I can't speak for other English speaking nations, but in 21st century America just making an effort to draw a distinction between genders is all too often considered offensive. That having been said, I find a certain charm to gender specific terms. Guess I'm just 'old fashioned'. Unfortunately English, especially Americanized English, has a tendency to outright steal words from other languages so spelling in English isn't as easy as some more orderly languages. Even so, here are a couple of pointers:
If it ends in "-tor"
then drop the -tor in favor of a "-trix"
So "aviator" becomes "aviatrix" and "administrator" becomes "administratrix"
If the word ends in "-ter"
then drop the -ter in favor of "-tress"
So "hunter" becomes "huntress" and "enchanter" becomes "enchantress"
And if all else fails you can try just hanging a "-ess" off the end of the word:
So "lion" becomes "lioness" and "author" becomes "authoress"
But these are not rules you can count on because "protector" can become "protectress" and don't even bother looking for "actrix" in your spell check dictionary!
There are a few other suffixes that indicate female gender but the rules of spelling get even more obscure. Such as "farmer" becomes "farmerette" and "wolf" becomes "she-wolf".
What can I say- besides "Good Luck!"
@KenB Actors did used to be fairly exclusively male, I understand: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boy_player
– mcalex – 2013-02-12T13:39:07.567@mcalex Right, but that's strictly traditional and cultural, not etymological, am I right? – Ken Bellows – 2013-02-12T14:58:16.537
And some people still prefer actress. – Lambie – 2019-03-21T15:06:51.683
@KenBellows Anything language-related is by definition etymological. That being said, a lot of gendered words in English come from the French influence on the language. The origin of "-ess" as in actor/actress and similar words comes from Old French. Source: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/-ess#English
– GetOffMyLawn – 2019-03-21T18:02:34.470Perfect. I always thought it was weird that words like "actor" specifically referred to men. I suppose this rises out of tradition. There is no etymological basis to this, is there? Isn't an "actor" literally "one who acts", with -or being sort of a modified version of the suffix -er? Or am I wrong? – Ken Bellows – 2013-01-25T12:45:48.907