Theories Flashcards
(45 cards)
Gender:
Julia Stanley
what did she suggest?
there were 220 terms for a promiscuous (sexual overtones) women, 20 cross over to men
Gender:
Muriel Schulz
its not accidental that there are more negative words for women
represents patriarchal order. words ‘marked’ for female become pejorated…
pejorative = the process of which a word becomes negative. ‘a word expressing contempt or disapproval’ (the pejorative ‘spinster’ is specific to women)
Gender:
Simon Baron - Cohen
who criticises his theory?
people can have either female or male brains
criticised by Cameron
female brained - empathy & communication
male brained - complex
usually why they have different occupations.. stereotypes
Gender:
Robin Lakoff - Deficit
what was his deficit theory?
women are taught how to use language in a limited way.
they avoid expressing opinions by hedging, using tag questions, the avoidance of taboo lexis & humour, and the use of mild expletives & empty adjectives.
women’s spoken lang is also hypercorrect …
Gender:
Otto Jespersen - Deficit
what did he believe?
what did he think about women’s language:
defined male language as the standard & unmarked and women’s language as deficient & marked…
he thought:
women talk a lot
less fluent
have smaller vocab than men
writing by women is easier to read because of the diminished vocab
don’t think before they speak
use empty adjectives and are hyperbolic
shrink from coarse language
Gender:
Deborah Cameron - Diversity
what did she do?
what was her belief?
what term did she coin?
she disputed many of the claims made about ‘male & ‘female’ language.
states that biological differences do not determine linguistic differences; rather they are due to social conditioning.
(challenges the idea that men & women speak different languages)
she believes:
women are more verbally skilled than men
w talk more about feelings & people, whereas men talk facts
men are competitive, women are supportive
the differences lead to miscommunication between the 2 sexes
coined ‘verbal hygiene’ in 2012 book, to refer to the ways in which people regulate their lang and communication to conform to social expectations & norms
Gender:
Deborah Tannen - Difference
what was her book called?
what does she believe?
what 6 main differences does she claim?
book = ‘you just don’t understand: women & men in conversation’.
believes the difference starts in childhood, where girls are introduced to more words about feelings and use more verbs than boys
M & F are conditioned to belong to different sub-cultures & therefore speak differently
6 main differences:
status vs support
independence vs intimacy
advice vs understanding
information vs feelings
orders vs proposals
conflict vs compromise
Gender:
Janet Holmes - Difference
whats her theory?
what are women usually described as in articles?
gender metaphors
there are dehumanising representations of women: the shaping of hostile sexist attitudes through animalistic metaphors.
women usually described as prey-like, predatory, consistent with both metaphors emphasise on sex-based power differences.
Gender:
Jennifer Coates - dominance, diversity model
whats her model?
what did she say that men do differently to women within their speech?
she sees women as an oppressed group,
she said that:
topic choice = men talk about impersonal topics, women talk about more sensitive aspects of life
dominance - males will sometimes hold the floor for a long time ‘playing the expert’
rapid fire - males sometimes exchange comments in a short, snappy style - friendly sparring & not a quarrel
no overlays - males scarcely overlap during conversation because men prefer to talk one at a time
Gender:
Jenny Chesire
what did she belief about girls and boys?
studied the factors which affected the way that teenagers spoke
focused out non-standard forms of words were used more by boys than girls. e.g., ‘ain’t’
girls try to make themselves speak formal because of the perceived necessity to be polite
men are more likely to seek covert prestige
Gender:
Peter Trudgill
what did he believe about male and female language
men are more likely to use non-standard pronunciation of -ing suffix
women’s pronunciation was closer to received pronunciation than men’s
women’s perception of formal language is more correct
(-ing forms) than them when they actually use it.
Gender:
Judith Butler
what was he belief about gender?
gender performativity
language can be used to construct gender
gender is performative, socially constructed & never-ending process which we are constantly engaged within
Gender:
Naomi Wolf - ‘the beauty myth’
4th wave feminism
speaks about the expectations of beauty & stereotypes that people have
Gender:
Dale spender - Dominance
book - ‘man made language’, construct the world we live in according to the man made rules
strong claims about the way language is organised
social world uses language biased against women, men able to get their opinions heard more than women
‘it is men who have made the world which women must inhabit’
she said that women who talk like men are judged harshly (old data / studies)
Gender:
John gray - ‘men are from mars, women are from venus’ book
what is the book about?
expresses difference & stereotypical gender between each planet
Gender:
Zimmerman & West - Dominance
recorded everyday convos as a study
found that in mixed sex convos, men interrupted women more, gave delayed minimal responses to women & spoke more.
women were silent more & for longer periods of time.
Gender:
Pamela Fishman - Dominance
taped mixed sex convos naturally
observed men maintain control & women ask more questions
men initiate convos more & more likely to succeed
women do more work (conversational shitwork), in keeping convos going. (questions, supporting men)
men tend to control the convo, reinforce their dominance & social power
Spoken Lang:
Grice’s Maxims
What are they and what do they mean?
every convo should have them to be successful…
maxim of quantity - try to give a needed amount of info
maxim of quality - telling the truth & informative
maxim of relevance - one tries to be relevant & says things that are pertinent to the discussion
maxim of manner - try to be clear, orderly, brief, avoid obscure & ambiguous
Spoken Lang:
Goffman’s face theory
what does it include & consist of?
Negative face - desire to feel unimpeded (the freedom from feeling imposed upon by the interaction)
Positive face - desire to feel approved of, (to maintain a positive & consistent self-image during the interaction)
Spoken Lang:
Grices’ accommodation theory
what are the types of convergence?
convergence - moving closer to someones speech, change non-verbal & verbal to match each other
upward convergence = sounding more posh/upper class to match someone
downward convergence = adjusting communication to downplay their social status
divergence - moving further away from someone’s speech - non-verbal & verbal differences
upward = seen as holding authority / dominance over someone
spoken Lang:
Overlaps
where 2 people in a convo speak at the same time, accidentally or deliberately
Spoken Lang:
hedging
a strategy used to avoid directness or to prevent somebody getting offended, e.g., ‘like’, ‘kind of’, ‘maybe’, ‘perhaps’
Spoken Lang:
back channelling
a feature of speaker support to show attention or agreement, ‘right’, ‘mmmm’, ‘ok’, - speaking in the background
Spoken Lang:
Fillers
non-verbal sounds that can act as pauses in speech, either naturally or to give a speaker thinking time. may signal speaker uncertainty ‘er’, ‘um’
