Language Variation in Relation to Gender as a Social Factor
CHAPTER ONE
OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY
- To examine language variation in relation to
- To analyze the visibility of the variation in the use of language of males and females.
CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
INTRODUCTION
There has been considerable interest on the study of sociolinguistic variation associated with speaker’s gender. Over the years, there has been lots of research in this field. Many articles have been published both in learned journals and edited collections. Sociolinguistics, among other fields of study within the scope of linguistics has several evidences on gender related issues.
Sociolinguistics can be best defined as the study of language and its society. The study of language in its social context then has to do with the study of linguistic variation.
Moreover, speakers who differ from each other in terms of age, gender, social class, ethnic group, for example, will also differ from each other in their speech, even in the same context.
Sociolinguists are interested in both stylistic and social variation. According to Gumperz (1971), sociolinguistics is ‘an attempt to find correlations between social structure and linguistic structure and to observe any change that occurs’. Hudson (1996) sees sociolinguistics as ‘‘the relationship between language and society’’, while Holmes (1994) conceives sociolinguistics as ‘‘aimed towards theory which provides a motivated account of the way language is used in a community and of people when they use language’’. Coulmas (1997) perceives sociolinguistics as ‘‘an investigation of how social structure influences the way people talk and how language varieties and patterns of use correlates with social attributes such as class, sex and age’’.
This chapter thus, reviews some related literature on language and gender, and how gender as a sociolinguistic variable affects interaction among males and females.
LANGUAGE AND GENDER
Language can be described as a system of communication that enables humans to cooperate. This stresses the social functions of language and the fact that humans use it to express themselves and to manipulate objects in their environment. According to Bloomfield (1914) ‘‘language refers to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication’’.
According to Thorne et al (1983) the term gender “does not refer to grammatical gender (the system to be found in some language of organizing certain word class into contrasting categories of masculine, feminine, neuter) but referred to social categories based on sex but encompasses behaviour, roles and images that, although not biologically determined are regarded by society as appropriate to its male and female members”.
Gender is therefore distinguished from sex in that sex is referred to as a biological component of male and female, whereas, gender component is socially learned and acquired. More so, sociolinguistic study of gender shows that variation in the use of language according to gender is intimately connected to socio-cultural patterns which reflect socio-economic and political inequality and male dominance in many societies.
Reflecting social status or power difference, Lakoff (1975) in her research claims that women’s language as a whole reveals women’s social powerlessness and is thus dominated by stylistic features, significant insecurity and lack of assertiveness. She further argues that female language is consequently heavily influenced by the pragmatic principle of politeness which basically rules adaptive social behaviour. The different views of language and gender as elicited above have come to a common ground that language and gender are inseparable and if any major difference exists, it becomes obvious in the intention of the user were believed to use strong asserted sentences. This study confirms Lakoff’s assumption about the usage of tag questions even though Lakoff never provided any empirical evidence about the usage of tag questions (Coates, 1993:118-119).
CHAPTER THREE
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS
INTRODUCTION
Having explored the concept of variation in the previous chapters, it is obvious that variation is not restricted to language or does not refer only to differences between two languages, say English and Yoruba. Therefore in this chapter we are going to make vivid presentation of variation according to gender from different languages.
CHAPTER FOUR
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS
INTRODUCTION
This study set out to demonstrate the inherent differences in male and female use of language, that is, the sex exclusive and sex preferential markers that exist in a language. This study has examined the language use among male and female speakers of various languages.
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS
This chapter gives a summary of the whole concept this research work, the project consist of four chapters. From the study carried out, it can be said that in so many languages, males and females use different speech patterns. Cultural and environmental factors are argued to be the underlying factors responsible for these differences. It is pertinent to also note that these variations could either be phonological, morphological or sociological gender variation.
These differences in the speech pattern of males and females could result in miscommunication and misinterpretation in the process of interaction especially among second language learners.
CONCLUSION
This study has demonstrated that in many societies, there exist male and female differences in the use of language. In a society where gender plays a major role language also has a key role to perform in the contribution of that role. Differences in the gender roles, identities of men and women, hierarchical nature of gender relations and the dominance of men constitute the factors that contribute to the differences in language use. Gender differentiation does not exist in vacuum: it interacts in a complex way with other kinds of social differentiation. But language and gender are developed through participation in everyday social practice. In other words, language and gender are inextricably linked.
REFERENCES
- Bloomfield, L. (1914). An Introduction to the Study of Language. New York: Holt
- Buffery, A. W. and Gray, J. A. (1972). ‘‘Sex differences in the development of spatial and linguistic skills’’ in C. Ounsted and D. C. Taylor (eds.) Gender Differences: Their Ontogeny and Significance, p. 123-158. London: Churchill Livingstone.
- Coates, J. (1993). Women, Men and Language. England: Longman Group Limited.
- Coulmas, F. (1997). The Handbook of Sociolinguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press
- Crystal, D. (1989). A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics. U.K.: Basil Blackwell
- Drude, S. (2002). “Fala Masculine e Feminine em Aweti”. In: Cabral, Ana Suelly A[rruda] C[amara], and Aryon D[all’lgna] Rodrigues (eds). Linguas Indigenas Brasileras: Fonologia, Gramatica e Historia (atas do I Encontro Internacional do Group de Trabalho Sobre Linguas Indegenas da ANPOLL). Belem, Para: EDUFPA. Vol. 1. 177-190
- Flexner, S. (1960) Dictionary of American Slangs. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell.
