Genderlect

Genderlect is the word used to describe the relationship between a speakers gender and the language that they use. It is also an instrumental field in the exploration of gender stereotypes and sociolinguistics. The field became active in the early 70s with Robin Lakoff, a professor of linguistics at the University of California, Berkley but has been dominated by Deborah Tannen over the last 20 years.

For example, it is stereotypically accepted that women gossip, often discussing personal and domestic issues whereas men communicate at a bare minimum level only to convey important topics. There is even a stereotype on the sound of the voice; women are supposedly demure and gentle while men speak with an authoritarian tone. These stereotypes still prevail despite the fact that we encounter contradictions to them on a daily basis.

Gender, grammar and lexis

Investigations into spoken discourse between men and women has shown that men will interrupt a woman even if she is of a higher status then he, they will hold the floor for a larger proportion of the conversation and are quite happy to discuss their topics but have no interest in the women's choice of subject.

Jennifer Coates

"Women, Men and Language"(first published 1986, 2nd edition 1993) outlines a crucial difference in approach described by Coates as "dominance" and "difference".

Dominance is an approach whereby the female sex is seen as the subordinate group whose difference in style of speech results from male supremacy. Researchers of this view: Robin Lakoff (1975), Dave Spender (1980) and Zimmerman and West (1983).

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. Deborah Tannen (1989) is the main advocate of this position.

Deborah Cameron

In "Verbal Hygiene" (1995) Cameron argues against the dominance approach from the point of view that throughout history the male has always been the "unmarked norm" from which the female deviates to the "marked form". For example the norm 'manager' becomes the marked form 'manageress' when referring to a female counterpart.

Cameron also challenges whether or not two separate language styles exist at all for men and women as it is a "deficit model" - one being inferior to the other - and asks if it is gender alone that makes up the core of an identity.