MODULE 2
Language and gender
Week 7
Lecture overview
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Women’s language vs. men’s language:
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Stereotypes?
Gender distinctive use of language: example of study of differences
in pronunciation; speculations why there are difference in
pronunciation and vocabulary; vocabulary differences; is it possible
to itemize men’s and women’
Story-telling;
Encoding of gender differences in language
Complexity and variety of talks.
Mixed talk.
Women’s language vs. men’s
language ?
Stereotypes?
Men normally do
not talk much (they
are strong and
silent).
 Men talk
compulsively and
competitively about
sports, cars and
eating/drinking.
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Stereotypes?
 Women are
talkative;
 Women talk
more about about
clothes, children,
other relatives
Women are more
interested in gossip
than men are
Stereotypes?
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Are these stereotypes accurate or not? Women are
perceived as talking more than men but the
evidence contradicts this (men speak more on talk
shows, meetings, husband-wife dialogue)
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Do men and women talk differently in different
contexts, for example, in one-gender (all men or
all women) conversation and in a mixed-gender
conversation?
Gender distinctive use of
language
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Gender influences the distribution of social
roles and economic and social activities one
gets access to. These activities, in their turn,
influence language use.
The differences may take various forms in
different societies: e.g. competence in
different languages or dialects, vocabulary,
pronunciation, etc.
Gender distinctive use of
language
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A widespread belief that women’s language should be
more refined than men’s.
Vocabulary range is sometimes regarded as a feature
of refinement.
Difficult to conduct empirical study of vocabulary
range: a language study like this should control
various factors in the two control groups (male and
female), i. e. education, class, ethnicity, religion, etc.
Difficult to have two homogenous groups.
Second difficulty: the interviewees may control their
usage of vocabulary knowing the aim of the study
(observer’s paradox).
Gender distinctive use of
language
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Research on pronunciation differences
(the USA, Canada & the UK):
Except in casual conversations women
tend to use more prestigious variants
than men.
Society recognizes some accents as
better than others: e.g. Received
Pronunciation in Britain is associated
with competence and intelligence.
Vocabulary differences
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R. Lakoff:
Vocabulary of women’s talk: e.g. shirr; dart;
Precise color terms: e.g. beige, aquamarine;
Affective adjectives: e.g. divine, adorable;
Superpolite forms: e.g. euphemisms;
Hedges: you know, well, kind of;
Tag questions: turn a statement into a
questions so that the force is reduced, etc.
Itemizing men’s and women’s
language?
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Talbot (1998):
We cannot expect to find a simple checklist itemizing
men’s and women’s language on the basis of
linguistic forms. Linguistic forms are multifunctional:
there is no one-to one correlation between form and
function. The context of interaction determines
the function of a linguistic form. The need to
move from itemization of linguistic forms to the study
of the dynamics of the interaction.
The problem of the inequality of men and women is
not a linguistic but rather a social one.
Story-telling
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Different aspects of studying stories:
content of stories: themes, characters,
situations, the structure of narratives;
talk in which stories are produced and
interpreted: how the stories are
produced, how many narrators there
are, the role of the audience,
participation by the audience; why the
storied are being told, etc.
Story-telling
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Johnstone 1990, 1993.
Men talk about cars, modern technologies,
drinking, travel, fighting, etc.
Such topics help to talk away from the personal:
men’s stories do not involve self–disclosure.
All-female talk often involves self–disclosure: the
narrative will tell of an event that occurred in the
speaker’s life, usually very recently, which had
some kind of emotional impact.
Story-telling
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Women’s stories are mainly set at home, the
majority of men’s stories are set in the outside
world; workplace – the least favourite setting for
women; women talk while walking.
Women often reveal sensitive personal
information and show that they are vulnerable.
Women often discuss trivial things. Gossip, chitchat, natter is the content of everyday women’s
talk.
Story-telling
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Temporal relations: the majority of women’s
stories are set in the recent past, the majority of
men’s stories are set in the distant past.
Men’s talk portray a world peopled by male
human beings.
“When men are not the protagonists of their own
stories, they tell stories about other men”
(Johnstone).
86% of all-female conversations involve both
women and men.
Story-telling
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Men portray women in sexual terms. When
women are not defined in sexual terms, they
tend to be peripheral characters in men’s
stories, appearing most commonly as wives
or mothers.
Men have a significant presence in women’s
lives. They are visible in women’s stories.
Story-telling
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Men pay a great deal of attention to details.
e.g. talking about a car & mentioning the
speedometer, the windscreen wipers, the
fuses, etc.
Attention to details is an important strategy
in men’s conversation: it allows them to
avoid more personal talk.
Story-telling
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Men use taboo language more extensively:
it emphasises the point of the narrator and
performs masculinity.
Men are emotionally restrained. It is often
expressed by the usage of technical
vocabulary and formal syntax.
Men talk about their achievements. Male
protagonist is successful or a hero.
Story-telling
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Men try to beat other men in their stories. They
boast or add comments to their interlocutor’s
stories.
Women’s talk is almost never competitive. In
women’s stories the topic of fear or embarrassment
is more likely to be covered.
Men have fun together. Males tell stories that are
funny in themselves, but very often males also tell
stories about having a laugh.
Story-telling
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Men and women are actively creating
different worlds in and through their
stories (Johnstone).
Story-telling
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Women tell more stories: women - 17
stories/ hour, men - 11 stories/ hour.
Physical alignment: women are
more closely oriented to each other,
more involved, sit closer to each other,
maintain an eye contact, etc.
Encoding of gender difference
in language
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Traditional terms of address for women:
Mrs., Miss; no terms showing the marital
status of men. → Ms.
The convention of using a masculine
pronoun when referring to the person whose
sex is unknown or to both sexes (man).
Transmission of surname: woman losing her
surname when getting married.
Encoding of gender difference
in language
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Agent nouns:
Old English: suffixes indicated the sex of the
referent: -er(e) (male), -ster(e) female:
Somebody who bakes – baxter
Sews – Seamster
If men moved to a profession, no new word
was introduced; if men became predominant
in the profession, new terms were coined:
e.g. seamstress.
Encoding of gender difference
in language
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In English terms that can refer to both
sexes are almost always masculine: e.g.
actor, author.
In contrast, terms that are
morphologically marked as referring to
females (actress, authoress) are never
applied to males.
Complexity and variety of talks
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Human talk exhibits complexity and
variety. There may be many overlaps
between women’s and men’s talk.
Jennifer Coates: “alternative
femininities” and “alternative
masculinities” (2003: 134).
Mixed talk
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Male narratives in mixed conversations are more varied
than those produced in all-male conversation, both in form
and function. A range of masculinities is produced, from
the most macho, to the more sensitive and expressive.
In mixed talk, male speaker are encouraged by the female
participants to take longer turns. In the presence of women
men often explore topics such as cooking, which do not
appear in all-male conversations.
Less taboo language for males, more taboo language for
females.
Why are there gender differences
in vocabulary & pronunciation?
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(Talbot, 1998)
Speculations:
The social position of women is less secure and more
subordinate, therefore it is more necessary for women to signal
their social status linguistically and in other ways.
Men in the society are “rated” socially by their occupation,
earning power – by what they do. This is not always possible for
women. They are “rated” on the basis of how they appear.
Since they are not rated by what they do, other signals of
status, including their speech behavior become relevant.
In some Western cultures WC speech appears to have
connotations of masculinity. It is not considered to be a
desirable feminine characteristic. Features such as refinement
and sophistication are preferred feminine characteristics.
When do gender differences in
language use emerge?
Suggested Readings on Gender
and Discourse
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Coates, J. (Ed.) (1998). Language and Gender: A Reader. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishers.
Coates, J. (2003). Men Talk: Stories in Making of Masculinities.
Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Coates, J. (1996). Women Talk: Conversation between Women
Friends. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
Mey, Y. (1998). (Ed.). Concise Encyclopaedia of Pragmatics.
Amsterdam, Lausanne, etc.: Elsevier. (pp. 316 – 325.)
Talbot, M. (1998). Language and gender: an introduction.
Cambridge, UK: Polity Press. Malden, MA.: Blackwell Publishers.
Tannen, D. (1994). Gender and Discourse. N.Y., Oxford: Oxford
University Press.
Wodak, R. (Ed.) (1997). Gender and Discourse. London, etc.:
SAGE Publications.