GENDER THEORIES

Question 1

DOMINANCE APPROACH
- ZIMMERMAN + WEST

Answer 1

• found that men had interrupted women more in mixed sex conversations
• study of students in california who were middle class, under 35 and white
• found that in 11/31 convos - men had used 46 interruptions whereas women had only used 2
• shows how men had interrupted 96% of the time
• men often use interruptions to try and dominate conversations

Question 2

DOMINANCE APPROACH
- SPENDER

Answer 2

• suggested that language was ‘man made’ and that this constructs our reality and men use language as a means of control
• language is also patriarchal and reflect a mans best interest
• historically, men’s pronouns were seen as more powerful than women - example if someone’s gender was unknown it was traditionally prefereable to actually use ‘ he/him’ pronouns to refer to them
• the word man is also incorporated into many lexical terms such as ‘mankind’ which encompasses women without explicitly referring to them
• if a women was to speak like a man they are seen as bossy or rude , if they speak more feminine they are seen as weak or passive

Question 3

DOMINANCE APPROACH
- FISHER

Answer 3

• had a book called ‘interaction- the work women do’ and found that conversations between men and women sometimes fail but this is because of how men do or don’t respond
• studied data of conversations between heterosexual couples at home
• found women were more likely to ask questions - not necessarily insecurity but rather as interactional shift work
• women were also seen as more enthusiastic - and used prefacing interrogatives
• men’s statements were more likely to elicit a response from women

Question 4

DOMINANCE APPROACH
- CRITICISM - BEATTIE

Answer 4

• studied conversations between students and tutors in a university setting
• found that there was no such sex differences in the frequency or type of interruptions
• also criticised the original sample size of zimmerman and west
• men’s freq = 34.1 and women’s freq = 33.8

Question 5

DIFFERENCE APPROACH
- TANNEN

Answer 5

• suggested that men and women do speak differently however this may be due to them being socialisalised differently or simply because they have different conversational goals
• came up with the idea of asymmetries ‘genderlects’ which contrast men and women’s convo
• include :
  1. status v support
  2. advice v understanding
  3. information v feelings
  4. order v proposals
  5. conflict v compromise
  6. independence v intimacy

Question 6

DIFFERENCE APPROACH
- COATES

Answer 6

• suggested that in same sex groups men and women have different speech
• men have more competitive, hierarchical speech and want to maintain or gain status
• women have more supportive, encouraging speech
• in mixed gender convos - men control and usually do more turn taking
• men often reject convos proposed by women but women do not do the same

Question 7

DIFFERENCE APPROACH
- HOLMES

Answer 7

• studies gender in workplace communication
• found that women used more tag questions and hedging - however this was more of a politeness and facilitated further conversations, also expressed uncertainty and softening
• men were more direct and assertive
• shows how power relations influence language just as much as gender does

Question 8

DEFICIT
- LAKOFF

Answer 8

• language and a woman’s place
• idea of women speaking differently to men because they have a weaker position in society, less authoritative, suffer discrimination, less power etc
• features include women using - hedges, tag questions, intensifiers, euphemisms, diminutives, speak more slowly, they show they are listening, apologise more, speak less
• women are socialised into behaving like ladies and this subordinate position stops their power
• but her ideas are outdated, stereotypical, ignore context, sexist ( lack empirical value ) and is more seem as a theoretical steeping stone

Question 9

DIVERSITY APPROACH
- O’BARR AND ATKINS

Answer 9

• 30 month study of language used in courtrooms and used the results to criticise lakoffs idea about women’s language
• suggests that language reflects social status or contextual situation and that women’s language may actually be more labelled as powerless language instead

Question 10

DIVERSITY APPROACH
- JUDITH BUTLER

Answer 10

• the way we construct ourselves such as our speech and body language actually is what shapes our identity and it is not biologically determined and when we continually repeat these it forms our gender

Question 11

DIVERSITY APPROACH
- DEBROAH CAMERON

Answer 11

• suggests that the gender template does not fit everyone and that there can be as many gender differences between two men as there can be between a man and a woman
• this is because gender is one of many intersecting identities which shape how we speak, for example our age, occupation etc also play a role
• came up with idea of verbal hygiene which is that women are expected to monitor and control their language much more than men which reflects societal pressures
• they have to clean up their language and not say anything which may not be appropriate