What Is the Masculine Gender? (with Examples)

Masculine Gender (English Grammar)

Masculine gender is one of three genders in English grammar. The three genders for nouns and pronouns are as follows:

masculine
feminine
neuter

Click on Two Masculine Nouns

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Here are the associated singular pronouns:

Gender	Pronoun	Possessive Determiner (a type of pronoun)	Possessive Pronoun
masculine pronouns	he Example: He is warm.	his Example: Those are his tools.	his Example: Those are his.
feminine pronouns	she Example: She is warm.	her Example: Those are her shoes.	hers Example: These are hers.
neuter pronouns	it Example: It is warm.	its Example: Those are its toys.	its Example: These are its. (rare)

Unless its meaning makes it obviously male (e.g., boy, king, boar) or female (e.g., princess, hen, mare), a noun in English is neuter by default. Here are two noteworthy points related to gender:

Large machines. Large machines such as ships and trains, which - by default - are neuter, are sometimes affectionately given a female gender (i.e., referred to as she or her).
Animals. An animal is referred to as it. It is only referred to as he or she when the sex is known.

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Why Should I Care about Masculine Gender?

There are three noteworthy issues related to masculine gender.

(Issue 1) Finding an alternative to his/her.

In the past,he or his was used in documents to denote "his or her." This is no longer an acceptable practice, and their is used instead. Look at these sentences:

Every person must remember which horses he rode.
Anyone who neglects his responsibility will be sacked.

These are only correct if all the people are male. Using he or his for unknown people was the accepted practice in the past, but no longer.

Here are some options:

Every person must remember which horses he/she rode.
Anyone who neglects his/her responsibility will be sacked.

These are okay, but they're clumsy solutions. These are better versions:

Every person must remember which horses they rode.
Anyone who neglects their responsibility will be sacked.

(Issue 2) Choosing the right version of blonde/blond.

The word blond/blonde changes depending on its gender.

Blond is a noun meaning a fair-haired male.

The blond has a unique dancing style. (for a boy)

Blond is also an adjective used to describe anybody (regardless of their gender) with fair hair.

The blond girl and the blond boy make a nice blond couple.

blond

Blonde is a noun meaning a fair-haired female.

The blonde a unique dancing style. (for a girl)

Blonde is also an adjective used to describe a female (or females) with fair hair.

The blonde girl and the blond boy make a nice blond couple.

blonde

blond

(Issue 3) Using gender-neutral pronouns for people who do not identify themselves as either male or female.

Some people identify as non-binary; i.e. they do not identify as male or female. These people might ask you to use they (and of course their, them, theirs, themself) or just their name instead of a pronoun (e.g., Sarah, Sarah's, Sarah's self) when talking about them.

Read more about using non-binary pronouns.

Key Points

When writing about someone whose gender is unknown, don't use he/she, his/her, etc. Use they, their, etc. For example:

Any person who believes ~~he/she is~~ they are being disadvantaged should raise the issue with ~~his/her~~ their team leader.

Use blond for men and blonde for women.
Use they when talking about non-binary people.

Interactive Exercise

Here are three randomly selected questions from a larger exercise, which can be edited and printed to create exercise worksheets.

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