Seeing the Water Around Us

Experience and the Art of Being{Phenomenology}

feminine

— adj1. suitable to or characteristic of a woman: a feminine fashion2. possessing qualities or characteristics considered typical of or appropriate to a woman3. effeminate; womanish4. grammar a. denoting or belonging to a gender of nouns, occurring in many inflected languages, that includes all kinds of referents as well as some female animate referents b. ( as noun ): German Zeit ``time'' and Ehe ``marriage'' are feminines [C14: from Latin fēminīnus, from fēmina woman]

Etymology and usage

The word female comes from the Latin femella, the diminutive form of femina, meaning "woman," which is not actually related to the word "male." In the late 14th century, the English spelling was altered so that the word paralleled the spelling of "male."[2]