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Origin and history of gender

gender(n.)

c. 1300, "kind, sort, class, a class or kind of persons or things sharing certain traits," from Old French gendre, genre "kind, species; character; gender" (12c., Modern French genre), from stem of Latin genus (genitive generis) "race, stock, family; kind, rank, order; species," also "(male or female) sex," from PIE root *gene- "give birth, beget," with derivatives referring to procreation and familial and tribal groups.

 The unetymological -d- is a phonetic accretion in Old French (see D). Also used in Latin to translate Aristotle's Greek grammatical term genos. The grammatical sense is attested in English from late 14c. Jespersen ("Philosophy of Grammar," 1924) defines grammatical gender by reference to the Indo-European distinction of masculine, feminine, neuter, "whether the division be based on the natural division into two sexes, or on that between animate and inanimate, or on something else."

The "male-or-female sex" sense of the word is attested in English from early 15c. As sex (n.) took on erotic qualities in 20c., gender came to be the usual English word for "sex of a human being," in which use it was at first regarded as colloquial or humorous. Later often in feminist writing with reference to social attributes as much as biological qualities; this sense first attested 1963. Gender-bender is from 1977, popularized from 1980, with reference to pop star David Bowie.

gender

gender(v.)

"to bring forth," late 14c., from Old French gendrer, genrer "engender, beget, give birth to," from Latin generare "to engender, beget, produce" (see generation). Related: Gendered; gendering.

gender

also from late 14c.

Entries linking to gender

D

fourth letter of the Roman alphabet, from Greek delta, from Phoenician and Hebrew daleth, pausal form of deleth "door," so called from its shape.

The form of the modern letter is the Greek delta (Δ) with one angle rounded. As the sign for "500" in Roman numerals, it is said to be half of CIƆ, which was an early form of M, the sign for "1,000." 3-D for "three-dimensional" is attested from 1952.

*

Unetymological -d- is the result of a tendency in English and neighboring languages, perhaps for euphony, to add -d- to -n-, and especially to insert or swap a -d- sound when -l- or -r- follow too closely an -n-.

Compare sound (n.1), thunder (n.), pound (v.), spindle, kindred, strand (n.2) "fiber of rope," dialectal rundel, rundle for runnel. Swound was a form of swoun (swoon) attested from mid-15c, and used by Malory, Spenser, Lyly, Middleton, Beaumont & Fletcher. Also obsolete round (n.) "whispering," variant of roun "secret, mystery, divine mystery" (from Old English run, source of rune), with unetymological -d attested by 15c. in the verb. 

Among the words from French are powder (n.), meddle, tender (adj.), remainder, gender (n.), also riband, jaundice. It is less evident in spider (an agent noun from the Germanic *spin- root), and perhaps explains lender in place of loaner.

generation(n.)

early 14c., "body of individuals born about the same period" (historically 30 years but in other uses as few as 17), on the notion of "descendants at the same stage in the line of descent," from Old French generacion "race, people, species; progeny, offspring; act of procreating" (12c., Modern French génération) and directly from Latin generationem (nominative generatio) "generating, generation," noun of action from past-participle stem of generare "bring forth, beget, produce," from genus "race, kind" (from PIE root *gene- "give birth, beget," with derivatives referring to procreation and familial and tribal groups).

From late 14c. as "act or process of procreation; process of being formed; state of being procreated; reproduction; sexual intercourse;" also "that which is produced, fruit, crop; children; descendants, offspring of the same parent."

Generation gap is recorded by 1967; generation x for the (American) generation born after Baby Boomers (c. 1965 - c. 1979) is from 1991, by author Douglas Coupland (b.1961) in the book of that name; abbreviation gen X is by 1997; generation y is attested by 1994 but did not catch on. Adjectival phrase first-generation, second-generation, etc. with reference to U.S. immigrant families is from 1896. Related: Generational.

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Trends of gender

adapted from books.google.com/ngrams/ with a 7-year moving average; ngrams are probably unreliable.

More to explore

genre
1770, "particular style of art," a French word in English (nativized from c. 1840), from French genre "kind, sort, style" (see gender (n.)). Used especially in French for "independent style." In painting, as an adjective, "depicting scenes of ordinary life" (a domestic interior o
sexuality
1789, "action or fact of being sexed or having distinctions between the sexes;" see sexual + -ity. Meaning "capability of sexual feelings" is from 1879. Meaning "(one's) sexual identity" is by 1980. According to a strict biological definition sexuality is the characteristic of t
masculine
mid-14c., "belonging to the male grammatical gender;" late 14c., "of men, of male sex," from Old French masculin "of the...male sex" (12c.), from Latin masculinus "male, of masculine gender," from masculus "male, masculine; worthy of a man," diminutive...As a noun, "masculine gender," from c. 1500....
neuter
late 14c., neutre, in grammar, of nouns, pronouns, etc., "neither masculine nor feminine in gender," also of verbs, "having...middle or reflexive meaning, neither active nor passive," from Latin neuter "of the neuter gender," literally "neither one...As a noun from mid-15c., "the neuter gender;" by 1797 of certain animals (among bees, ants, etc.) that are of neither sex...
kin
c. 1200, from Old English cynn "family; race; kind, sort, rank; nature" (also "gender, sex," a sense obsolete since Middle...race, tribe," Old Norse kyn, Old High German chunni "kin, race;" Danish kjön, Swedish kön, Middle Dutch, Dutch kunne "sex, gender...Teutonic word, as in Latin genus and Greek [ genos], three main senses appear, (1) race or stock, (2) class or kind, (3) gender...
male
Male, matching female, applies to the whole sex among human beings and gender among animals, to the apparel of that sex,...Masculine, matching feminine, applies to men and their attributes and to the first grammatical gender; a woman may wear male...
its
The neuter genitive pronoun in Middle English was his, but the clash between grammatical gender and sexual gender, or else...
feminine
mid-14c., "of the female sex," from Old French femenin (12c.) "feminine, female; with feminine qualities, effeminate," from Latin femininus "feminine" (in the grammatical sense at first), from femina "woman, female," literally "she who suckles" (from PIE root *dhe(i)- "to suck").
tenure
early 15c., "holding of a tenement," from Anglo-French and Old French tenure "a tenure, estate in land" (13c.), from Old French tenir "to hold," from Vulgar Latin *tenire, from Latin tenere "to hold" (see tenet). The sense of "condition or fact of holding a status, position, or o
ink
"the black liquor with which men write" [Johnson], mid-13c., inke, from Old French enche, encre "dark writing fluid" (12c.), earlier enque (11c.), originally enca, from a shortening of Late Latin encaustum, from Late Greek enkauston. This is the neuter of the past-participle adje

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