Identifying masculine or feminine through pronouns

24. With many nouns we don't know whether the person referred to is male or female until we hear the pronoun: My accountant says he is moving his office. My doctor says she is pleased with my progress.

25. This applies to nouns such as: adult, artist, comrade, cook, cousin, darling, dear, doctor, enemy, foreigner, friend, guest, journalist, lawyer, librarian, musician, neighbour, orphan, owner, parent, passenger, person, pupil, relation, relative, scientist, singer, speaker, spouse, stranger, student, teacher, tourist, traveller, visitor, writer. Sometimes we can emphasize this choice by using both pronouns: If a student wants more information he or she should apply in writing. However, this is becoming less acceptable. The tendency is to avoid this kind of construction by using plurals:

26. Students who want more information should apply in writing.

The category of case.

Case denotes the relation of a noun or a pronoun to other words in a sentence.
In English, there are three cases:

· the nominative

· the objective

· the possessive

Note

The nominative case is also called the subjective case.
The possessive case is also called the genitive case.

English nouns have exactly the same form in the nominative and the objective case. The possessive case of nouns is marked in written English by adding 's or s’ to the noun. English pronouns have different forms for each case.

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