Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Myths4 Gender
Myths4 Gender
General usage of the term gender began in the late 1960s and 1970s,
increasingly appearing in the professional literature of the social sciences.
The term helps in distinguishing those aspects of life that were more easily
attributed or understood to be of social rather than biological origin (see
e.g., Unger & Crawford, 1992).
Linguistic origins of Gender
According to Aristotle, the Greek philosopher Protagoras used
the terms masculine, feminine, and neuter to classify nouns,
introducing the concept of grammatical gender.
Gender as a grammatical category
Many languages specify Gender (and gender agreement)
(1) Greek
o andras i gyneka to pedhi
the.masc. man the.fem. woman the.ntr. child
(2) German
der man die Frau das Kind
the.masc. man the.fem. woman the.ntr. child
(3) French
l(e) homme la femme
the.masc. man the.fem. woman
(1) He left.
(2) She left.
(3) It left. (what types of things does “it” refer to?)
German
Examples
(2) a He is a professional.
b She is a professional.
Sexist language
Shift to gender differences in discource
English is different.
According to Lakoff, women’s talk has the following properties:
Thus:
Boys:
• Tend to play in large groups that are hierarchically structured
• Their group has a leader
• Status is negotiated via orders, or telling jokes/stories
• Games have winners and losers
• Boast about skills, size, ability
Girls:
• Tend to play in small groups or in pairs
• The center of a girl’s social life is a best friend
• Within the group, intimacy is the key
• Differentiation is measured not by status, but by relative
closeness
• Many of their activities do not have winners and losers (e.g.
in hopscotch or jump rope, everyone gets a turn).
• Girls are not expected to boast (in fact they are encouraged
to be humble), or give orders (they would be bossy)
Problem talk:
For a woman: a bid for an expression of understanding
For a man: a request to solve the problem
Myth: Women talk more than men
Some folk “wisdom”:
(1) Foxes are all tail, and women are all tongue.
(2) A woman’s tongue wags like a lamb’s tail.
(3) The North sea will sooner be found wanting in water
than a woman be at a loss for a word.
However:
Research found that men talk more often (Eakins
and Eakins): men’s turns 10.66 secs, women’s 3-10
secs at faculty meetings
At academic confernces (Swacker): women 40.7%
of the presentations, 40% of audience. But only 27.2%
asked questions.
There seems to be an asymmetry between private and
public speaking—Tannen’s rapport versus report talk
Claims:
Gossip is about:
• Informing
• Share secrets
• Promote closeness
• Work
• Sports
• Institutional power
• Politics
• Not so much about family
Examples
• Hawai: children jointly joke and engage in “talk
story”.
• More simultaneous speech among Japanese
speakers than among Americans.
Conclusions
1) The question of whether men and women as
groups have different conversational styles must
be considered in the context of cross-cultural
communication.