenz	intelligence
-heit	die Mehrheit	majority
-ie	die Astrologie	astrology
-ik	die Musik	music
-ion	die Kommunikation	communication
-keit	die Müdigkeit	tiredness
-tät	die Kreativität	creativity
-schaft	die Erbschaft	inheritance
-ung	die Bedeutung	meaning, importance
-ur	die Frisur	hairstyle

Some  exceptions  are:  das  Sofa  ‘sofa’,  das  Genie  ‘genius’,  das  Abitur ‘A levels’.

Note that about 90 per cent of nouns ending in -e are also feminine:

die Anzeige	advert	die Karriere	career
die Frage	question	die Schokolade	chocolate

Exceptions  include:  das  Auge  ‘eye’,  das  Interesse  ‘interest’,  der  Käse ‘cheese’, der Name ‘name’, and all male persons and animals endings in -e: der Junge ‘boy’, der Löwe ‘lion’ etc.

Neuter endings

The following endings signal that a noun is neuter:

-chen	das Märchen	fairy tale
-il	das Ventil	valve
-lein	das Männlein	little man
-ma	das Drama	drama
-ment	das Instrument	instrument
-o	das Auto	car
-um	das Zentrum	centre

Some exceptions are: die Firma ‘company’, der Reichtum ‘wealth’

Compound nouns
The last noun defines the gender

Compound nouns usually consist of two or more nouns. The gender is defined by the last noun:

der Computer + das Spiel ® das Computerspiel (computer game)

der Bauch + der Tanz + die Lehrerin ® die Bauchtanzlehrerin (teacher of belly dancing)

Adding -s

When joining noun + noun together an extra -s is often inserted to link the components and to make the pronunciation easier. This usually happens when the first noun ends in -heit, -ing, -ion, -keit, -ling, -schaft,

-tät or -ung:

der Liebling + die Band            ®  die Lieblingsband (favourite band)

die Mehrheit + der Beschluss   ®  der Mehrheitsbeschluss (majority decision)

Nouns in use
Determiners and nouns

When used in sentences, nouns normally appear with determiners such as der, die, das etc. Depending on the function of the noun within the sentence the determiners can change.

For example, the definite articles der, die, das and die for plural nouns are used when the noun is the subject of a sentence (nominative case). These articles change to dem, der, dem, den if the noun is the indirect object (dative case).

Changes affecting nouns

Note that nouns themselves normally change only (other than their plural forms) in the following instances:

•   in the genitive case, where masculine and neuter nouns add -(e)s and

•   in the dative plural where -n is usually added. For more information see Units 3 and 4.

However, there are two groups of nouns whose endings do change: the so-called weak nouns and adjectival nouns.
Weak nouns
About 10 per cent of masculine nouns, usually referring to male people or animals, add -(e)n to all forms apart from the nominative singular.

	Singular	Plural
Nominative Accusative  Dative  Genitive	der Junge  den  Junge-n dem Junge-n  des Junge-n	die Junge-n  die Junge-n  den  Junge-n  der Junge-n

Der Junge spielt mit seinem Gameboy.                      (nom.,  sing.) 

Siehst du den Jungen dort?                                          (acc., sing.) 

Er kauft dem Jungen eine Flasche Wasser.                 (dat., sing.)

Other examples include: Architekt ‘male architect’, Student ‘male student’, Herr ‘Mr’, ‘gentleman’, Tourist ‘male tourist’, Mensch ‘human being’, Name ‘name’.

Note that Herr adds -n in the singular, and -en in the plural: Kennst du Herrn Becker ‘Do you know Mr Becker?’ Meine Damen und Herren! ‘Ladies and gentlemen!’.

Adjectival nouns
Adjectival nouns are derived from adjectives:

krank	®	ein Kranker, eine Kranke	ill, sick person
reich		ein Reicher, eine Reiche	rich person
verwandt		ein Verwandter, eine Verwandte	relative

Adjectives used as nouns follow the pattern of adjectival endings. As an example, here are all forms of Verwandte/r ‘relative’ with the indefinite article:

	Singular (masc.)	Singular (fem.)	Plural
Nominative Accusative  Dative  Genitive	ein Verwandter  einen Verwandten  einem Verwandten  eines Verwandten	eine Verwandte  eine Verwandte  einer Verwandten  einer Verwandten	-Verwandte -Verwandte -Verwandten -Verwandter

Ein Verwandter von mir wohnt in Bonn. (nom., masc.) 

One of my relatives lives in Bonn.

Eine Verwandte von Petra arbeitet bei Sony. (nom., fem.) 

One of Petra’s relatives works for Sony.

Other nouns belonging to this group include

Angestellte/r	employee	Arbeitslose/r	unemployed person
Erwachsene/r	adult	Deutsche/r	German person
Jugendliche/r	young person