וְהָאֲנָשִׁים֙ רֹ֣עֵי צֹ֔אן כִּֽי־אַנְשֵׁ֥י מִקְנֶ֖ה הָי֑וּ וְצֹאנָ֧ם וּבְקָרָ֛ם וְכׇל־אֲשֶׁ֥ר לָהֶ֖ם הֵבִֽיאוּ׃
They happen to be shepherds; they have always been breeders of livestock, and they have brought with them their flocks and herds and all that is theirs.’
(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation, an adaptation of the NJPS translation. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term containing אִישׁ—in this case its plural form אֲנָשִׁים—by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)
Heb. וְהָאֲנָשִׁים רֹעֵי צֹאן. The speaker is Joseph, quoting what he plans to say to Pharaoh. This kind of verbless clause uses the situating noun אִישׁ to introduce into the discourse an attribute of the referent that is essential for grasping the depicted situation (i.e., the import of the arrival of Joseph’s family). In this clause, the determined subject/topic noun phrase regards its referent in terms of the previously mentioned situation. The focus of attention is on explaining the new situation that Pharaoh is facing. This is a prototypical usage of אִישׁ as a situating noun.
The referent’s gender is not at issue.
As for rendering into English, the NJPS ‘The men are shepherds’ nowadays overtranslates gender—it comes across as a statement about only the adult males in Joseph’s family. The revised rendering avoids overtranslating gender.