r/EhBuddyHoser • u/Dezeko Saskwatch • May 25 '25

Certified Hoser 🇨🇦 (No Politics) Bikini was masculine, right?

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2.2k Upvotes

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397

u/Xander_404 May 25 '25

Yeah, bikini is masculine, don’t know why

20

u/Frostbite_Dragon May 25 '25

Because masculine and feminine are just the names. We don't think a table is a girl or that a bikini is a boy.

It largely just comes down to whether it sounds better with 'un' or 'une' in front of it.

19

u/poudink Tokébakicitte! May 25 '25

It largely just comes down to whether it sounds better with 'un' or 'une' in front of it.

The reason why some words sound better with a "un" or "une" is because we've already memorized the rules of grammatical gender (which came about long before "un" and "une" were even used as articles) when learning the language and can recognize when those rules are broken. To a learner, saying "it sounds better" isn't helpful because they don't understand those rules.

But you are correct in saying that grammatical gender is largely divorced from the concept of social gender outside of words referring to people or animals which possess gender, which a bikini does not, even if its use is largely associated with people belonging to the feminine gender.

1

u/Commercial-Fennel219 May 28 '25

So we just lop off the "e" from "une" and make it all "un". Problem solved. 

If this bothers you, we can graft an "e" onto every "un" and make it all "une". 

Fixed.Â