English marks gender in he/she but not in you, ordinary verbs, or adjectives. Mainstream Cairene Egyptian marks it in all of those places: إنت / إنتي “you.M / you.F,” هو / هي “he / she,” رحت / رحتي “you.M went / you.F went,” and جاهز / جاهزة “ready.M / ready.F.” Ignoring one distinction can make the listener revise the identity of the person being discussed.
The goal is not to add feminine endings everywhere. Gender is distributed across several agreement systems, and plural Egyptian often merges distinctions that formal Arabic keeps separate. Diagnose the controller first—who or what the form describes—then choose the matching pronoun, verb, adjective, participle, or demonstrative.
Diagnostic 1: who is being addressed?
Cairene has singular إنت inta for one man and إنتي inti for one woman. The same contrast appears in the verb: feminine singular commonly has ـي where masculine singular does not.
❌ إنت جاهز نبدأ؟
Incorrect when addressing one woman—both the pronoun and adjective are masculine.
✅ إنتي جاهزة نبدأ؟
ʾinti gāhza nibdaʾ?
Are you ready to start? (to one woman)
❌ إنتي رحت البنك امبارح؟
Incorrect to one woman—the perfect verb needs the feminine singular ending ـي.
✅ إنتي رحتي البنك امبارح؟
ʾinti roḥti l-bank imbāriḥ?
Did you go to the bank yesterday? (to one woman)
❌ إنت بتشتغلي هنا؟
Mixed agreement—the pronoun is masculine while the verb is feminine singular.
✅ إنتي بتشتغلي هنا كل يوم؟
ʾinti bitishtaghali hina koll yōm?
Do you work here every day? (to one woman)
The written final ي is meaningful. English speakers often hear the first part of the verb and forget to finish the feminine ending. Practice pronoun and verb as one rhythm: إنتي رحتي، إنتي بتشتغلي، إنتي حتيجي.
Diagnostic 2: is the third-person subject masculine or feminine?
Third-person pronouns contrast هو huwwa and هي hiyya. In the perfect, the third-person masculine verb is usually the bare citation form, while feminine adds ـت pronounced -it. In the imperfect, masculine normally has يـ and feminine تـ.
❌ هي راح الشغل بدري.
Incorrect—هي requires the feminine perfect راحت.
✅ هي راحت الشغل بدري عشان عندها اجتماع.
hiyya rāḥit ish-shoghl badri ʿashān ʿandaha igtimāʿ.
She went to work early because she has a meeting.
❌ هو بتشتغل في مستشفى قريب.
Incorrect—the feminine imperfect prefix تـ conflicts with masculine هو.
✅ هو بيشتغل في مستشفى قريب من هنا.
huwwa biyishtaghal fi mostashfa ʾarīb min hina.
He works at a hospital near here.
The subject need not be a pronoun. أختي بتشتغل follows feminine أختي; أخويا بيشتغل follows masculine أخويا.
❌ أختي بيشتغل من البيت يوم الخميس.
Incorrect—أختي is feminine, so the third-person imperfect begins بتـ.
✅ أختي بتشتغل من البيت يوم الخميس.
ʾokhti bitishtaghal min il-bēt yōm il-khamīs.
My sister works from home on Thursday.
Diagnostic 3: does the adjective or participle describe that same person?
Predicate and attributive adjectives agree with singular gender. Many feminine forms add ـة, though some frequent classes, especially colors, have different stems. Participles also agree: رايح / رايحة “going.M/F,” مبسوط / مبسوطة “happy.M/F.”
❌ هي تعبان ومش رايح الشغل.
Incorrect—both predicates are masculine although the subject is feminine.
✅ هي تعبانة ومش رايحة الشغل النهارده.
hiyya taʿbāna wi-mish rāyḥa sh-shoghl in-nahārda.
She's tired and isn't going to work today.
❌ قابلت واحدة مصري في المؤتمر.
Incorrect—the adjective describing واحدة must be feminine مصرية.
✅ قابلت واحدة مصرية في المؤتمر.
ʾābilt waḥda maṣriyya fil-moʾtamar.
I met an Egyptian woman at the conference.
English adjectives do not change, so learners often fix the pronoun and miss the predicate. Treat the whole agreement chain as one unit: هي تعبانة ورايحة.
Diagnostic 4: what is the noun's grammatical gender?
With people, grammatical gender usually follows the referent. With objects, places, and ideas, it belongs to the Arabic noun. كتاب is masculine and takes ده، جديد; شنطة is feminine and takes دي، جديدة. A final ـة is a strong clue, but markerless feminine nouns such as شمس must be learned individually. The noun gender overview groups the most useful clues and exceptions.
❌ الشنطة ده جديد.
Incorrect—شنطة is feminine, so both demonstrative and adjective must be feminine.
✅ الشنطة دي جديدة بس تقيلة شوية.
ish-shanṭa di gidīda bass tiʾīla shwayya.
This bag is new, but it's a little heavy.
❌ الكتاب دي غالية.
Incorrect—كتاب is masculine, requiring ده and غالي.
✅ الكتاب ده غالي، فحاستعيره من المكتبة.
il-kitāb da ghāli, fa-ḥastaʿīro min il-maktaba.
This book is expensive, so I'll borrow it from the library.
Where gender distinctions merge
Mainstream Cairo does not maintain a separate everyday feminine plural pronoun or feminine plural verb paradigm. هم، إنتوا، راحوا، بتشتغلوا، شاطرين work for male-only, female-only, and mixed human groups. Do not import formal MSA هنّ، أنتنّ into casual Cairo unless deliberately code-switching (formal/MSA).
البنات وصلوا بدري وهم مستنيين بره.
il-banāt wiṣlu badri wi-humma mistannyīn barra.
The girls arrived early, and they're waiting outside.
الولاد والبنات شاطرين في الشغل ده.
il-wilād wil-banāt shāṭrīn fish-shoghl da.
The boys and girls are good at this work.
Nonhuman plurals are a different issue: ordinary Egyptian often uses feminine-singular agreement with them, as in العربيات الجديدة غالية “the new cars are expensive.” Do not interpret that as the individual cars being biologically feminine; it is a plural agreement pattern covered separately.
A four-step correction routine
- Identify the controller: addressee, third person, or noun.
- Decide singular versus plural before deciding gender.
- Check every agreeing item: pronoun, verb, adjective/participle, and demonstrative.
- For a human plural, use the mainstream common plural rather than inventing a feminine plural.
This routine catches mixed forms such as إنت بتشتغلي: the ending is feminine, but the pronoun was left masculine.
Register and variation
The singular contrasts taught here are mainstream urban Egyptian with Cairo as the production baseline (informal/neutral). Pronoun vowels and some agreement choices vary across Alexandria, the Delta, Upper Egypt, Bedouin-associated speech, class, age, and communities (regional/social). Formal MSA preserves distinct feminine plural pronouns and verbs (formal). Some speakers deliberately use formal forms in religious, ceremonial, comic, or performance settings. Those are register choices, not evidence that everyday Cairo lacks a coherent gender system.
Common Mistakes
Final mixed correction set
1. Mixed second-person agreement
❌ إنتي عايز تروحي دلوقتي؟
Incorrect—the pronoun and lower verb are feminine, but عايز is masculine.
✅ إنتي عايزة تروحي دلوقتي؟
ʾinti ʿāyza tirūḥi dilwaʾti?
Do you want to leave now? (to one woman)
2. Third-person perfect
❌ نادية وصل بدري وقعدت تستنى.
Incorrect—the first perfect verb must agree with feminine نادية.
✅ نادية وصلت بدري وقعدت تستنى.
Nādya wiṣlit badri wi-ʾaʿadit tistanna.
Nadia arrived early and sat down to wait.
3. Overcorrecting a female group
البنات هن ذهبن إلى الجامعة.
al-banāt hunna dhahabna ʾila l-gāmiʿa.
The girls went to the university. (formal MSA feminine plural; not the casual Cairo baseline)
✅ البنات هم راحوا الجامعة الصبح.
il-banāt humma rāḥu l-gāmʿa ṣ-ṣobḥ.
The girls went to the university in the morning.
Key Takeaways
- Contrast singular إنت / إنتي and هو / هي.
- Check gender on perfect and imperfect verbs, not only on pronouns.
- Make adjectives, participles, and demonstratives agree with singular nouns.
- Learn lexical noun gender; ـة is helpful but not a complete rule.
- Everyday Cairo generally uses common plural forms for female and male human groups.
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Start learning Arabic →Related Topics
- Masculine and Feminine NounsA1 — How grammatical gender works in Egyptian Arabic, how to recognize common patterns, and how noun gender controls nearby forms.
- Masculine and Feminine Adjective FormsA1 — Form and choose masculine and feminine Egyptian Arabic adjectives while keeping gender separate from plural and definiteness agreement.
- Independent Subject PronounsA1 — Use Egyptian independent pronouns for reference, contrast, and discourse prominence without repeating them wherever English requires a subject.
- Human and Rational Plural AgreementB1 — Track mainstream Cairene plural agreement across verbs, predicates, demonstratives, and pronouns for groups of people in either word order.
- ده، دي، and دولA1 — Choose the everyday Cairene demonstrative for masculine, feminine, and plural referents, and use it naturally as a pronoun or after a noun phrase.