In my native language there are gender markers so depending on how a word ends, its gender becomes male, female or neuter. Since English has no gender markers, how are the pronouns of cities (such as Rome, which in my native language is masculine) or countries determined?
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3Aside from perhaps informally in a few uncommon situations, I've never actually heard of a city referred to with a gender-based pronoun. – Jason Bassford May 28 '18 at 03:58
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4Cities and countries don't have gender in English. Sometimes, however, the a city or country is referred to as "she", especially in poetic contexts. Ships also are sometimes referred to as "she", even if they're named after men, like the ore carrier Edmund Fitzgerald in the famous song (1975) by Gordon Lightfoot. – tautophile May 28 '18 at 04:06
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2To be explicit, the pronoun for a place is virtually always "it" outside of poetic contexts, even if locals would use a gendered pronoun in the place's native language (so I would say "I've never been to Rome, but I've heard it's beautiful" even if Rome has a gender in Italian). – 1006a May 28 '18 at 04:32
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For once, English is relatively logical here. The neuter pronoun 'it' goes with etically genderless referents. Anthropomorphism messes this up; ships, steam locomotives etc are often affectionately 'she'. Thus one can hear "The Duke of Gloucester is in preservation. She is a fine engine." Thomas the Tank Engine is obligatorily 'he'. – Edwin Ashworth May 28 '18 at 09:50
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What is your native language, out of interest. In Italian Roma is feminine (as are Torino and Milano, despite their o endings). – David May 28 '18 at 17:29
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Somewhat duplicate: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/12632/is-it-a-good-practice-to-refer-to-countries-ships-etc-using-the-feminine-form – Dave Costa May 29 '18 at 02:45
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English has almost completely lost gender. Our pronouns are gendered, with
- masculine (he, him, his, etc.)
- feminine (she, her, hers, etc.)
- neuter (it, its, etc.)
- and unspecified (I, me, we, us, you, they, etc.)
However, nouns (including proper nouns, i.e. names given to individuals) are not gendered unless they have a natural (physiological) gender, e.g. lion (masculine or unspecified), lioness (feminine), Andrew (masculine), Andrea (feminine).
Cities, being inanimate objects, have no natural gender and are all neuter.
What do you think of Rome? It's a beautiful city!
Generally speaking, only people and animals get masculine or feminine pronouns, with animals being called it unless their gender is known. It's also considered rude to call a person it, as it implies that they're a thing, not a person.
The only exception is some machinery or vehicles which are occasionally given a feminine gender:
It's a beautiful ship! (normal usage)
She's a beautiful ship! (emphatic use, the speaker feels an emotional connection to the object)
Cities don't fit into this category, so you can't say:
What do you think of Rome? *She's a beautiful city!
Doing so will mark you as a foreign speaker to most people.
