Is a dog masculine or feminine in English?

Answer 1

There is no gender in the English noun. Nouns that refer to male or female creatures are not themselves masculine or feminine.

DOG

1. In general conversation, a dog is understood to mean the domesticated animal Canis lupus familiaris, with no reference to its sex.

Example sentence:

• "Next door's dog barks all night!'

This sentence tells us where the dog lives, and what it does, and when it does it, but it does not tell us if the animal is male or female, which is probably not important!

2. There are wild animals of the dog kind, e.g. wolves, foxes, coyotes etc. These are sometimes called wild dogs, but again the word 'dog' just indicates the species, not its sex.

3. HOWEVER, if specific reference is being made, or needs to be made, to the sex of this type of animal, 'dog' means the male, and 'bitch' means the female of the species.

Examples of usage

• "If we get a new puppy, shall we get a dog or a bitch?"

  This means: "... shall we get a male dog or a female dog?"

• "Wendy and her husband breed farm dogs. At the moment they are breeding from four dogs and six bitches, all prizewinners at the Working Sheepdog shows."

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For more information, see Related links below.

Answer 2

In English, the gender of a dog is considered neutral. It is common to use "he" or "she" for individual dogs based on their physical characteristics, but grammatically, the word "dog" itself does not have a gender assigned to it.