Gender and Discourse
Do men and women produce different linguistic forms and functions?
Do they have a different way of interacting when they talk?
Do women speak differently when men are around?
Do men speak differently when women are around?
Gender differences in language
1) Traditional terms of address : Mr. (men) –no term for marital status of men
: Mrs (married women) and Miss (unmarried women)
2) Pronoun ‘He’ : used to identify when sex is unknown
3) Terms for both sexes: Actor and author can be applied to both sexes but actress/authoress cannot.
Linguistics differences
1) Pronunciation: dialect, prestige forms, vocabulary choice, variation of pitch and swearing.
2) Vocabulary: Women use more precise color terms, more affective adjectives, more markers of politeness (and euphemisms), more hedges (well, kind of) and more tag questions (isn’t it, don’t you) compared to men.
Interactional differences
Men
1) Tell fewer stories,
2) Topics: sports, cars, technology, travel, their achievements
3) More technical language, swearing, taboo language, comical incidents
4) Pay less attention to details and avoid personal talk
5) Competitive
Women:
1) Tell more stories with eye contact
2) Topic: family, personal information, emotional issues such as fear and embarrassment, gossip
3) Talk about men and women
4) Non-competitive
Mixed talk
Men: Longer turns, more expressive, different topics and less taboo language
Women: More taboo language.
Source taken from:
http://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/gender-interaction-theory-%E2%80%93-holmes-tannen-cameron-defrancisco/
Source taken from:
http://aggslanguage.wordpress.com/gender-interaction-theory-%E2%80%93-holmes-tannen-cameron-defrancisco/
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