Gender - Genre

In French, nouns are either masculine or feminine. They don't "carry" their gender in a way that would make it easy to recognize. So, when you come across a new noun, note it with the undefinite article: un for a masculine noun and une for a feminine noun.

To use the undefinite article will prevent you from being confused
when the definite article, le or la, comes before a vowel and become: l'.
L'amour (love) is masculine, l'amitié (friendship) is feminine, but they both begin in a vowel so they have the same article: l', which tells you nothing about the gender.

Which gender

The gender of a noun is mostly arbitrary, but in some cases the gender obeys a certain logic.
Nouns that refer specifically to male are masculine: un homme, un père, un oncle, un frère, un neveu, un cheval, un chien, un taureau, un coq...
Nouns that refer specifically to female are feminine: une femme, une mère, une tante, une soeur, une nièce, une jument, une chienne, une vache, une poule...

For long time, a few jobs have a masculine and a feminine form, ie:
un danseur/ une danseuse, un commerçant/ une commerçante, un gardien/une gardienne.
The present trend is to give a feminine form to every masculine form because nowadays there are women in most jobs. Of course, there is no change for many nouns ending in e, only the article tells you the gender: un chimiste/une chimiste.

For other words, there are some large categories... with some exceptions. Don't think meaning, think ending.

-ment
bâtiment, parlement, enchantement

-isme
classicisme, scepticisme, laxisme

-eau
bateau, corbeau, couteau, cadeau
Notable exception: eau une eau claire et fraîche

-tion
traduction, partition, méditation, action

-ance
chance, naissance, mouvance, lance

-ence
science, patience, agence, essence

-té
beauté, charité, clarté, vérité, santé

-ture
culture, nourriture, voiture, couture

-esse
prouesse, richesse, sveltesse, fesse

-elle
hirondelle, truelle, ruelle, bagatelle, selle

Other groups, alas, have as many exceptions as regular nouns.

un livre, book; une livre, pound
un manche, handle; une manche, sleeve
un mode, method; une mode, fashion
un page, page-boy; une page, page (book)
un pendule, pendulum; une pendule, clock
un poële (or poêle), stove; une poële (or poêle), frying pan
un poste, post positon job; la poste, the post office
un somme, nap; une somme, sum
un tour, walk; une tour, tower
un vase, vase; la vase, mud
un voile, veil; une voile, sail