Posted on 06/13/2004 5:58:11 PM PDT by EggsAckley
Le Computer
A French teacher was explaining to her class that in French, unlike English, nouns are designated as either masculine or feminine. "House" for instance, is feminine -- "la maison." "Pencil" , however, is masculine -- "le crayon."
A student asked, "What gender is 'computer'?"
Instead of giving the answer, the teacher split the class into two groups, male and female, and asked them to decide for themselves whether "computer" should be a masculine or a feminine noun.
Each group was asked to give four reasons for their recommendation.
The men's group decided that "computer" should definitely be of the feminine gender ("la computer"), because:
1. No one but their creator understands their internal logic; 2. The native language they use to communicate with other computers is incomprehensible to everyone else; 3. Even the smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for possible later retrieval; and 4. As soon as you ¡ dü¿¿ÿ ¿ð ì¿¿ make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.
(No chuckling guys... this gets better!!!)
The women's group, however, concluded that computers should be Masculine (le computer"), because:
1. In order to do anything with them, you have to turn them on; 2. They have a lot of data but still can't think for themselves; 3. They are supposed to help you solve problems, but half the time they ARE the problem; and 4. As soon as you commit to one, you realize that if you had waited a little longer, you could have gotten a better model.
The women won.
I want a recount!
All well and good, but what gender are Macs?
Definitely feminine. They come in fruity colors.
I liked Umberto Eco's dichotomy between (pre-Windows) PCs and Macs. He likened them to Protestantism and Catholicism. Macs were Catholic, because you clicked on icons. But users of PCs agonized in the solitude of their souls about the state of their eternal salvation, or at least how to save a file, as they stared at the prompt on the command line.
Perhaps. If so, How would the French refer to them? "le" or "la?" Of course, either one sort of sounds... oh nevermind.
I respectfully disagree!
Wrong! It is feminine!
Whenever something goes wrong, and you try to find out what, it says
NOTHING!!
How about making computers both masculine and feminine.
That way they could be claimed by either sex.
Further, the French can adopt the new term
"le/la" computer which could make it either masculine or feminine or gay or bi.
What say ya'll?
By the way IMHO the French can keep their language, shouldn't they?
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