ABSTRACT
Hesitations in the usage of gender for inanimate objects are visible in words where traditional gender assignation differs in Catalan and Spanish, or where the word ending challenges the customary forms for masculine or feminine. Attaching unstressed pronouns to infinitives is another common mistake. Combinations such as coneixe'ns, mereixe-us, porteu-se, and menja'l are the result of simplifying the infinitive or imperative ending and processing them as if they ended in a vowel. These forms are colloquial and must be avoided in writing and formal speech. There is the rather usual mistake in native speech of the obligation formula tenir que. This is a clear and unnecessary borrowing from Spanish. It is quite usual to hear sentences where an expected pronoun hi or en is forgotten. The fact of Spanish lacking parallels to these pronouns may explain it.
