Language and Situation Political Correctness. Flashcards
Define political correctness.
Someone who is politically correct believes that language and actions that could be offensive to others, especially those relating to sex and race, should be avoided.
A politically correct word or expression is used instead of another one to avoid being offensive.
Outline the latest views on offensive language.
Less tolerant of racist or discriminatory or racist language.
More likely to tolerate swearing on TV and radio provided it reflects ‘real world’ situations.
Outline the importance of context.
Viewers and listeners take into account context, such as the tone, delivery and time of the broadcast, when assessing whether offensive language is acceptable.
Sexual terms were seen in a similar way - unacceptable with some exceptions.
Outline Harvey and Shalom (1997, Language and Desire).
They observed a problem area is often indicated by the large number of alternative words for it. These may be categorised into the technical (Sexual intercourse, fornication, carnal knowledge), the euphemistic (go to bed with, sleep with, have sex with) and the dysphemistic (fuck, shag, screw) etc. Even within this last list, some words are more acceptable than others.
Outline Deborah Cameron: Verbal Hygiene 1995.
Verbal hygiene refers to the collection of discourses and practices through which people attempt to clean up language and make its structure or its use more closely to their ideals of beauty, truth, efficient, logic, correctness and civility. Cameron argues verbal hygiene practices are inevitable and common to all language uses. We observe language rather than challenge it, takes on a descriptivist view. Those who oppose language change have deep rooted fears about larger social change.
Outline Sapir-Whorf’s approach to political correctness.
According to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, our perception of reality is determined by our thought process, which is influenced by the language we use. Therefore changing a word that is pejorative, can also change the negative thoughts associated with what is signifies.
Outline Miller and Swift: Handbook of Non-Sexist Writing.
Miller and Swift advocated practical reforms to improve equality, mentioning ‘the pronoun problem’ (‘them’ instead of ‘he’ when the gender is unknown); job titles (doctor & lady doctor) and non parallel treatment (Mr and Mrs, husband and wife, brother and sister etc).
Outline Steven Pinker: Euphemism Treadmill.
Refers to the idea of using words as a euphemism to replace an offensive concept but, due to association with that concept, the euphemism itself, in turn, becomes offensive. Resulting in a cycle in which terms are used and discarded to mask the politically incorrect concept. This theory shows a descriptivist attitude towards language as it supports the idea of language evolving with society, it respects that English is a complex language that has changed over time and will continue to; reflected through the ranks in which the term will evolve.
Outline Norman Fairclough: Political Correctness.
Fairclough stated that language change is not enough on its own, we must also change society E.g. there’s no point in calling out a sexist chairman, if you’re missing the point that women are underrepresented in the committee. Deborah Cameron agrees with this and calls non-sexist language policies ‘lip service’ and ‘cosmetic change’ as they fail to alone reduce women’s oppression.
Outline prescriptivist attitudes to political correctness.
On the one hand PC is a form of prescription (telling us how we should speak) and therefore they should be in favour, however introducing new terms may be seen as an attack on the crumbling castle viewpoint and therefore, seen s a decay by prescriptivists.
Outline descriptivist attitudes to political correctness.
Descriptivist’s would see it as a form of prescription and would be against it.
