Theorists Flashcards
To be able to recite the name of the theorists and outline their view on language in relation to gender or power.
What is ‘overt prestige’ and who uses it?
Overt Prestige:
- is acquired by those who have command of a standard dialect (which is spoken to gain social status)
- it is often used by that of the elite
- to ‘talk’ is a woman’s overt prestige.
What is ‘covert prestige’ and who uses it?
Covert prestige is:
- acquired by those speakers desiring to belong.
What is the ‘Communication Accommodation Theory’ and who is the theorist?
Howard Giles argued that when people interact they adjust their:
- speech
- vocal patterns
- gestures
to accommodate others.
It explores the various reasons why individuals EMPHASISE or MINIMISE the social differences between themselves and their discussers through VERBAL and NONVERBAL communication.
What is convergence? (CAT)
CONVERGENCE refers to the strategies through which individuals adapt to each other’s communicative behaviours (IN ORDER TO REDUCE THESE SOCIAL DIFFERENCES).
Sometimes when individuals try to engage in convergence they can end up over-accommodating and despite their good intentions they can be seen as condescending.
What is Divergence? (CAT)
DIVERGENCE refers to the instances in which individuals accentuate the speech and nonverbal differences between themselves and their interlocutors (discussers).
What is influential power?
When the person does not have power and they are trying to gain influence over you:
- an example would be an advertisement.
What is instrumental power?
Is when a person already has power over you:
- usually due to authority or law
- an example would be a teacher or a police officer.
What is the dominance theory and who theorised it?
The theory that:
- in mixed-sex conversations men are more likely to interrupt than women.
It was recorded by Don Zimmerman and Candace West in 1975.
Who discovered that women differ to men in language?
Robin Lakoff.
In Robin Lakoff’s theory how do women differ to men in language?
Women use:
- lexical hedges or fillers (you know, sort of, well, you see)
- tag questions (she’s very nice, isn’t she?)
- rising intonation on declaratives (it’s really good?)
- “empty” adjectives/qualifiers (divine, charming, cute)
- precise colour terms (magenta, aquamarine)
- intensifiers/intonational emphasis (I like him So much)
- ‘hypercorrect’ grammar (consistent use of standard verb forms)
- ‘super-polite’ forms (indirect requests, euphemisms)
- avoidance of strong swear words (fudge, my goodness)
- emphatic stress (it was a BRILLIANT performance)
- use (super)polite forms (would you mind, I’d appreciate it if, if you don’t mind)
- English prestige grammar and clean enunciation
- use direct quotation, whereas men paraphrase more
- have a special lexicon (women use more words for things like colour, men for sports)
- use “wh” imperatives such as “why don’t you…?”
- speak less frequently
- apologies more
- use modal constructions such as “can”, “would”, “should” and “ought”
- avoid coarse language or expletives
- use indirect commands and requests
- lack a sense of humour (women don’t tell jokes well).
What is the ‘deficit theory’?
That conversation is dominated by males.
What are the ten sub groups which divides males and females in language and who categorised them?
Deborah Tannen found subtle differences in men an women’s conversation which are:
- status and support
- independence Vs. intimacy
- advice Vs. understanding
- information Vs. feeling
- order Vs. proposal
- conflict Vs. compromise
- the male as norm
- report talk Vs. rapport
- interruptions and overlapping
- high involvement and high considerateness.
What is ‘status Vs. support’?
Women:
- talking is often a way to gain confirmation and support for their ideas
- see the world as ‘‘a network of connections seeking support and consensus’’.
Men:
- grow up in a world which conversation is competitive
- seek to achieve the upper hand or prevent others from dominating them
- see the world as a place where people try to gain status.
What is ‘independence Vs. intimacy’?
Women often think in terms of closeness and support and struggle to preserve intimacy.
Men (concerned with status) tend to focus more on independence.
These traits can lead women and men to different views of the same situation.
A woman will check with her husband and a husband will independently make a decision.
What is ‘advice Vs. understanding’?
To many men a complaint is a challenge to find a solution, whereas women prefer sympathy.