Editing Grammatical gender (section)

====Strict semantic criteria====

In some languages, the gender of a noun is directly determined by its physical attributes (sex, animacy, etc.), and there are few or no exceptions to this rule. There are relatively few such languages. The [[Dravidian languages]] use this system as described [[#Dravidian|below]].

Another example is the [[Dizi language]], which has two asymmetrical genders. The feminine includes all living beings of female sex (e.g. woman, girl, cow...) and [[diminutive]]s; the masculine encompasses all other nouns (e.g. man, boy, pot, broom...). In this language, feminine nouns are always marked with ''-e'' or ''-in''.{{sfn|Corbett|1991|p=11}}

Another African language, [[Defaka language|Defaka]], has three genders: one for all male humans, one for all female humans, and a third for all the remaining nouns. Gender is only marked in personal pronouns. Standard English pronouns {{crossreference|(see [[#Germanic: English|below]])|printworthy=y}} are very similar in this respect, although the English gendered pronouns (''he'', ''she'') are used for domestic animals if the sex of the animal is known, and sometimes for certain objects such as ships,{{sfn|Corbett|1991|p=12}} e.g. "What happened to the Titanic? She (or it) sank."