- Gender in Language and Communication I
Language and gender
refers to the relationship between language and our idea of men and women
leads to confusion as many consider gender as a category of grammar and not a social category
Gender vs Sex: A Definition
The terms 'gender' and 'sex' are different.
'Gender' refers to the expected social characteristics (expectations)
'Sex' refers to biological characteristics.
The term 'man’ and 'woman’ refers to the difference on the basis of biology.
Masculine vs Feminine
The term 'masculine' and 'feminine' refer to the characteristics of the community, namely the condition of a man or woman.
The term ending 'ine' has the meaning of 'like'.
Example: Bovine – like a cow, Vulpine – like a wolf
Man vs Woman
‘Man’ and ‘Woman’ are nouns
‘Masculine’ and ‘Feminine’ are adjectives – suggest quality or attributes
‘Male’ and ‘Female’ can be used as nouns or adjectives
‘Male behaviour’ = ‘masculine behaviour’.
Women and men often behave in the manner that is expected of the society. Behaving like this is said to be ‘doing gender’.
For example, men are more aggressive than women. More men are involved in violent crimes compared to women.
Linguistic Sex Differentiation
The focus is on phonology and lexical-grammar that includes sound patterns, words and structures. The focus of such study is on the detailed pronoun differences for women and men.
For example: System of pronouns for Germanic languages such as Danish and English. These languages distinguish gender in the third person pronoun reference such as he/she, she/her or it.
Men vs. Women
According to Rochefort, "…the men have a great many expressions peculiar to them, which the women understand but never pronounce themselves. On the other hand, the women have words and phrases which the men never use, or they would be laughed to scorn. Thus it happens that in their conversations it often seems as if the women had another language than the men."
Example
Terms used for preparation of food
Computer jargons
Projections
How far does our ideas about 'sexes' make us see what we want to see or see what we should see because of the language that is available to us?
How do we project our ideas?
Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
We impose our ideas on our environment as a result of the language we have. We dissect nature along lines laid down by our native languages. The categories and types that we isolate from the world of phenomena we do not find there because they stare every observer in the face; on the contrary, the world is presented in a kaleidoscopic flux of impressions which has to be organised by our minds – and this means largely by the linguistic systems in our minds.
Anthropomorphism
One of the 'projections' that we used to see
Something that describes human to things
An example of connecting language and thinking
Example: Concept of animation for children: brooms and spoons can talk, dance and sing like humans
(e.g. Beauty and the Beast)
Language differences also include different coding of 'reality' such as color terms.
Metaphorical: He turns green means 'jealous'.
Connotations: black clothes – signifies bereavement, in India; white shirt symbolises period of mourning
White symbolises purity
Yellow means cowardice
Red means danger;
seeing red means angry/anger
Female names are given for cars such as Teana, Serena, Sephia
Boat – Christina, ship - Queen Elizabeth II, hurricane – Diana, Katrina, Irma
We ‘humanise’ or ‘inanimate’ in order to be ‘friendly’ or ‘less terrifying’ – to reduce fear.
Like wild and savage bear or beasts - we make 'teddy bear' which is a child’s favorite and women love to cuddle.
The physical attraction of these objects (cars, boats and boats) is often highlighted.
The same as highlighting the physical beauty of women in terms of appearance or body shape.
For example, an extract from a news report on the Britannia royal yacht, ‘a ship which has given good faithful service for 44 years, and which is still as elegant now as when she was commissioned …’
According to Spender (1980), this is the perspective of men or the way men think about the world as a whole and such language is used by the public.
Language is used without giving detailed analysis of anything we think - no due attention is given to the use of language and the language is used naturally.
But when the use of the language is stuck then we give a subtle study of the implicit pattern of thought in the language. Then we ask ourselves who came up with such ‘thinking’ and subsequently the language itself.
Social Stratification Study (Sociolinguistics)
Sex, Gender and Voice Quality
Women's Language
Women's Linguistic Features
Men's Language
All social classes - women use the 'standard' language features
In one study of linguistic variables (study of different linguistic features) such as:
Variable: (ng) - walking and laughing
Variants: [n] - [n] - walkin' and laughin'
Men are seen as the breadwinner and the head of the family. They provide income and employment, shelter and education.
Women are viewed from a different perspective: work and income of husbands, shelters and education.
Women - mostly use Standard language; overt prestige - uses language forms related to standard prestige.
Men – use vernacular language; covert prestige - uses a non-standard form of language that contains hidden status content.
Masculine traits – hard, gravelly and loud.
Feminine traits - soft, gentle, low voice (high-pitched) and breathy or squeaky (especially blonde).
Stereotypes are different according to a culture.
The Lakoff hypothesis on women's language - many of the characteristics of politeness, lack of self-confidence and eagerness to please.
Jespersen - a woman's contribution to language is to maintain the purity of the language in which they prefer the subtlety of language and the use of the language of resonance and indirect expressions.
Women have limited vocabulary and words not used accurately and correctly.
They are unable to complete the sentences as they are uneducated compared to men.
Women's conversations are considered trivial and there is no or less substance.
The phenomenon of women speaks a lot - a myth.
There are currently studies that prove that men speak more than women (see Jariah Mohd Jan, 1999).
Speech style that is considered typical for women - less confident, weak and too polite.
Vocabulary
The exact term for colors
Affective adjective
Superpolite forms
Adjectives that depict emotions and feelings
Beige, lavender
The terms/words used about their activity
Avoid using swear-words and instead, use 'euphemisms’ - words that rely on 'indirect expressions' e.g. 'Passed away' - 'died' and 'put down' - 'killed'.
Using abusive words is to express a strong sense of anger and this is considered impolite and ‘unladylike’.
Dale Spender (1980) suggested that language is 'man made’
Hedges
Filling words or 'filler' items e.g. 'You know', 'well', 'kind of', 'sort of' - used to reduce intensity of utterance.
The intensifiers ‘so’
Ex: 'I like him so much'. To weaken a speaker's strength of feeling - a boosting device like ‘very’.
Tag questions
To reduce intensity like ‘don’t you? haven’t we? isn’t it?’ Holmes divides the tag into two (2) referential and affective.
Rising intonation
Found at the end of the question and made the speakers less confident.
Hypercorrect grammar
Women use standard forms where the grammar of the language is too correct
Emphatic stress
Give emphasis to something (italics). For example, “What a beautiful dress!”
Lack of sense of humour
Women do not have sense of humor and they cannot tell jokes and do not receive jokes.
Overall, women's language is considered inferior and deficient.
Men’s language - more 'vigor', imaginative and creative.
Without all this, the language would be 'languid and insipid.'
This is due to the intelligence and importance of men's role as well as the tensions of women.