Gender Theorists

Question 1

Tannen - 1990

Answer 1

-Status vs support
-independence vs intimacy
-advice vs understanding
-information vs feeling
-orders vs proposals
-conflict vs compromise

Question 2

Jones - 1990

Answer 2

In female single sex conversations are made up of house talk (being female), scandal (judging others), bitching (about others) and chatting (gossiping)

Question 3

Coates

Answer 3

Primary aged girls and boys speak about the same things

Question 4

Wiseman

Answer 4

-Women are more verbally aggressive with other women

Question 5

Cameron - 2000s

Answer 5

‘Verbal Hygiene’ - language differences are due to gender roles/expectations within society

Question 6

O’Barr and Atkins

Answer 6

Power is the most influential factor on language use:
-Studied 30 months of court cases
-male/female barristers used the same language
-male/female defendants used the same language

Question 6

Brizendine - 2006

Answer 6

Brizendine: Claimed that women speak 20,000 words per day, men spoke 7,000 (based of thought/’common sense’)

Question 7

Jesperson - 1923

Answer 7

Deficit:
- Women have smaller vocabulary
- Men create more words
- Women use ‘and’ as a connective due to women’s emotion
- Women use adverbs too much
- Women tend towards hyperbole

Question 7

Lakoff - 1975

Answer 7

Deficit:
- hypercorrect grammar
- Tag questions
- Lack of taboo
-Specialist lexis

Question 8

Spender - 1980

Answer 8

Dominance - Men are superior (due to the patriarchy), it is seen in language by their interruptions in language and dominating mixed gender conversations.

Question 9

Fishman - 1980-1990

Answer 9

Women do ‘conversational shitwork’:
tag questions, inferior position, back-channelling

Question 10

Zimmerman and West - 1975

Answer 10

96% of interruptions were made by men in mixed gendered conversations (lack of diversity)

Question 11

Tag Questions (Janet Holmes) - Use for Paper 1, Question 3

Answer 11

Referential tag questions - signal factual uncertainty - we turn here, DONT WE

Facilitative tag questions - express solidarity and intimacy - we love that show, DONT WE?

Softening tag questions - weakening a command or criticism - take out the rubbish, WONT YOU

Holmes suggests women use more facultative, men use more referential, use of softening is statistically insufficient.

Question 12

Pennebaker - 2006

Answer 12

Pennebaker: Men/women use same amount of words per day (used EAR, recording device)