Language/Croatian/Grammar/Gender-in-Croatian

Croatian → Grammar → Gender in Croatian

As a Croatian language teacher, I’ve noticed that one of the trickiest parts of the Croatian language for foreign learners is the gender system. In this lesson, we’ll cover everything you need to know about the three genders in Croatian: masculine, feminine, and neuter.

With the completion of this lesson, consider investigating these related pages: How to Use Have & Participles and Gerunds.

What are genders in Croatian?

In Croatian, like in many other Slavic languages, every noun has a gender. They are classified into three categories: masculine, feminine, and neuter. Knowing the gender of a noun is important because it affects the way adjectives, pronouns, and verbs agree with it.

Masculine gender

Masculine gender is assigned to nouns referring to male humans or animals, as well as many inanimate objects. The masculine gender usually ends in -o, -e, -in, -an or consonants, but there are many exceptions.

Examples:

Croatian	Pronunciation	English
muškarac	muʃkârat͡s	man
pas	pâːs	dog
vrtić	ʋr̩̂tiːt͡ɕ	kindergarten
novinar	nôʋinar	journalist

Note that many words that end in -a are actually masculine, not feminine.

Feminine gender

The feminine gender is assigned to nouns referring to female humans or animals, some professions, and many inanimate objects. The feminine gender usually ends in -a or -i, but again, there are many exceptions.

Examples:

Croatian	Pronunciation	English
žena	ʒěna	woman
kuća	kût͡ʃa	house
knjiga	kńiːɡa	book
majka	mâjka	mother

Neuter gender

The neuter gender is assigned to nouns referring to things, concepts, and some animals. The neuter gender usually ends in -o, -e, or -je.

Examples:

Croatian	Pronunciation	English
dijete	d͡ʑîːjɛtɛ	child
more	môːrɛ	sea
jaje	jâjɛ	egg
slovo	slôʋɔ	letter (of the alphabet)

Some words can have different gender depending on the context:

Croatian	Pronunciation	English
radio	rádijɔ	radio (device), masculine; radio (station), neuter
zebra	zêbra	zebra (animal), feminine; zebra (crossing), neuter

Irregularities

There are numerous exceptions to the rules for gender assignment. This can be frustrating for learners who are trying to memorize the gender of every noun. Here are some irregularities to be aware of:

- Some nouns change gender depending on the plural form (e.g. "zubi" (teeth) is masculine, but "zubalo" (set of teeth) is neuter). - Some nouns have different genders in different dialects or spoken registers (e.g. "gramofon" is masculine in standard Croatian, but neuter in some regional dialects). - A small number of nouns can be both masculine and feminine (e.g. "čovjek" (person) is masculine when referring to a male, but feminine when referring to a female). - Some nouns have ambiguous or unclear gender, especially loanwords from other languages (e.g. "taksi" (taxi) can be masculine or neuter).

Conclusion

That's all for now on the basics of gender in Croatian. While it can be challenging to learn all the gender patterns and exceptions, it's an important part of mastering the language. Keep practicing and you'll get the hang of it!

Sources

• Learn The Grammatical Croatian Genders: Masculine, Feminine ...
• Gender and plural in Croatian | coLanguage
• General rules for noun gender in Croatian
• Serbo-Croatian grammar - Wikipedia

Now that you've completed this lesson, don't stop learning! Check out these related topics: Prepositions and Pronouns & 0 to A1 Course.

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• Plurals
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• 0 to A1 Course
• Adjectives
• Croatian Language Varieties
• Prepositions and Pronouns
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• Advanced Verb Tenses
• Croatian Phonetics and Pronunciation