The Wendish Research Exchange - Menzel, Thomas: Gender and Word Formation. On Inflection according to Gender in Sorbian

Lětopis Abstract 2023:Thomas Menzel: Gender and Word Formation. On Inflection according to Gender in Sorbian.

Using random examples from chronologically applied dictionaries of both Sorbian languages we have examined how far paired-gender terms relating to persons are present in the lexicography of Sorbian languages. Those personal names which are treated in a relatively uniform way, such as place and inhabitant names, gender specific attributive nouns and pejorative/emotional expressions are compared with a residue class, in which the appearance of gender-paired personal names seems partly to occur arbitrarily. It turns out that the development of gender-paired entries in dictionaries does not happen in a linear way, and that Upper and Lower Sorbian exhibit completely different lexicological traditions in this respect. Derivations of names from the opposite sex are already surprisingly numerous in Phuhl’s Upper Sorbian-German dictionary from 1886, which can presumably be attributed to the models provided by contemporary Czech or Polish dictionaries.