53-518 Grammatical Gender (ENG-4, ENG-4a, ENG-10, ENG-11, AA7, AA9, LAA8, LAA11, IAA20, IAA23, IAA24, IAA25, ENGAGE-M01a, ENGAGE-M02)

Lehrende: Dr. Christine Günther

Veranstaltungsart: Seminar II

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Semesterwochenstunden: 2

Unterrichtssprache: Englisch

Min. | Max. Teilnehmerzahl: - | 30

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Kommentare/ Inhalte:
Among the many structural differences between English and German gender is probably one of the most intricate ones, as it does not only affect the language’s grammar but also has an impact on the reference to individuals. German has grammatical gender, which means that nouns fall into three classes, masculine, feminine, and neuter. The gender of a noun is reflected in NP-internal agreement relations and anaphoric reference – a third person singular pronoun matches the gender of its antecedent. Present Day English, in contrast, has natural gender, i.e. it lacks this type of nominal classification system. Here, the natural/inherent gender of referents becomes visible in singular personal pronouns and with a few gender-specific nouns only. This linguistic contrast raises interesting questions for contexts where the two languages meet, such as in second language acquisition. Is there a gender transfer? If so, is the abstract feature transferred or is it the specific gender of nouns that is active in the acquisition of a second language? What effect does this have on reference to persons?

These questions will be addressed in this seminar. In the first half, we will look at the theoretical background including aspects such as
- gender systems from a cross-linguistic perspective
- the role of transfer in SLA
- the generic masculine in English and German
- implications for the reference to people

We will also have a look at methods and methodology and have a short introduction to experimental linguistics.
In the second half of the seminar, students will work in small groups to design, conduct and present their own empirical studies on gender. Project work and active participation are requirements for the Studienleistung, for a Prüfungsleistung, students will have to write a term paper that is based on their project.