Hauptinhalt

Alan K. Scott: Das Suffix –In. Eine Ergänzung zum deutschen Wortbildungssystem

There has not yet been a detailed and neutral portrayal from a linguistic viewpoint of the relatively recent suffix -In, which is more commonly encountered in its plural form -Innen (MitarbeiterIn, StudentInnen, etc.). Mostly, -In is viewed merely as one means among several of achieving sex equality in language, usually with the aim of identifying the most successful means. The linguistic activity of -In, which is not dealt with in any of the handbooks on German word formation, is generally ignored. In this paper the suffix -In is described on the basis of usage examples, with regard to its history, development and use, its semantics, its orthography, its pronunciation, its morphology and its syntax. Finally, the future prospects for the further development of -In are assessed. It is usually assumed that -In is a variant – with an initial capital letter – of the feminine sex-marking suffix -in, a view that proves to be false. The suffix -In is a suffix in its own right. The sense of the -In-derivatives depends on whether the suffix is used in its singular or plural form: singular -In denotes a hypothetical person of unknown sex, whose sex is not specified; plural -In denotes a group that expressly consists of men and women: the sexual composition of the group is not necessarily known to the speaker.