I know a lot of languages have some aspects that probably seem a bit strange to non-native speakers…in the case of gendered words is there a point other than “just the way its always been” that explains it a bit better?
I don’t have gendered words in my native language, and from the outside looking in I’m not sure what gendered words actually provide in terms of context? Is there more to it that I’m not quite following?
This doesn’t really answer your question but it reminded me of the following that I think is somewhat relevant.
I was listening to a podcast several years ago that was discussing a study that was done about the effects of gendered words in various languages. It was rather interesting. They did things like showed people a picture of a bridge and asked them to describe it. In languages that used a masculine gender for ‘bridge’ it was generally described in ways that highlighted features such as strength, solidness, etc. And for languages that used a feminine gender it tended to be described more artistically, talking about it’s grace or curves etc. If I remember correctly, they even studied people fluent in both languages and the answers would vary along those same lines depending which language they were asked/responded in.