Género profesional /Gender in professions

[sosia]

Many years ago, some professions were only masculine (médico, juez, torero, chófer, ...) so using the femenine was referring to the wife (médica: mujer del médico). If it was really a woman, it was used with la: la médico, la juez, la torero, la chófer. This is the common usage and aproved by the RAE.
With the time was more common that women were in all kind of profesions, and some words (not all) were accepted. Now are different trends in Spain, about what's "politically correct". Examples
- Some people (for example Hopper here) use the symbol @ for both genders. It's not approved for the RAE though (point 2.2 of the next link) but perhaps in the future.....
- Others says "señores y señoras" when "señores" can be used for both
- Others give femmenine to "neutral words" and change joven to "jovena" and juez to "jueza"

The main link (spansih)
The RAE page reference about gender
The point 3 speak about gender in professions.
I will try to make a proper translation of point 3. Please be patient
3.a) If the masculine form ends with -o, usually the feminine will end with -a:
"bombero/bombera, médico/médica, ministro/ministra, ginecólogo/ginecóloga".
there are excepcions like "piloto", "modelo" or "testigo", who works as commons: "el/la piloto, el/la modelo, el/la testigo "(an excepcional one is "reo", wich femmenine is "rea", but can be used "la reo")
Also words wich come from shortenings: "el/la fisio, el/la otorrino".
Sometimes, the femenine has the more learned ending -isa (del lat. -issa), for his former latin femenine origin: "diácono/diaconisa, sacerdote/sacerdotisa"; and as exception are words wich two feminines with -a ending and -esa ending (-eas as derivation of -isa): "diablo, fem. diabla o diablesa; vampiro, fem. vampira o vampiresa"

b) Proffesions ending in -a are mostly commons: "el/la atleta, el/la cineasta, el/la guía, el/la logopeda, el/la terapeuta, el/la pediatra". sometimes, as sayed, the feminine presents the learned ending -isa: "profetisa, papisa". For "poeta", both exits: "la poeta/poetisa". The word "guarda" has also two femenines, with different meaning (→ guarda): "la guarda/guardesa". Are also used as common gender words with the suffix -ista: "el/la ascensorista, el/la electricista, el/la taxista". An exception is the word "modista", wich normal masculine "el modista" has created a regresive masculine "el modisto".


Corrections per private. I want to keep this thread clean, it's too long for corrections

[Jessica]

well in class we learned it as la médica. Yesterday I learned here in Tomisimo that it's now acceptable
oh and by and the way approved have 2 p's in them

[Tomisimo]

Great information Sosia, thank you!

[Planet hopper]

Only to point out:

This is a very hot issue, evolving every day, really. Spanish is a rather machist language and it's going over it, slowly but steadily

Some of the variations are random. For example, why would we say doctora and not medica (in terms of usage)? Who knows? It just sounds better.

To me, in an issue of this kind, the RAE and its American sisters will fail to provide a systematic account, or, at least, they may be unreliable.

[Elaina]

Bueno Sosia te llevas la !

Es muy interesante lo que escribiste. Aunque creo que algunas palabras no las usa uno por razón a que no se oyen bien (como dice Planet Hopper), tal como, la médica, la rea (I prefer, la prisionera), etc.

Gracias de nuevo......te mereces unas vacaciones (como siempre)

[CrOtALiTo]

Ohh, it was very interesting, and I don't believe you have mistakes in your text, but it's simply, the words does not always sound better if you don't know use them, if you know the words simply you will use them, for example El Taxista, La Taxista, La Banquera or El Banquero, I believe to in the first chose sounds better than the second chose then, you know, the way to say the things are knowns in your own language, as you well know all it's acceptable.