Grammatical gender and linguistic sexism in Galician

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Published: May 17, 2000

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Xoán Carlos Lagares
University of Salamanca
Spain
Vol. 1 (2000), Articles, pages 67-96
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17979/rgf.2000.1.0.5396
Published: May 17, 2000
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Abstract

Gender is a grammatical category that classifies nouns as masculine or feminine and triggers agreement in related words. At times, however, the inflectional gender morpheme expresses a semantic opposition. This study examines the different ways of expressing semantic information in relation to sex in Galician, and the relationship between lexical and grammatical gender. The second part of the analysis attempts to provide a definition for the concept of linguistic sexism, bearing in mind the non-biunivocal relationship between grammatical gender and sex. To conclude, the author reflects on the development and use of non-sexist language, noting that we must take into account not just of the linguistic forms themselves but of the meanings and connotations they acquire.

Keywords:

grammatical gender, linguistic sexism, morphology, semantic opposition, Galician

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