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The text below consists primarily of observations made
and/or synthesized by Enam Al-Wer, based on the classic variationist
literature; but I have adapted, filtered and added my own thoughts, so Enam
can't be held responsible for it! and neither can the authors referred to… |
Notes on Sex and Gender-linked Patterns of
Variation
Peter L. Patrick, Univ. of Essex
III. 4 ideas by Labov and Trudgill
IV. Supporting data (self-evaluation)
VI. References
1. Simple Sex-Linked
Patterns in Linguistic Variation
A biological difference b/w
males and females: fundamental frequency
Let's look at variation data
on sex differentiation in two batches. The first seems to show a fairly
straightforward, simple pattern. This corresponds to many of the early results
observed by sociolinguists following the correlational pattern made famous in
Labov’s (1966) New York City study.
The second batch shows more
complex patterns of variation, which require different kinds of explanation.
(Actually, it’s not true that the early data showed simple patterns, and later
data were complex. Rather, many researchers, limited by their methods and
expectations, tended to find simple patterns where more complex ones might
have been uncovered, and to be satisfied with prevailing simple
interpretations.)
The studies cited so far
include:
NYC
(Labov 1966) – Detroit (Wolfram 1969) – Norwich (Trudgill 1974) – Sydney
(Horvath 1985)
Data include (all
illustrated by figures in Chambers 1995, except Labov data):
Simple 2-variable patterns:
Simple 3-variable patterns:
o
Sydney
(Ing) by class/age/sex. (OK, age distribution is not so simple!)
NYC Dept-store data:
This is from Labov 1972, chap. 2
NYC Lower East Side survey supporting data: This is from Labov 1972, 1990, and
1994, chap. 4.
(After this we
will proceed to examine more complex patterns, including data from:)
Cairo/Amman (Haeri 1987/95) – Belfast (Milroy 1987) – Detroit
suburbs (Eckert 1995/98)
1. Simple
Patterns
Their results have a common
feature: Holding constant other variables such as age and social class (i.e.,
all things being equal), women generally appeared to use forms which closely
resemble those of a standard or prestigious speech variety more frequently than
men, or in preference to the vernacular, non-standard or stigmatized forms
which men appeared to favour. A less theoretical way of putting this, which
corresponds with many public attitudes, is that women tend to use forms which
are generally considered ‘better’, ‘nicer’, or ‘correct’ more often than men
use them.
It is important to remember
that these findings fit what Wolfram & Schilling-Estes (1998, Ch. 9) call group-preferential distributions – in which
speakers from two groups both use a set of forms, but one group uses them more
often – rather than group-exclusive
patterns, in which speakers from one group use a form, while speakers from another
group do not. We can then call the kinds of patterns observed above sex-preferential rather than sex-exclusive: the differences observed are a
matter of degree.
2. Status-based
Explanations for Sex-Linked Differences
How have such sex-linked
differences (the simple pattern) been explained? The most prominent
explanations until the late 1980s (associated with Labov and Trudgill)
crucially involved the notions of prestige and status-consciousness.
Labov suggested that women
are more prestige-conscious than men; therefore, they avoid using forms which
are stigmatized in their speech community. Women in the socially-mobile interior classes (e.g., in NYC, the
lower-middle class; in Norwich, the upper-working class) are most likely to
avoid stigmatized forms because the potential for social mobility in their
group is greater than for members of exterior classes (i.e., near the lower and
upper extremes of society). Women are seen as especially intent on increasing
their social status.
(Such an explanation
assumes a view of society which has been called the consensus
view, as opposed to a conflict
approach to social class. For more on these, see Rickford 1986, Guy 1988, and Patrick 2001.)
3. Four ideas by Trudgill & Labov
Trudgill carries this idea
further. Based on sociologists’ findings, he suggests reasons why women might
be generally more status-conscious than men:
a. Women are more closely involved with
child-rearing and the transmission of culture (socialization) – thus more aware
of the importance, for their children, of acquiring prestige norms.
b. Women have a less secure social
position than men. They may use linguistic means more crucially to secure and
signal their social status; for this reason, they may be more aware of the
importance of speech. (Compare the insecurity of the interior social classes:
this effect might then be compounded for their female members.)
c. Men have traditionally been evaluated
on their occupation and their earning power – ‘what they do’. Women have been
discriminated against in occupational choice and earnings – they may be rated,
instead, on ‘how they appear’. Again, other signals of status, including
speech, would be more important for women, who would be critically aware of the
social significance of linguistic variables.
d. Both Labov and Trudgill also suggest
that working-class speech has associations with masculinity – with a ‘roughness
and toughness’ that is characteristic of working-class life. These are
generally not desirable, feminine attributes for women – and, correspondingly,
they are desirable, masculine attributes for men.
(Discussions of these
explanations, both pro and con, are numerous in the literature on language and
gender; see especially Eckert 1989, Labov 1990, Coates 1993, Gordon 1997, and
articles by Cheshire, Eckert, Nichols and Trudgill, all in Coates ed. 1998.)
4. Supporting data:
Self-evaluation of speech in Norwich
Support for differing
preferences of men and women with respect to overt & covert prestige can be
found in Trudgill’s self-evaluation data for Norwich:
|
‘tune’ variable |
male |
female |
Total |
|
% Over-reporting |
0 |
29 |
13 |
|
% Accurate |
94 |
64 |
80 |
|
% Under-reporting |
6 |
7 |
7 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
‘ear’ variable |
male |
female |
Total |
|
% Over-reporting |
22 |
68 |
43 |
|
% Accurate |
28 |
18 |
23 |
|
% Under-reporting |
50 |
14 |
33 |
(from
Trudgill 1983)
·
We
assume that speakers usually report themselves as using the forms which have
positive connotations for them: the ones they are aiming to produce (at any
rate, when they are directing attention to their speech, i.e. in more formal
styles)
·
Here,
women reported themselves as using prestige variants (the yod /j/ in ‘tune’-words) more often
than they actually did – presumably because they wish they did so, or think
they ought to do so.
·
Men, on
the other hand, significantly under-reported their use of the prestige form ([IK]) for /iyr/-words like ‘ear’, as opposed to
vernacular forms (like [E:]).
(Nobody under-reported /j/
much.)
·
Trudgill
concludes that women aim at a publicly-legitimised (i.e. overt) prestige
norm; men aim at a norm with covert prestige.
·
Note
too that speakers using more prestige forms and those preferring vernacular
forms are differently evaluated – though both are positively evaluated in some
ways.
·
Elyan
et al. 1978 (in Trudgill ed. 19??) performed an experiment contrasting RP
speakers with speakers of British vernacular Englishes. RP speakers were rated
higher on intelligence, fluency and self-confidence; vernacular speakers were
seen as more charming, humorous and good-natured. To the extent that these
stereo-types are shared by both sexes, men and women on the whole may be aiming
for different images.
5. Problems &
Criticisms
The prestige-based and
status-consciousness explanations have been criticised on a number of grounds.
·
The
concept of prestige itself is poorly-defined and possibly circular (J. Milroy).
·
This
view assumes that gender is an independent variable, and less important than
status.
·
This
view emphasizes male behaviour as the norm, and treats female behaviour as
deviant and needing to be explained.
·
In
emphasizing prestige and consensus models, it downplays the power differential
between men and women (Eckert 1989) and the insights of conflict models.
·
This
view takes behaviour as sex-linked in an uncomplicated fashion instead of
seeing gender as socially constructed, involving roles, norms and expectations,
and potentially differing within sex-groups, as well as between
them.
·
There
is no reason to expect simple, general or constant relations between gender (or
sex) and sociolinguistic variation.
·
This
view ignores differences of gendered behaviour for variables that are stable,
or at various stages of linguistic change in progress (Labov 1990).
·
Methodological
flaws are common in older studies: e.g. in the ways that women are assigned
socioeconomic or occupational status; lack of awareness of gender dynamics in
collecting speech data; and analysis of gender as involving a simple binary
variable (=sex).
·
Finally,
the data themselves turn out to be more complex (once you know to look
for it!): there are many cases where women have been found to use vernacular
forms as often as men, or more often; both men and women have been found to
lead in some sound changes; etc. Such cases suggest that a more sophisticated
view of gendered variation is required.
6. References
Chambers, J. K. 1995. Sociolinguistic
theory: Linguistic variation and its social significance. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Cheshire, Jenny. 1982, Linguistic
variation and social function. In S Romaine, ed. 1982, Sociolinguistic
variation in speech communities, 153-166. [Excerpted in J. Coates ed. 1998,
Language & Gender: A Reader, 29-41.]
Coates, Jennifer. 1993 (2nd
ed.). Women, Men and Language. London: Longman.
Coates, Jennifer, ed. 1998. Language
and Gender: A Reader. (Blackwell Publishers).
Coupland, Nikolas, & Adam Jaworski,
eds. 1997. Sociolinguistics: A reader. Palgrave/St. Martin’s Press.
Eckert, Penelope. 1989. The whole woman:
sex and gender differences in variation. Language Variation and
Change 1:245-267.
Eckert, Penelope. 1998. Gender and
sociolinguistic variation. In J. Coates ed. 1998, Language & Gender: A
reader, 64-75.
Elyan, O., Smith, P., Giles, H., and
Bourhis, R. 1978. RP-accented female speech: the voice of perceived androgyny?
In P. Trudgill, ed., Sociolinguistic Patterns in British English,
122-31. London: Arnold.
Gordon, Elizabeth. 1997. Sex, speech, and
stereotypes: why women use prestige speech forms more than men. Language in
Society 26: 47-64.
Guy, Gregory R. 1988. Language and social
class. In F. Newmeyer, ed., Linguistics: The Cambridge Survey, vol. 4.
(Language: The Socio-cultural context.), 37-63. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Labov, William. 1966. The Social
Stratification of English in New York City. Washington DC: Center for
Applied Linguistics.
Labov, William. 1990. The intersection of
sex and social class in the course of linguistic change. Language Variation
and Change 2: 205-254.
Nichols, Patricia. 1998. Black women in
the rural South: Conservative and innovative. In B. L. Dubois & I. Crouch,
eds., American minority women in sociolinguistic perspective, 45-54.
Mouton: The Hague. [Revised and excerpted in J. Coates ed. 1998, Language
& Gender: A reader, 55-63.]
Patrick, Peter L. To appear 2001. The
speech community. In J.K. Chambers, P. Trudgill and N. Schilling-Estes, eds., Handbook
on Language Variation. Oxford: Blackwell. Online version (restricted to U.
Essex terminals).
Rickford, John R. 1986. The need for new
approaches to social class analysis in linguistics. Language and
Communication 6(3): 215-221.
Trudgill, Peter. 1983. Sex and covert
prestige. In P Trudgill On Dialect, Chap. 10. [Revision of the original
1972 article in Language in Society; which is excerpted in J. Coates,
ed. 1998, Language & Gender: A reader, 21-28.]
Wolfram, Walt, & Natalie
Schilling-Estes. 1998. 1998 American English. Oxford: Blackwell.