Source Unknown | September 15, 1999 | NA |
From: Joe Esposito; joeespo@worldnet.att.net
A language instructor was explaining to her class that French nouns, unlike their English counterparts, are grammatically designated as masculine or feminine. Things like "chalk" or "pencil" have a gender association, although in English these words are neutral.
Puzzled, one student raised his hand and asked, "What gender is a computer?"
The teacher wasn't certain which it was, and divided the class into two groups; one group all male, the other all female. They were to decide which gender should be applied to "computer" and give four reasons for their decision.
The results:
The group of women concluded computers should be referred to in the masculine gender because: