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Research into the many possible relationships, intersections and tensions between language and gender is diverse. It crosses disciplinary boundaries, and, as a bare minimum, could be said to encompass work notionally housed within applied linguistics, conversation analysis, cultural studies, feminist media studies, feminist psychology, gender studies, interactional sociolinguistics, linguistics, Mediated Stylistics, sociolinguistics and media studies. In methodological terms, there is no single approach that could be said to ‘hold the field’. Discursive, poststructural, ethnomethodological, phenomenological, positivist and experimental approaches can all be seen in action during the study of language and gender, producing and reproducing what Susan Speer (2005: 7–8) has described as ‘different, and often competing, theoretical and political assumptions about the way discourse, ideology and gender identity should be conceived and understood’. As a result, research in this area can perhaps most usefully divided into three main areas of study: first, there is a broad and sustained interest in the varieties of speech associated with a particular gender; second, there is a related interested in the social norms and conventions that (re)produce gendered language use. A variety of speech (or sociolect) associated with a particular gender is sometimes called a genderlect.; and third, there are studies that focus on the contextually specific and locally situated ways in which gender can be brought into being/invoked/oriented-to/made accountable (and so on) to and for people in and as their everyday talk/textual interaction.〔 (Pdf. )〕 The study of gender and language in sociolinguistics and gender studies is often said to have begun with Robin Lakoff's 1975 book, ''Language and Woman's Place'', as well as some earlier studies by Lakoff. The study of language and gender has developed greatly since the 1970s. Prominent scholars include Deborah Cameron, Penelope Eckert, Janet Holmes, Deborah Tannen, and others. == Studies of language and gender == In 1975 Robin Lakoff identified a "women's register," which she argued served to maintain women's (inferior) role in society. Lakoff argued that women tend to use linguistic forms that reflect and reinforce a subordinate role. These include tag questions, question intonation, and "weak" directives, among others (see also Speech practices associated with gender, below). Studies such as Lakoff's have been labeled the "deficit approach," since they posit that one gender is deficient in terms of the other. Descriptions of women's speech as deficient can actually be dated as far back as Otto Jespersen's "The Woman," a chapter in his 1922 book ''Language: Its Nature and Development.'' Jespersen's idea that women's speech is deficient relative to a male norm went largely unchallenged until Lakoff's work appeared fifty years later.〔 Nevertheless, despite the political incorrectness of the chapter's language from a modern perspective, Jespersen's contributions remain relevant. These include the prospect of language change based on social and gendered opportunity, lexical and phonological differences, and the idea of genderlects and gender roles influence language. Not long after the publication of ''Language and Woman's Place'', other scholars began to produce studies that both challenged Lakoff's arguments and expanded the field of language and gender studies.〔〔 One refinement of the deficit argument is the so-called "dominance approach," which posits that gender differences in language reflect power differences in society.〔O’Barr, William and Bowman Atkins. (1980) "'Women’s Language' or 'powerless language'?" In McConnell-Ginet et al. (eds) ''Women and languages in Literature and Society.'' pp. 93-110. New York: Praeger.〕 Jennifer Coates outlines the historical range of approaches to gendered speech in her book ''Women, Men and Language''.〔Coates, Jennifer (1986). ''Women, Men and Language: A Sociolinguistic Account of Gender Differences in Language''. London: Longman.〕 She contrasts the four approaches known as the deficit, dominance, difference, and dynamic approaches. "Deficit" is an approach attributed to Jespersen (1922) that defines adult male language as the standard, and women's language as deficient. This approach created a dichotomy between women's language and men's language. This triggered criticism to the approach in that highlighting issues in women's language by using men's as a benchmark. As such, women's language was considered to have something inherently 'wrong' with it. ''Dominance'' is an approach whereby the female sex is seen as the subordinate group whose difference in style of speech results from male supremacy and also possibly an effect of patriarchy. This results in a primarily male-centered language. Scholars such as Dale Spender〔Spender, Dale (1980). ''Man Made Language''. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.〕 and Don Zimmerman and Candace West〔West, Candace, and Don H. Zimmerman (1983). "Small insults: a study of interruptions in conversations between unacquainted persons." In B. Thorne, C Kramarae, and N. Henley (eds.) ''Language, Gender and Society'',102-17. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.〕 subscribe to this view. ''Difference'' is an approach of equality, differentiating men and women as belonging to different 'sub-cultures' as they have been socialised to do so since childhood. This then results in the varying communicative styles of men and women. Deborah Tannen is a major advocate of this position. Tannen compares gender differences in language to cultural differences. Comparing conversational goals, she argues that men tend to use a "report style," aiming to communicate factual information, whereas women more often use a "rapport style," which is more concerned with building and maintaining relationships.〔 The "dynamic" or "social constructionist" approach is, as Coates describes, the most current approach to language and gender. Instead of speech falling into a natural gendered category, the dynamic nature and multiple factors of an interaction help a socially appropriate gendered construct. As such, West and Zimmerman (1987)〔West, Candace, and Don H. Zimmerman (1987). Doing Gender, ''Gender & Society'' 1: 125-51.〕 describe these constructs as "doing gender" instead of the speech itself necessarily being classified in a particular category. This is to say that these social constructs, while affiliated with particular genders, can be utilized by speakers as they see fit. Scholars including Tannen and others argue that differences are pervasive across media, including face-to-face conversation,〔Fitzpatrick, M. A., Mulac, A., & Dindia, K. (1995). Gender-preferential language use in spouse and stranger interaction. ''Journal of Language and Social Psychology'', 14, 18-39.〕〔Hannah, Annette, and Tamar Murachver (1999). Gender and conversational style as predictors of conversational behavior. ''Journal of Language and Social Psychology'', 18, 153-174.〕 written essays of primary school children,〔Mulac, A., Studley, L.B., & Blau, S. (1990). "The gender-linked language effect in primary and secondary students’ impromptu essays." Sex Roles 23, 439-469.〕 email,〔Thomson, R., & Murachver, T. (2001). "Predicting gender from electronic discourse." British Journal of Social Psychology 40, 193-208.〕 and even toilet graffiti.〔Green, J. (2003). "The writing on the stall: Gender and graffiti." Journal of Language and Social Psychology 22, 282-296.〕 Deborah Cameron, among other scholars, argues that there are problems with both the dominance and the difference approach. Cameron notes that throughout the history of scholarship on language and gender male-associated forms have been seen as the unmarked norm from which the female deviates.〔Cameron, Deborah (1995). ''Verbal Hygiene''. London: Routledge.〕 For example the norm 'manager' becomes the marked form 'manageress' when referring to a female counterpart. On the other hand, Cameron argues that what the difference approach labels as different ways of using or understanding language are actually displays of differential power. Cameron suggests, "It is comforting to be told that nobody needs to 'feel awful': that there are no real conflicts, only misunderstandings. () But the research evidence does not support the claims made by Tannen and others about the nature, the causes, and the prevalence of male-female miscommunication." She argues that social differences between men's and women's roles are not clearly reflected in language use. One additional example is a study she has done on call center operators in the UK, where these operators are trained to be scripted in what they say and to perform the necessary 'emotional labor'(smiling, expressive intonation, showing rapport/empathy and giving minimal responses) for their customer-callers. This emotional labor is commonly associated with the feminine domain, and the call center service workers are also typically females. However, the male workers in this call center do not orient to the covertly gendered meanings when they are tasked to perform this emotional labor. While this does not mean that the 'woman's language' is revalued, nor does this necessarily call for a feminist celebration, Cameron highlights that it is possible that with time, more men may work in this service industry, and this may lead to a subsequent "de-gendering" of this linguistic style.〔Cameron, D. (2000) "Styling the Worker: Gender and the Commodification of Language in the Globalized Service Economy.", Journal of Sociolinguistics 4:3: 323-347.〕 Communication styles are always a product of context, and as such, gender differences tend to be most pronounced in single-gender groups. One explanation for this, is that people accommodate their language towards the style of the person they are interacting with. Thus, in a mixed-gender group, gender differences tend to be less pronounced. A similarly important observation is that this accommodation is usually towards the language style, not the gender of the person. That is, a polite and empathic male will tend to be accommodated to on the basis of their being polite and empathic, rather than their being male.〔Thomson, R., Murachver, T., & Green, J. (2001). "Where is the gender in gendered language?" Psychological Science 12, 171-175.〕 However, Ochs (1992) argues that gender can be indexed directly and indirectly.〔Ochs, Elinor. 1992. Language as an Interactive Phenomenon. Ed. by Alessandro Duranti and Charles Goodwin. Great Britain: Cambridge UP. 335-357〕 Direct indexicality is the primary relationship between linguistics resources (such as lexicon, morphology, syntax, phonology, dialect and language) and gender. For example, the pronouns "he" and "she" directly indexes "male" and "female". However, there can be a secondary relationship between linguistic resources and gender where the linguistic resources can index certain acts, activities or stances which then indirectly index gender. In other words, these linguistic resources help constitute gender. Examples include the Japanese particles "wa" and "ze". The former directly index delicate intensity, which then indirectly indexes the female "voice" while the latter directly indexes coarse intensity, which then indirectly indexes the male "voice". Women are generally believed to speak a better "language" then men do. This is a constant misconception, but scholars believe that no gender speaks a better language, but that each gender instead speaks its own unique language.〔Azizi, Masoud. "Language And Gender: Do Women Speak A Better Language?." E-Proceedings Of The International Online Language Conference (IOLC) 2.(2011): 90-93. Communication & Mass Media Complete. Web. 1 May 2013.〕 This notion has sparked further research into the study of the differences between the way men and women communicate. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Language and gender」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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