The assignment of grammatical gender in German is a notoriously problematic phenomenon due to the apparent opacity of the gender assignment system (e.g. Comrie 1999: 461). Various models of German gender assignment have been proposed (e.g. Spitz 1965, Köpcke 1982, Corbett 1991, Wegener 1995), but none of these is able to account for all of the German data. This thesis investigates a relatively under-explored, recent approach to German gender assignment in the form of Optimal Gender Assignment Theory (OGAT), proposed by Rice (2006). Using the framework of Optimality Theory, OGAT claims that the form and meaning of a noun are of equal importance with respect to its gender. This is formally represented by the crucial equal ranking of all gender assignment constraints in a block of gender features, which is in turn ranked above a default markedness hierarchy *NEUTER » *FEMININE » *MASCULINE, which is based on category size. A key weakness of OGAT is that it does not specify what constitutes a valid gender features constraint. This means that, in theory, any constraint can be proposed ad hoc to ensure that an OGAT analysis yields the correct result. In order to prevent any constraints based on 'postfactum rationalisations' (Comrie 1999: 461) from being included in the investigation, the gender features constraints which have been proposed in the literature for German are assessed according to six criteria suggested by Enger (2009), which seek to determine whether there is independent evidence for a gender features constraint. Using an independently-verified constraint set, OGAT is then tested on a sample of 592 nouns systematically selected from the Duden Rechtschreibung. The results indicate that OGAT is relatively successful in its predictions when compared to other approaches but that it cannot account fully for the sample data. Accordingly, a revised version of the theory is proposed (OGAT II), which involves the ranking of certain gender features constraints. It is found that OGAT II is able to account for the genders of around 95% of nouns in the sample. A number of specific aspects of OGAT II are then tested by means of an experiment in which native German speakers are required to assign genders to 26 pseudo-nouns. The results suggest that OGAT II comes the closest of the systems discussed in the literature to modelling how native speakers assign gender in German.

This thesis uses an experimental approach to explore optimal gender assignment theory, an approach to gender assignment housed in Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky 1993/2004). Optimal gender assignment theory was proposed by Curt Rice (2006) and stipulates that grammatical gender is assigned based on a set of crucially non-ranked gender features constraints and markedness constraints. Thirty-seven participants who were bilingual in English and German received 40 sentences containing English loanwords with the definite article removed and asked to provide the appropriate gender marker and a lexical equivalency. The study found that the constraints employed and developed for optimal gender assignment theory are not applicable to English loanwords in German.

This thesis is dedicated to the problems of gender assignment to English loan words in Italian. The thesis is divided into two parts. In the first, theoretical part, attention is paid to the definition of gender category in Italian, to the rules describing the formation of gender in Italian and then the gender assignment rules for English loan words are presented in detail. The second, analytical part, is dedicated to the research which is carried out via Italian text corpus itWaC. The application of the presented rules for gender assignment is being verified on a sample of English loan words.The aim of the thesis is to introduce the problems of gender assignment to English loan words in Italian, to provide a detailed overview of the individual rules for gender assignment and to verify how much are these rules observed in practice.

This work deals with the assignment of grammatical gender of nouns in Italian. Work will try to fully describe the category of grammatical gender in Italian with the comparative excursion to these issues in Czech and establish rules for the attribution of new or borrowed words. The part of this work is also analysis of selected words from the linguistic corpus and examination of validity of the rules of assignment and determination of the developmental trends in field of gender assignment.

<p>The category of grammatical gender has gained considerable attention in the linguistic literature. Previous studies focused primarily on describing the often very complex system of genders in particular languages, on the understanding of the category <em>per se</em> (e.g. the origin of gender differentiation) or the acquisition of grammatical gender and the processing of this category in language production.</p> <p>In contrast, the present dissertation looks at grammatical gender from a cognitive point of view. For the sake of this dissertation, <em>cognitive perspective</em> is defined as the assumption that human language cannot be separated from the way human beings perceive the world since language and thought are inextricably related. This approach also implies that research cannot be limited to theoretical explorations, but rather, that it must employ experimental methods and use research tools traditionally associated with other disciplines to collect data about authentic language use. All studies included in this thesis concentrate on the topic of grammatical gender, but they approach the category from a variety of perspectives.</p> <p>It was found that the grammatical gender, at least to some degree, shapes the worldview of speakers of those languages in which the category operates, since the gender of the personification of concepts usually agrees with the grammatical gender of the respective nouns. In the context of translation, grammatical gender proved to be much more challenging than had been expected; there were many mistakes found in the translation product and many hesitations observed in the translation process.</p> <p>The findings of the studies included in this thesis add to the general understanding of the complexities of the category of grammatical gender and its relationship to the way language users perceive the world. What is more, the investigations and proposals presented here emphasize the need for a more interdisciplinary approach to the study of grammatical gender.</p> / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

In this study I’ve used qualitative interviews to examine four male preschool teachers’ interpretations of gender and their work with gender in preschool. Specifically, I’ve been interested in what thoughts male teachers have about the preschool gender assignment, how they express these thoughts in their work, and how they perceive their role as men in preschool in relation to gender and gender equality. The teachers express that the preschool gender assignment means that one should treat girls and boys equally and give them the same opportunities. Based on their interpretations they explain how they work with gender, that they´re trying to change the image of what’s feminine and masculine through interactions with the children by using the language as an instrument. Despite this, they seem to have difficulties presenting substantial examples of how to counteract gender stereotypes. Unlike previous studies, the teachers in this study express their awareness that the replication of gender is unconscious. They’re not certain if they treat girls and boys equally. The male teachers believe that their role as men in the gender assignment is to show children that regardless of gender one can do everything and that there isn’t anything that´s typically feminine or masculine. / I denna studie har jag med kvalitativ intervju som metod undersökt fyra manliga pedagogers uppfattningar om genus och genusarbete i förskolan. Jag har genom mitt arbete velat ta reda på vilka tankar pedagogerna har om förskolans genusuppdrag, hur de berättar om hur de arbetar med detta i verksamheten samt hur de ser på sin roll som man i arbetet med genus och jämställdhet. Genusuppdraget innebär för pedagogerna att man ska behandla flickor och pojkar lika och ge dem samma möjligheter. Utifrån deras tolkningar berättar de om hur de arbetar med genus i verksamheten, de försöker att ändra bilden av vad som är kvinnligt och manligt genom interaktioner med barnen, med språket som verktyg. Däremot upplever jag att de har svårigheter att ge konkreta exempel på hur man kan motverka könsstereotyper i förskolan. Till skillnad från tidigare forskning framhåller pedagogerna i denna studie att de är medvetna om att reproduktionen av kön är omedveten och de menar att de inte vet om de behandlar flickor och pojkar lika. Pedagogerna ser att deras roll som man i förskolans genusuppdraget är att visa barn att man oavsett kön kan göra allting samt att det inte finns något som är typiskt kvinnligt eller manligt.

German and Greek are both Indo-European languages that realize grammatical gender and indeed they have similar grammatical gender systems, they both realize three genders (masculine, feminine, neuter). They pose some similarities concerning gender agreement as well. However, the lexical gender between these two languages differs a lot. The purpose of this study is to examine first, whether L2 learners of German with Greek as their first language are able to use German grammatical gender predictively. Secondly, it was also examined to what extent the differences associated with L1-L2 lexical gender are going to affect their ability to make gender-based predictions in their L2. An experimental condition providing lexical cues (i.e., numeral) as informative cues was added, so that a comparison between the L2ers’ predictive ability based on morphosyntactic cues compared to lexical cues, can be investigated. The research questions of the study were examined by means of a speeded picture-selection task. Gender Assignment Tasks and a proficiency test were also included to investigate the influence of proficiency and knowledge of grammatical gender on the L2ers’ ability to use gender predictively. Besides the L2ers’ group, a control group of German native speakers also participated. The results suggest that L2ers were not able to use grammatical gender in their L2 predictively across the board of the gender trials, although they did successfully use the lexical cues to predict upcoming words. Although proficiency did not significantly interact with L2ers’ performance at the task, their knowledge of grammatical gender did significantly affect their performance, leading to faster Reaction Times.

Human reproduction is increasingly commodified, which paves the way for reproductive enhancement rather than just assistance. Non-medical gender/sex selection is one of the reproductive enhancement services that is offered on the fertility market, and it is a practice that raises severe concerns regarding the social and political impact of biotechnologies. Through Critical Discourse Analysis and Biomedicalization theory, I analyse how non-medical gender/sex selection is legitimised in online forum discussions. I argue that gender/sex selection is legitimized through gender- and family-conservative and neoliberal ideologies, and that gender/sex selection can be understood as a tool to enhance the family, increase privilege, and attain hypernormativity.