Gender

Question 1

Lakoff (1970s) deficit approach

Answer 1

• states women are socially conditioned into a male dominated society to use weak language e.g) tag ?, hedges, politeness, SE
• assumes men’s language is the default language & that they’re socially conditioned to be dominant

Question 2

what did Zimmerman & West (1970s) find

Answer 2

found men made 96% of interruptions in mixed-sex interactions

BUT parents interrupted children more too

Question 3

what did Fishman mean by conversational shit-work

Answer 3

women use more tag ? but in order to start & sustain convos w men, who are reluctant to do so b/c they see themselves as of a higher status than women

Question 4

what did Eckert find

Answer 4

jock boys used non SE mutiple negation more than jock girls b/c

1) men see non SE as having covert prestige & a marker of masculine identity
2) women more standard & conformist in their language than men

Question 5

what did Holmes say

Answer 5

• tag ? can be cooperative & polite rather than weak

- hedges are used for politeness/mitigation rather than indecision

Question 6

what did Trudgill find about mens language

Answer 6

used more non standard pronunciation of the suffix ‘ing’ & attached covert prestige to it therefore over-reported use of it to seem cool

Question 7

who found that men use more tag ? than women

Answer 7

Dubois & Crouch (1975)

Question 8

what did Pilkington find

Answer 8

• all-female talk is collaborative & uses positive politeness
• men are less complimentary & supportive in all-male talk

Question 9

Difference approach- what did Deborah Tannen say about male & female speech

Answer 9

said their speech is cross-cultural communication & so involves miscommunication

Question 10

according to Tannen how do men & women use language differently

Answer 10

men seek status & independence, give advice & info, issue orders
BUT
women seek intimacy, offer support, talk about feelings, make proposals

Question 11

what critiscms has Cameron made about the difference theory

Answer 11

1) over-simplifies & exaggerates differences between male & female language & ignores other contexts e.g) power, age…
2) difference theory perpetuates sexist stereotypes, if we do communicate differently then both genders have to change & fix miscommunication

Question 12

what did the Canadian rape tribunal show

Answer 12

pretending men can only understand direct messages & can’t make inferences can have serious implications

Question 13

what does Cameron believe affects language more

Answer 13

power roles are more important

Question 14

2000s research- what did Baxter find

Answer 14

dominant boys could command support of side-kicks but assertive girls couldn’t

Question 15

2000s research- what did McRae find

Answer 15

men & women in business meetings used cooperative speech styles, but men more likely to get points acknowledged & supported

Question 16

2000s research- what did McElhinny find

Answer 16

women police officers adopted an unemotional speech style (suited for the role)

Question 17

2000s research- what did McDowell find

Answer 17

male nurses just as empathetic in their language as female nurses

Question 18

what was Hydes meta analysis

Answer 18

analysis of many research projects found minimal differences between male & female language use

Question 19

what did the Hydes gender similarities hypothesis show

Answer 19

men interrupt slightly more but its been over-exaggerated