Gender of nouns in Spanish IV Nouns that can change gender by replacing the final letter

In the previous lessons we were talking about nouns that are either masculine or female. There are other types of nouns in Spanish, which can be applied to both male and female objects. The first can be called "sustantivos de genero inherente" (inherent gender nouns) and the second "sustantivos con moción de género" (nouns with gender motion). Here, anyway, we are not so interested in knowing their names, but in knowing how to use them. 

The nouns that can change their gender are those applied to sexual beings as humans or animals. These can be of two types. On the one hand, there are cases in which the word used to refer to the person or animal changes. In this post we are going to focus on them

As we saw in a previous lesson, most male nouns end with "o" and most female nouns end "a". Therefore, we can change the gender of many male nouns that end with "or", only replacing this last letter for an "A" and vice versa. This is the case, for example, with the nouns "oso" y "osa" (male bear and female bear), "hijo" e "hija" (son and daughter), "niño" y "niña" (little boy and little girl), "abuelo" y "abuela" (grandfather and grandmother), "cocinero" y "cocinera" (male cook and female cook).

"Quién fue el abuelo de María Asunción Aramburuzabala, la mujer más rica de México" (Who was the grandfather of María Asunción Aramburuzabala, the richest woman in Mexico"

"La historia de la abuela que cumplió su sueño: terminó el secundario y fue abanderada a los 82 años" (The story of the grandmother who fulfilled her dream: she finished high school and was flagged at 82)

However, not all male nouns who can change gender end in "o". In some cases they end with a consonant. In such cases, we usually can make the noun feminine simply by adding an "a" at the end of the word.

If we want, for example, refer to a male teacher, we say "profesor", but if we want to talk about a female teacher, we say "profesora", adding an "a" at the end of the word. In general these are nouns that refer to activities or professions whose names end with "r" as "profsor" and "profesora" ("male and female professor or teacher), "contador" and "contadora" (male y female accountant), "vendedor" and "vendedora" (male and female seller)" but there may be others such as "León" and "Leona" (male y female lion).

"La profesora que explica los polinomios con piezas de Lego en las redes sociales" (The teacher (female) who explains the polynomials with Lego pieces on social networks).

There are other cases in which the word changes more radically or even changes completely when going from masculine to feminine. We will talk about these nouns in a next lesson.