Editing Grammatical gender (section)

==== Slavic languages ====
The [[Slavic languages]] mostly continue the Proto-Indo-European system of three genders, masculine, feminine and neuter. Gender correlates largely with noun endings (masculine nouns typically end in a consonant, feminines in {{lang|sla|-a}} and neuters in {{lang|sla|-o}} or {{lang|sla|-e}}) but there are many exceptions, particularly in the case of nouns whose stems end in a [[soft consonant]]. However, some of the languages, including [[Russian language|Russian]], [[Czech language|Czech]], [[Slovak language|Slovak]] and [[Polish language|Polish]], also make certain additional grammatical distinctions between [[animacy|animate]] and inanimate nouns: Polish in the plural, and Russian in the accusative case, differentiate between human and non-human nouns.

[[Russian declension|In Russian]], the different treatment of animate nouns involves their accusative case (and that of adjectives qualifying them) being formed identically to the genitive rather than to the nominative. In the singular that applies to masculine nouns only, but in the plural it applies in all genders.

A similar system applies [[Czech declension|in Czech]], but the situation is somewhat different in the plural: Only masculine nouns are affected, and the distinctive feature is a particular inflective ending for masculine animate nouns in the nominative plural, and for adjectives and verbs agreeing with those nouns.

[[Polish morphology]] might be said to distinguish five genders: personal masculine (referring to male humans), animate non-personal masculine, inanimate masculine, feminine, and neuter. The animate–inanimate opposition for the masculine gender applies in the singular, and the personal–impersonal opposition, which classes animals along with inanimate objects, applies in the plural. (A few nouns denoting inanimate things are treated grammatically as animate and vice versa.) The manifestations of the differences are as follows:
* In the singular, masculine animates (in the standard declension) have an accusative form identical to the genitive, and masculine inanimates have accusative identical to the nominative. The same applies to adjectives qualifying these nouns, the same as in Russian and Czech. Also, Polish masculine animates always form their genitive in {{lang|pl|-a}}, whereas in the case of inanimates some use {{lang|pl|-a}} and some {{lang|pl|-u}}:
*:animate: {{lang|pl|dobry klient}} ("good customer"; nominative); {{lang|pl|dobrego klienta}} (accusative and genitive)
*:animate: {{lang|pl|dobry pies}} ("good dog"; nominative); {{lang|pl|dobrego psa}} (accusative and genitive)
*:inanimate: {{lang|pl|dobry ser}} ("good cheese"; nominative and accusative); {{lang|pl|dobrego sera}} (genitive only)
* In the plural, masculine personal nouns (but not other animate nouns) take accusatives that are identical to the genitives; they also typically take different endings in the nominative (e.g. {{lang|pl|-i}} rather than {{lang|pl|-y}}). Such endings also appear on adjectives and past tense verbs. The two features are analogous to features of Russian and Czech respectively, except that those languages make an animate/inanimate distinction rather than personal/impersonal) . Examples of the Polish system:
*:personal: {{lang|pl|dobrzy klienci}} ("good customers"; nominative); {{lang|pl|dobrych klientów}} (accusative and genitive)
*:impersonal: {{lang|pl|dobre psy}} ("good dogs"; nominative and accusative); {{lang|pl|dobrych psów}} (genitive only)
*:impersonal: {{lang|pl|dobre sery}} ("good cheeses"; nominative and accusative); {{lang|pl|dobrych serów}} (genitive only)

A few nouns have both personal and impersonal forms, depending on meaning for example, {{lang|pl|klient}} may behave as an impersonal noun when it refers to a [[Client (computing)|client in the computing sense]]. {{crossreference|(For certain rules concerning contextual determination and mixed-gender groups, see [[#Contextual determination of gender|above]].)|printworthy=y}}