Discussion Groups / ESL Teaching / July 2004

No, there isn't. The reason is that English is a crazy mix of many
languages-- Anglo-Saxon, Latin, French, German and so on, each of
which may or may not have had general rules for determining gender,
but even when they did, the rules were not the same as those of other
contributing languges.

There are some suffixes that are used to transform a male name into a
feminine version that you can trust to some extent though. e.g.

George- Georgettte  Paul-Paulette
Edwin- Edwina  George-Georgina

There are very few reliable rules.  Names that end in -ie are often for
women (Marie, Angie, Billie, but Eddie for men).  Indeed, a fair number
of feminine forms of first names end in -e (Lynne, Anne), or
occasionally some other vowel (Angela, Linda, Laura).  But that isn't
entirely reliable.

I think it's more difficult in the USA where there seems to be a tendency to
choose names which don't immediately suggest gender. In Britain, although
there are some names which vary (eg Francis/Frances, Leslie/Lesley, Kim,
Hilary), most names have established male or female associations.

In the UK there are numerous books which list children's names and their
meaning (and gender), purchased by parents trying to choose their baby's
name. You could probably find something similar in your local bookshop or
library, or look online; eg

http://www.babychatter.com/
http://www.muslim-names.co.uk/
http://www.babynamenetwork.com/
http://www.indianchild.com/indian_baby_names.htm

Owain