GENDER
Unlike in English, gender is grammatical in Aragonese. Nouns may be masculine or feminine; neuter doesn't exist as a nominal category in Aragonese.
NOUNS
A noun is said to be masculine or feminine when it agrees with the masculine or feminine form of the article or is referred to by a masculine or feminine form of the pronoun. Masculine forms are characterized by a gender ending or morpheme -o, -e, or -Ø (not expressed); feminine forms are characterized by the gender morpheme -a.
According to this definition, the following nouns will be masculine: o nino (the kid -he), o can (the dog), l'árbol (the tree), o tellau (the roof), l'esquirgüelo (the squirrel); and feminine: a nina (the kid -she), a tefla (the shamrock, the trefoil), a mesa (the table), a güella (the sheep), l'augua (the water).
ADJECTIVES
Adjectives are also inflected and they share the same gender endings of nouns, showing the agreement when they modify them. Besides, the adjective has a sort of neuter gender when it is used preceeded by the neuter article o, which turns it into an abstract noun: escuro (dark) > l'escuro (the darkness), or makes it denote a plurality of things sharing the same quality: o millor (the best things, as in "we only sell the best"), o leyible (what can be read), me cuaca tot o royo (I like all the red things).
FEMININE FORMATION (nouns and adjectives)
The feminine is usually formed from the masculine by changing the last letter to -a: mesache (boy) > mesacha (girl); fillo (son) > filla (daughter); fiero (ugly) > fiera; berde (green) > berda.
When the masculine morpheme is not expressed (-ø
morpheme) -a should be added: chirmán (brother) > chirmana
(sister); choben (young) > chobena; chiquet (little, small) > chiqueta.
There are some special cases of phonetic modification:
can (male dog) > caña (female dog); bel (some) > bella.
Some nouns have dfferent forms (coming from different roots): ombre (man) > muller (woman); pai (father) > mai (mother); masto (male) > fembra (female); buco (buck) > craba (goat).
There are some adjectives that do not change: gran (big), prebable (probable), breu (brief), independién (independent), feliz (happy), azul (blue), millor (better).
Some rivers are considered feminine in Aragonese: a Zinca, a Isuela, a Uerba, a Garona, l'Arba, a Güecha, a Noguera...
