Level: 3

Lingaparivartanam

Grammatical genders are known as लिङ्गानि in Sanskrit.

The literal meaning of the word लिङ्गम्is 'sign'. Therefore, the word which denotes the feminine or masculine of a noun is called gender.

There are 3 genders in Sanskrit: 

1. Masculinegender - पुल्लिङ्गम्

2. Femininegender- स्त्रीलिङ्गम्

3. Neuter gender- नपुंसकलिङ्गम्

(e.g. पुरुष = 'man' is masculine, स्त्री = 'woman' is feminine)

• Masculine- Those words in which there is a sense of male caste are called masculine.

Ex:गजः, बालकः, मुनिः, कविः, विद्यालयः

• Feminine - The word which denotes the feminine caste of a noun, is called feminine.

Ex:माला, बालिका, मतिः, नदी, धेनुः

• Neutral- Nouns or pronouns which neither denotes the male caste nor the sense of the female caste, are called Neutral words.

Ex: फलम्, पुस्तकम्, जलम्, मधु, वस्तु

Nouns use a fixed gender even if they refer to non-living things, and a noun's gender cannot usually be predicted from its meaning alone. However, we can usually determine a noun's gender by looking at what sounds a stem ends in and what suffixes were used to make the noun stem. Some examples:

• Nouns ending in -a are never feminine.
• Nouns ending in -ā, -ī, and -ū are almost always feminine.
• Nouns made with the -tra and -ana suffixes are usually neuter.

 

Exampleswith sentences:

 

1. Masculine gender

 

सिंहो गच्छति।
The (male) lion goes.

 

1. Feminine gender

 

सिंही गच्छति।
The (female) lion goes.

 

1. Neuter gender

 

वनम्अस्ति।
There is a forest.

 

 

Image	पुल्लिङ्गम्	स्त्रीलिङ्गम्
	अजः	अजा
	अध्यापकः	अध्यापिका
	गजः	गजा
	सुन्दरः	सुन्दरी
	बालकः	बालिका

 

 

• पुल्लिङ्गशब्दाः

देवः,सूर्यः,रामः, समयः,रविः, कविः, भानुः, शम्भुः

• स्त्रीलिङ्गशब्दाः

लेखनी,लता,सीता,पद्मिनी,मातुलानी

• नपुंसकालिङ्गशब्दाः

फलम्,वनम्, ज्ञानम्, वारि, मधु

 

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