Language and Gender

Thursday 9th December

2021

Today’s session

1. Sentence Parsing – continue to practise this skill.

2. Recap Van Leeuwan’s Social Actor Network and Halliday’s verb processes.

3. Feedback on ‘Yellow Wallpaper’ analysis.

4. Analysis of headlines on ‘stay-at-home dads’

5. Quiz on language and gender (theories and concepts)

6. Analyse the article on the singer, Charlotte Church applying all of the theories.

7. Gender theory and spoken language1. Zimmerman and West2. Beattie3. O’Barr and Atkins4. Janet Holmes5. Deborah Cameron

8. Video – ‘Nice Girls Don’t Swear’

Developing analytical skills

Parsing a sentence

Mix the ingredients thoroughly and leave to cool for 10 minutes.

Mix = verb, regular, imperative

the = determiner

ingredients = concrete noun, plural

thoroughly = process adverb

and = coordinating conjunction

leave = verb, irregular

to = preposition

cool = verb (in this context. Can be an adjective in other contexts)

for = preposition

10 = number (in this case presented in numerals)

minutes = abstract noun, plural

the ingredients = noun phrase, direct object.

leave to cool = verb phrase.

for 10 minutes = temporal adverbial.

The whole sentence is in the active voice.

It is a compound sentence with two independent clauses (both imperatives).

GENDER AND SOCIAL ACTOR REPRESENTATIONTheo van Leeuwan Social Actor Network (1996)

In this model van Leeuwan places emphasis on the participants presented either in the text or the interaction, calling them the social actors. The Social Actor Network offers a detailed sub-categorisation of social actors, allowing for a more detailed analysis of:

What groups and individuals are referred to

How they are referred to

In his categories, he connects functions with the language used to construct these.

One of his main aspects of representation is through nomination (the naming of the social actor) but within this he labels further categories:

Functionalisation: the roles and occupations held by the social actor

Classification: aspects of identity such as class, age and gender

Relational identification: relationship to others, such as family or work connections

Physical Identifications: aspects of appearance

NOMINATION

Social actors can be represented through nomination, where the social actor’s name or identity is used, but this can take different forms.

Formalisation: shown through surname only or with titles/honorifics

Semi-formalisation: shown through using both surname and first name

Informalisation: where the first name only is used.

Another method of representation is collectivisation, where social actors are referred to as a group with plural grammatical forms.

SOCIAL ACTOR REPRESENTATION AND VERB PROCESSES

An important element of Theo Van Leeuwan’s model is whether social actors are either activated or passivated.

Activation occurs when the social actor is represented as the active, forceful element in an activity.

Passivation happens when the social actor is presented as undergoing an activity or as being the receiver of an action or event (not just through passive voice)

In this model the nature of agency is important.

MICHAEL HALLIDAY’S CATEGORIES OF VERB PROCESSESThese focus on how particular meanings can be created and relationships between participants can be shown through the verbs used. They are very useful for looking at power and dominance.

1. Material verb processes: a process which is about what is going on outside the participant. Verbs used here are associated with actions and doing and involve one participant (called the agent) doing something to another participant (usually called the object)

2. Mental verb processes: a process which is about inner experience. Verbs used here are ones associated with the human senses of thinking, perception (like seeing and hearing) and feelings.

3. Verbal verb process: a process which is about the exchange of meaning through ‘saying’. Verbs used here are associated with communication.

4. Relational verb process: a process which is about classifying and identifying experiences through the use of verbs like being, becoming or having.

EXPLORING GENDER AND SOCIAL ACTOR REPRESENTATION IN LITERATURE

The extract is from ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, a short story written in 1892 by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. The narrative depicts an unnamed female narrator’s struggles with her mental health after the birth of her child. It also presents a response to being confined by her family in an attic room with barred windows in the belief that this will help her recovery.

Read the text, and consider the following questions:

a) Who are the social actors and how are they nominated? How are they functionalised, classified and identified relationally?

b) Who is activated and passivated? In what ways?

c) What types of verbal processes do you see used in relation to the different social actors?

d) From your analysis, how are the characters represented in a gendered way?

Extract:

John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that in marriage.

John is practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and he

scoffs openly at any talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in figures.

John is a physician, and PERHAPS—(I would not say it to a living soul, of course, but this is dead paper and

a great relief to my mind)—PERHAPS that is one reason I do not get well faster.

You see he does not believe I am sick!

And what can one do?

If a physician of high standing, and one's own husband, assures friends and relatives that there is really

nothing the matter with one but temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency—what is one

to do?

My brother is also a physician, and also of high standing, and he says the same thing.

So I take phosphates or phosphites—whichever it is, and tonics, and journeys, and air, and exercise, and am

absolutely forbidden to "work" until I am well again.

Personally, I disagree with their ideas.

Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good.

But what is one to do?

“The Yellow Wallpaper" is a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, published 1892

EXEMPLAR RESPONSE TO ‘THE YELLOW WALLPAPER TASK’

John is nominated by his first name. He is functionalised as a physician – a now more archaic term for a doctor – and classified by the reference to him being ‘of high standing’. He is relationally identified by the narrator in a slightly distant way as ‘one’s own husband’. This is repeated with her brother, who the narrator says holds a similar role and reputation.

In the extract from near the beginning of the story, it is clear that the actor with agency is john and he is activated throughout this passage. Relational verb processes represent John as dominant and in control. The declaratives and syntax foreground John as the subject of the clause: ‘John is practical’, ‘He has no patience with faith’ and ‘John is a physician’. The creation of male power and control is also re-emphasised when the narrator talks of her brother, further presenting her as a passivated actor in the decisions of the male family members. The narrator’s passivated role is shown syntactically in the extract with her as the object: ‘John laughs at me’, but other language choices such as the repetition of the pronoun ‘one’, and the interrogative ‘what is one to do?’ and exclamative ‘you see he does not believe I am sick!’ where her powerlessness is embedded within the clause showing a mental verb process and the negation ‘not’; this creates the sense of her being acted upon and unable to stop their restrictions on her decision-making .

At the end of the extract, the mental verb processes ‘believe’ and ‘disagree’ are modified by the adverb ‘personally’, but this too shows her passivated role as her own desires are unable to challenge the powerful male group of doctors and family members. Modality is also significant in the narrator’s passivation: the adverb ‘perhaps’ and the modal verbs ‘would not say it to a single living soul’, ‘would do me good’ and ‘what can one do?’ indicate her lack of certainty and commitment to her own feelings, emphasising the impossibility of the narrator asserting her own will against these powerful male forces.

TASK: INVESTIGATING GENDERED DISCOURSESLook at these headlines representing ‘stay-at-home’ fathers. Then answer the questions.

1. Why don’t more dads choose to stay at home? The answer is that they get bullied and are made to feel inadequate by yummy mummies.

2. Stay-at-home fathers double in 20 years: now over 200,000 look after their children. As Britain’s economy shrinks, is it the recession or the man-cession that keeps them there?

3. You can never fancy a man who becomes a house husband or stay-at-home dad: In Carina’s world he was the family breadwinner and she raised the children. When Carina and her husband swapped roles, he lost his sex appeal and his wife.

4. The stay-at-home dad who says he lost not only his dignity but his children’s respect: Once Jackson Jones used to be in charge of an annual budget of a million pounds, now he struggles to balance his monthly household bills and his family are not happy.

5. Richard Leigh was so proud to be a stay-at-home dad. Now he fears it’s harmed both his son and his daughter.

• How are the social actors identified? How is this achieved through lexical and grammatical choices?

• Overall, what kind of discourse is there about men who stay at home to look after their children?

SOME BRIEF FEEDBACK

The male social actors are called ‘dads’, ‘stay-at-home’ fathers/dad’, a ‘house husband’ or are nominated by a combination of their first and last names –‘Jackson Jones’ and ‘Richard Leigh’. In the first headline they are made the recipients of actions through the use of passive voice: ‘get bullied and are made to feel inadequate’. Interestingly, this is by the social actors ‘yummy mummies’, a collocation associated with physically attractive and desirable women who are mothers. The pun ‘man-cession’ implies these men who stay at home are opting out of the workplace and their loss of desirability is a theme through the headlines. Look at the direct address to women: ‘you can never fancy a man who becomes a house husband’. There are lots of references to loss in the headlines – in more abstract ways through the nouns ‘dignity’ and ‘respect’, and in financial terms as men who stay at home are presented as unable to manage money any more. A sense of me as damaging their wives’ and children’s lives also comes through in the language with verbs like ‘fears’ and ‘harmed’.

1. Deborah Tannen’s theories are knows as the ____________ model. (1 mark)

2. Deborah Tannen - Fill the gaps (6 marks)

Men Women

Status ?

Independence ?

? Understanding

? Feelings

Orders ?

Conflict ?

Robin Lakoff

3. Robin Lakoff’s theories are known as a _______________ model. (1 mark)

4. Write down five features of women’s language (as distinct from men’s language), according to Lakoff. (5 marks)

5. Deborah Jones 1990 study of women’s oral culture. Jones refers to this as ‘?’?- its distinguishing function is the exchange of information and resources connected with the female role as an occupation.

? - a considered judging of the behaviour of others, and women in particular. It is usually made in terms of the domestic morality, of which women have been appointed guardians.

? - this is the overt expression of women’s anger at their restricted role and inferior status. They express this in private and to other women only. The women who complain are not expecting change; they want only to make their complaints in an environment where their anger will be understood and expected.

? - this is the most intimate form of gossip, a mutual self-disclosure, a transaction where women use to their own advantage the skills they have learned as part of their job of nurturing others.

5 marks

6. King / Queen; Bachelor / Spinster are examples of what? (1 mark)

7. What term is used to describe a noun taking on negative connotations over time?

8. Male nurse; Woman priest are examples of what? (1 mark)

9. Which theorist stated that women are pressured into conforming to the ‘artificial look’? (1 mark)

10. Which theorist explored how women are objectified in media images through processes such as dismemberment, function ranking, infantilisation etc? (1 mark)

7. Which theorist stated that women are pressured into conforming to the ‘artificial look’? (1 mark)

8. Which theorist explored the idea of function ranking in media texts? (1 mark)

9. According to Van Leeuwan, what is functionalisation?

10. According to Van Leeuwan what is activation and passivation?

11. According to Van Leeuwan what are the three different sub categories of nomination?

12. According to Halliday, what are the four different verb processes

Answers

1. The difference model.

2. Deborah Tannen What is missing from the gaps?

Men Women

Status Support

Independence Intimacy

Advice Understanding

Information Feelings

Orders Proposals

Conflict Compromise

Robin Lakoff3. Deficit model

4. Any 5 of the following:

• Female adjectives of approval

• Fine definition terms (such as in colours)

• Weak expletives (oh dear..)

• Use more intensifiers

• Greater use of tag questions

• Greater use of hedges

• More use of correct grammar

• Higher levels of politeness

• Speak in italics

• Speak with rising intonation

• Implied indirect meaning

• More euphemisms

5. Deborah Jones 1990 study of women’s oral culture. Jones refers to this as ‘gossip’House Talk - its distinguishing function is the exchange of information and resources connected with the female role as an occupation.

Scandal - a considered judging of the behaviour of others, and women in particular. It is usually made in terms of the domestic morality, of which women have been appointed guardians.

Bitching - this is the overt expression of women’s anger at their restricted role and inferior status. They express this in private and to other women only. The women who bitch are not expecting change; they want only to make their complaints in an environment where their anger will be understood and expected.

Chatting - this is the most intimate form of gossip, a mutual self-disclosure, a transaction where women use to their own advantage the skills they have learned as part of their job of nurturing others.

6. Lexical asymmetry

7. Semantic derogation

8. Gender marking

9. Jean Kilbourne

10. Erving Goffmann

Text analysis – practice (annotation)

Analyse the text, ‘Stressed-out Charlotte Church turns to food and fags…’

Analyse the relevant language features and apply all relevant theories/theorists.

This is the theory that in mixed-sex

conversations men are more likely to interrupt

than women, as show by Zimmerman and West

(1975). They report that in 11 conversations between men

and women, men used 46 interruptions, but women only

two.

Dale Spender builds on this. She identifies power with a

male patriarchal order in society, and states that language

embodies structures that sustain male power.

However, this research is

often contested:

"The problem with this is that you might simply have

one very voluble man in

the study which has a

disproportionate effect

on the total…Why do

interruptions

necessarily reflect

dominance? Can

interruptions not arise from

other sources? Do some

interruptions not reflect

interest and involvement?" –

Geoffrey Beattie

Beattie found that

women and men

interrupted with more

or less equal

frequency.

Men did interrupt more, but

by a margin so slight as not

to be statistically

significant. Yet Beattie's

findings are not quoted as

often as those of

Zimmerman and West.

Why is this? Is it because

they don’t fit with what

someone wanted to

show…!?

William O'Barr and Bowman

Atkins studied the language of

the courtroom and found female

lawyers to be assertive and

interrupt.

They also found that witnesses

of both sexes would use Robin

Lakoff's weak "female"

language.

They concluded that these weak language traits are

actually a "powerless

language" rather than

a "female language".

More Recent Research

• Holmes (1984) – Argued that women’s language does not

display a weakness, but a desire to co-operate.

• Cameron (2007) – Argues that there are very few

differences between men and women’s language, and

situation affects how people speak more than gender.

EXAM QUESTION

Analyse the following text, applying:

• All relevant gender theory and concepts

• Theo Van Leeuwan’s Social Actor Theory

• Halliday’s verb processes

Make sure your points are linked to specific linguistic features – use the correct linguistic terminology in your

analyses.

Annotate the text applying all of the

relevant theories and concepts that we have

explored in class.

Make sure your analysis is focused on

specific language features.

Video

‘Nice Girls Don’t Swear’ (30 mins)