[StBernard] The Spanish Computer

Westley Annis westley at da-parish.com
Thu Jul 19 20:20:53 EDT 2007


> The Spanish Computer
>
> A Spanish teacher was explaining to her class that in Spanish,
unlike

> English, nouns are designated as either masculine or feminine.
> "House" for instance, is feminine: "la casa."
>
> "Pencil," however, is masculine: "el lapiz."
>
> A student asked, "What gender is 'computer'?"
>
> Instead of giving the answer, the teacher split the class into
two
> groups, male and female, and asked them to decide for themselves
> whether "computer" should be a masculine or a feminine noun.
>
> Each group was asked to give four reasons for its recommendation.

>
> The men's group decided that "computer" should definitely be of
the
> feminine gender ("la computadora"), because:
>
> 1. No one but their creator understands their internal logic;
>
> 2. The native language they use to communicate with other
computers
> is incomprehensible to everyone else;
>
> 3. Even the smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for
> possible later retrieval; and
>
> 4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself
> spending half your paycheck on accessories for it.
>
>
> (THIS GETS BETTER!)
>
>
> The women's group, however, concluded that computers should be
> Masculine ("el
> computador"), because:
>
> 1. In order to do anything with them, you have to turn them on;
>
> 2. They have a lot of data but still can't think for themselves;
>
> 3. They are supposed to help you solve problems, but half the
time
> they ARE the
> problem; and
>
> 4. As soon as you commit to one, you realize that if you had
waited a
> little
> longer, you could have gotten a better model.
>
> The women won.




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