Theory Flashcards
Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis
The idea that if you don’t have the word for something you can’t think it
Fairclough
Changing language is not enough- we need to change society and calls non-sexist language a ‘cosmetic change’
Thornborough 2004
The idea that the way we can establish our identity is through language choice
Wave modal
The idea that language chnage is like a ripple, it gets weaker the more it spreads
Miller and Swift
PC makes a difference to sexism by coining more gender-neutral words
Functional theory
Language changes because society does- as new words are introduced old ones die
Keith and Shuttleworth
Women- talk more, are more polite, are indecisive, complain and nag, co-operative
Men- swear more, talk about sport, talk more competatively, give more commands etc
Otto Jesperson 1922
women talk a lot, empty adjectives, use adverbs too much and use hyperboles, smaller vocabulary than men, emotional sentences
Robin Lakoff 1975
she claims that women use a lot more listening indicators such as ‘mmhmm’
range of inotation, hedge a lot, super-polite forms, use tag questions a lot,
o’barr and Atkins
Debunked Lakoff’s women’s language theory by studying the courtroom and noticed that everyone exibitated these features and renamed it Powerless Language
Zimmerman and West 1975
studied language of mixed gender conversations and found that men interrupted a lot more, in 11 conversations, men interrupted 46 times while women only 2.
Beattie 1982
opposed Zimmerman. Said one man may have affected the post and questioned why they assumed that interruptions mean dominance in the convo and not interest.
Dale Spender
The English Language is very male dominated and seen as the norm.
Men are also annoyed when it comes to them- fr example when a letter to teachers only used the feminine pronoun of she
Spender pointed out that women never have their own last name as they either come from fathers or partners.
Pamela Fishman
She believed that conversations fail because of the man or lack there off
She also believes that men speak a lot more frequently in conversations.
Women make all the effort in a mixed sex conversation.
Women ask a lot more questions to keep a conversation happen
Jennifer Coates 1980’s
Said men usually reject the conversation that women bring up while women usually allow the men to talk
Men talk about more things like sport, politics, economics etc
Women are far more likely to initiate in conversation even if women are more likely to not succeed in convo
