Mozzarella has a typical feminine Italian/Latin ending (-a).
So is there a specific reason, why it is masculine in the German language? If so, could you please tell me?
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11Maybe because it is "der Käse"?– user6191Jul 17, 2014 at 19:31
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@Carlster But Mozzarella is a name...– ArminJul 17, 2014 at 19:32
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10I was referring to a possible transformation from "der Mozzarella-Käse" to "der Mozzarella".– user6191Jul 17, 2014 at 19:34
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2related: german.stackexchange.com/questions/5545/…– TakkatJul 17, 2014 at 21:48
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2 Answers
In German every cheese name is masculine: "der Parmesan", "der Mozzarella", "der Ricotta", "der Gouda", "der Camembert", and so on.
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11Well, it's a rule, but like all "rules" in linguistics, it's descriptive, not prescriptive: A linguistic rule describes what (the majority of) native speakers of a language consider as correct; it does not dictate what they have to consider as correct.– UweJul 17, 2014 at 19:54
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10Could you add the bit that "Käse" is masculine? I think that is the reason why this "rule" exists– EmanuelJul 17, 2014 at 21:08
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2It's the reason why the rule says "all cheeses are male" rather than "all cheeses are female", but it doesn't explain why there is a rule at all. There are categories of things for which there is such a rule (e.g., cheeses, alcoholic spirits), and others for which there is no rule (e.g., body parts, currencies, magazine titles).– UweJul 18, 2014 at 8:00
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1Well, the real reason the "rule" exists is, as you correctly said, that people chose to speak that way. And why did they do it? Probably because it is "der Käse" and they just stuck with the gender. The reason why there is no rule for other groups is that people use different genders for members of the group.– EmanuelJul 18, 2014 at 8:06
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7It is not male, it is masculine, that is: of masculine grammatical gender. Not at all the same thing.– fdbJul 18, 2014 at 9:03
The German language is not terribly rational when it comes to assigning gender to various objects. For instance, some parts of the human body are male and some are female, no matter what the overall person owning them is. You should read Mark Twain's essay The Awful German Language for a side-splitting take on this. I lent a copy to my German-born teacher, and it came back slightly damp; she had laughed until she cried.
Why is cheese male? Because!
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I didn't mean cheese in general but a special cheese that has a name that should be female.– ArminJul 17, 2014 at 22:34
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21) This case seems quite rational to me. 2) The "problem" with the body parts applies not only to German.– user6191Jul 18, 2014 at 6:26
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