In the midst of numerous gender and race discussions, I have continued to review basic Latin grammar. Oh the excitement! While reflecting on Latin nouns which are categorized as either masculine, feminine or neuter, I noted something new. Despite having studied them for 45 years, I never really thought about the reason that the nominative and accusative cases are dissimilar for masculine and feminine nouns while they are identical for neuter nouns. Suddenly it occurred to me.
In the case of neuter nouns, the category implies a lack of subjectivity. Since the neuter noun lacks subjectivity, there is only a sense of being an object. The difference in nominative and accusative cases of masculine or feminine words reference a subjectivity in the difference of taking action or receiving action that does not occur in neuter nouns. I briefly explored how this implicated various nouns and may discuss in a later post. As my friend would say, "this does not make a bank deposit," but it's notable that after looking at something for such a long period of time, I still find some new.
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