Is it always la dentista or can you use el dentista for a male dentist?

Question

I am trying to figure out my first grade son's Spanish homework. If I am trying to say "the dentist" and it is a female dentist it is "la dentista". If it is a male dentist is it "el dentista"? If this is true, would this be considered one of the special rules for Spanish where you just change the adjective "the" from "la" to "el"?

Answer 1

You are right, it is "el dentista" for a male dentist and "la dentista" for a female dentist.

Here's an article on Nouns of Ambiguous Gender.

Answer 2

Yes. You can use "La" and "El" anytime with people to clarify whether they are male or female- even if it has a specific ending(O/A). With objects though, it's a different story. Obviously objects aren't a particular gender, but there are different types of words still called masculine(masculino) and feminine (feminino). Hope this helped...at least for future reference