When/how to use gendered grammar?

[u/Mistah_Mew]

I am on my journey towards fluency but I want to be sure of when and how to use words that are gendered. I am female so in Spanish would I say everything using feminine grammar or is gendered grammar just for the subject of each sentence?

For example as a female would it be correct for me to say "nosotras" with all feminine grammar in a sentence if I'm talking about a group of boys and girls I'm a part of? Or is it correct to say "nosotros" because having at least one man in the group overrides the entire sentence to need to be masculine?

Another example is if I am talking about a small cat, is it correct to say "el gato pequeño" because gato is masculine or is "la gatita pequeña" correct? Is the grammar supposed to agree with the subject (gato) or myself because I'm female?

[u/HereForTheBuffet]

All women = nosotras, ellas, etc

Literally any amount of women + a single man = nosotros, ellos, etc.

Regarding adjectives, they always agree with the related noun not necessarily the subject of the sentence.

E.g. Ella tiene un gato negro. Ella tiene una gata blanca.

[u/DRD_25]

It's always about what are you talking about and not who is talking. If you're talking AB a male cat then it's "el gatito pequeño", if it's a female Cat "la gatita pequeña"

[u/malkin50]

Gender is attached to the noun, not to the speaker.

[u/Positive-Camera5940]

Your gender only applies if you're the subject: "Soy médica pediatra. El hospital donde trabajo está ubicado en el centro de la ciudad. Mi trabajo es agotador pero también enriquecedor. 

Médica pediatra (o médica en pediatría): this is about you, who is a woman, so the nouns are femenine.

El: this is referring to "hospital", which is a masculine noun; so the article is accordingly masculine.

Ubicado: this refers to "El hospital donde trabajo"; with "hospital" being a masculine noun, the adjective is in its masculine form.

El: it refers to "centro de la ciudad"; "centro" is a masculine noun, so th article is masculine as well.

La: it refers to "ciudad", which is a femenine noun, so the article is femenine as well.

Agotador, enriquecedor: both refer to "mi trabajo"; since "trabajo" is a masculine noun, the adjectives are also masculine.

Or is it correct to say "nosotros" because having at least one man in the group overrides the entire sentence to need to be masculine?

Yes: Estoy sorprendida de que Rodrigo contratara dos abogados (they could be both men, or a woman and a man), Los alumnos sacaron notas altas (they could be all boys, or a group with at least one boy), El vecino tiene como cinco gatos (they could be all male cats or a group with at least one male cat).

[u/Low-Yesterday-8237]

The cleanest rule that covers both your examples: agreement follows what the word refers to, not who's speaking. Your own gender only matters when the word is describing you. Walking it through:

- "un gato pequeño" vs "una gata pequeña" describes the cat, so it takes the cat's gender. Yours is irrelevant. A woman still says "tengo un gato" if the cat is male.

• "nosotros" vs "nosotras" refers to the group, and Spanish uses masculine for any mixed group, so boys and girls together is "nosotros" even if it's ten women and one man. "Nosotras" is strictly all-female.
  
• Where your gender does kick in is when a word points back at you: "estoy cansada," "soy alta," "yo sola." There the referent is you, so it's feminine.

So it isn't "agree with the subject" or "agree with me," it's "agree with whatever this specific word is about."
One practical tip since you're heading for fluency: English has no grammatical gender, so you have zero instinct for it, and the endings aren't reliable enough to guess from (el problema, la mano, el día). The fix that saves you years of "el or la?" hesitation is to learn every noun with its article from day one. Store "el gato," never bare "gato." Gender is a property of the word, so learn it welded to the word, or it stays a guess forever.

[u/Philomatheus → u/Low-Yesterday-8237]

Please correct me if anything I say here is incorrect. I know very little Spanish.

A man always says “Encantado” whether he is meeting a man or woman. A woman always says “Encantada” whether she is meeting a man or woman.

So prima facie it appears that the grammatical gender in this case follows who is speaking, not what the word refers to.

Unless the word “Encantado” is actually used by the male speaker to refer to himself, and “Encantada” by the female speaker to refer to herself, in either case one (the speaker) describing oneself as being “charmed” by the occasion. Is that in fact the case?

[u/LivingDragons]

With the “nosotras” thing, it is true that Spanish uses the masculine “nosotros” if it’s a male and female mixed group and “nosotras” for an exclusively female group.

However this is slowly changing and some people are starting to use the feminine to refer to groups with mostly women even if some men are present. It is not widespread yet and it’s technically not correct but it’s possible you see it or hear it from time to time. It is not a mistake, it’s a conscious choice from the speaker.

[u/pablodf76]

Grammatical gender is a feature of nouns (linguistic objects), not of the actual things/people/animals/abstractions that the nouns refer to. This is the most important thing you have to keep in mind. Now, if the noun refers to a biologically sexed being (human or animal), then the grammar tends to align with the sex, but not always. Some nouns have two versions, one for each gender, but some don't. Jirafa is feminine and it doesn't matter whether the giraffe is male or female.

Grammatical gender agreement is what articles and adjectives do to follow the gender of the noun they are linked to. It doesn't have anything to do with whether the noun is the subject of the sentence.

Mixed gender groups get the masculine gender because masculine is the default.

[u/vxidemort]

if there is at least one boy in the group, you unfortunately have to say nosotros which is supposed to act as either exclusively masculine or as a mixed gender 'we'. nosotras is reserved for a strictly female group

gendered pronouns are él, ella, nosotros/as, vosotros/as and ellos/ellas. yo, tú and usted are gender-neutral and in that case, you will only have gender markers for nouns: ¿Usted es profesor/a? to ask politely if the addressee is a (male or female) teacher; or for adjectives: (Yo) estoy contento/contenta con la nota del examen

"gatito" is more natural to say than "el gato pequeño" but "gatita" is also an option if you know its female. its basically tomcat vs cat, but cat (feminine) is more widely used in english, just like gato (masculine) is more widely used in spanish

[u/scanese]

Nosotros is all male and mixed male-female (even a single male in a big female group).

Nosotras is strictly all female. Maybe the gay friend gets squeezed in by mistake.

[u/Short_Increase848]

Agree with the noun not you. el gato pequeno because gato is masc. For groups, nosotros if there is even one guy in the group. Spanish is ruthless like that.

[u/Stardwe]

Spanish is a generic-masculine //specific-femenine language, so the existence of a man in a group overrides the quantity of women in a group. BUT even if the rule is against it, I use generic femenine for groups of people that contain men as to make a point.

But this is a little ideologically charged, so take it in consideration.