In everyday speech we use gender to refer to the different sexes. Gender can be male or female when used to describe animals or humans. We can also talk about gender from a sociological point of view. Here it distinguishes the roles that society deems appropriate for men and those suitable for women.
For example: From the scan we should be able to tell (distinguish) the gender of your baby.
From birth children are subjected to gender stereotyping.
The ancient Greeks ascribed genders to nouns, so that they could be masculine, feminine, or neuter. Today in grammatically gender can be used for nouns, pronouns and occasionally other parts of speech. In English there are a number of nouns and pronouns which have gender. The nouns are generally used to talk about male or female gender for people or animals, however sometimes objects can also be ascribed gender.
Pronouns: He, she, it, him, her, his, hers, its.
Nouns referring to people: Wife, husband, bride, groom, boy, girl, son, daughter, king, queen, duke, duchess, master, mistress, waiter, waitress, spokesman, spokeswoman, spokesperson.
Nouns referring to animals: Bull (male cow), bitch (female dog), cock (male chicken), vixen (female fox), doe (female rabbit), sow (female pig), ram (male sheep).
Objects: Ships. When we launch a ship we say, "May God bless this ship and all who sail on her." Here the ship is feminine.
The Earth. We very often use the phrase "Mother Earth". Here the Earth is ascribed a feminine gender.