文学类翻译英语论文

2014届本科英语双学位毕业论文浅析英语交际中的性别差异

姓名：郭利娟

系别：美术学院

专业：雕塑

学号：101211014

指导教师：孟献策

2014年4月

Gender Differences in English Communication

by

Guo Lijuan

Shangqiu Normal University

Apr 2014

摘要

自古以来，男女性别差异无论是在身份﹑语言还是工作﹑地位以及其他一些方面，国内外都是有所体现的，并受到一些先进人士的关注。本文从社会语言学的角度出发，在变异理论基础上从性别差异方面点出了男女在日常交际中的不同方式，分析了男性与女性在语言方面的差异，并对原因及其在日常文化交际方面所起到的影响作了简单的分析。本文旨在描写男女在交际中的不同，着重从词汇﹑句型﹑以及内容等方面所存在的差异进行表述，并在后面对其原因进行了分析和总结。另外，作者在文末指出人们在生活中应该关注男女语言的差异，以便取得成功的交流，更好的提高人们的实际交流能力。

关键词：语言；性别差异；跨文化交际

Abstract

Gender differences is with us from ancient times to now, home and abroad, no matter on identity, language, status, jobs, or others. With the rising of feminist movement in western society in the 1960s, the relationship between language and gender gradually caused people’s attention. The study of gender differences has been a favorite subject of sociolinguistics. Gender differences is also embodied in language, language and gender has become an important branch in sociolinguistics. The aim of this paper is to describe the gender-related differences in daily English communication, such as the differences in vocabulary, syntax, content and analyze their reasons. From this paper people know more about the differences between male and female speech and this paper hopes to help people have an overall understanding of gender differences.

Key words: language; gender differences; cross-cultural communication

Contents

摘要 .................................................................................................................................... I Abstract ................................................................................................................................. II Contents ............................................................................................................................... III 1 Introduction (1)

1.1Communication and Gender Cultures (1)

1.2Motivations (2)

2Gender-related Differences in English Communication (2)

2.1V ocabulary Difference (2)

2.1.1Adjectives and Adverbs (2)

2.1.2Color Words (3)

2.1.3Hedges and Fillers (4)

2.1.4Colloquialism and Professional Words (4)

2.2Syntactic Structure (5)

2.2.1Declarative and Imperative Sentence (5)

2.2.2Tag Questions (6)

2.3Difference in Content (6)

2.3.1Difference in Topic (6)

2.3.2The Number of Talk (7)

2.3.3Turn-talking Regulations (8)

2.3.4Difference in Speech Strategies (8)

3Influence on Cross-cultural Communication (9)

4Conclusion (9)

References (10)

1 Introduction

Gender differences in English communication is gender differences between male and female using the same language when the characteristics shown by the differences. Gender differences is a new topic in the intersection of sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics, especially in the study of sociolinguistics, the relationship between language and gender which has long been of the study and research of traditional linguists.

Since the early 20th century, many linguists have focused on gender differences in pronunciation, intonation, words choice and so on. Until in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, when in the United States feminist movement aroused, the subfield of linguistics known as Language and Gender studies is the best thought of as a quite important part. Nowadays linguists focus on the language use to study the gender related differences.

Robin Lakoff is one of the most known scholars under the wave of Western feminist movement to deal with the issue of language and gender. She thinks language reflects society and cultural differences, and women’s language depends entirely on her own intuitions and casual observations, while men’s language is assertive, adult-like, and direct. (Lakoff. 1975) Lakoff may well be regarded as one of the forerunners of recent research into the field of language and gender in western societies.

1.1Communication and Gender Cultures

A communication culture is a group of people with the exiting set of norms regarding how they communicate with each other. These cultures can be categorized as masculine or feminine, each differing in how they get along with others through different styles of communication. (Tannen, Deborah. 1990) Masculine and feminine cultures differ dramatically in when, how and why they use communication.

In the study of sociolinguistics, gender indicates the distinctions between male and female from social perspectives, so the relationship between language and gender is bi-directional, too. People always grow up in a specific gender group, during their daily life, boys and

girls are subconsciously influenced by the speech and the custom of their group, so a special gender group can develop a special language. In addition, men are related with masculinity, women are regarded as feminine. It is natural that men and women speak differently with each other. Deborah Tannen’s studies found these gender differences in communication styles “where men more generally refer to masculine people and women correspondingly refers to feminine people.” (Tannen, Deborah. 1990, 13 )

1.2Motivations

This thesis is particularly interested in the gender-related differences between male and female speeches. In the study of sociolinguistics, it shows what differences between male and female speeches exist and reasons cause the gender differences in English communication and what problems people should take care of in daily communication.

The aim of this thesis is to show the differences that exist between male and female in daily communication, the reasons that cause these differences and to give some suggestions to people who would take some cross-cultural communication.

2Gender-related Differences in English Communication

It is known that there do exist differences between male and female speech. These differences can be found in their vocabulary, syntax, content and other aspects.

2.1Vocabulary Difference

In vocabulary, the differences between male and female mainly in adjectives, adverbs, color words, slang words and professional words. The following part will show these aspects.

2.1.1Adjectives and Adverbs

The terms of the difference in choice of words, women prefer to use the adjectives and adverbs to show admiration, appreciation, and praise. Lakoff worked out a special list of

empty adjectives like “divine”, “charming”, “lovely cute”, “sweet”, “precious”, and “fantastic”, “fabulous”, “adorable”, “gorgeous”, etc, which are used typically by women, but rarely used by men. When women see beautiful clothes, they would use adorable; when they see delicious food, they would use gorgeous; they also use divine to describe chocolate. However, men prefer to use “great”, “terrific”, “neat”and some other neutral words. (Lakoff. 1975) Some other researchers also prove that women use adjectives more frequently than the men of the same age.

On the other hand, women use adverbs more frequently than men. When they express their feelings, women are fond of using hyperbole. Jesperson suggested that the fondness of women for hyperbole will very often used lead the fashion with regard to adverbs of intensity, and these are often used with disregard of their proper meaning. (Jesperson,Otto. 1922) Take “so” for example, in the hot movie-Desperate Housewives, women often say:

(1)I am so sorry!

(2)The food there was so delicious!

(3)Thank you so much!

It is a great favorite with women while men use then not so frequently.

2.1.2Color Words

Women, the beauty of nature determines the good use of complex, precise words to describe color in contact with things, while men in contact with things for far less careful than women. Generally speaking, women possess stronger ability of distinguishing and sensing color. So they use color words more frequently in communication. Lakoff claims that women like use color words like “mauve”, “beige”, “aquamarine”, “lavender”and “magenta”, but most men do not. From clothes, ornament, flowers and other aspects, many researches got the result women are fond of color words much more than men, because women wear more colorful clothes, use more decorates and love flower more, while men often dress black and brown, use little decorates, and so on.

The author found when a couple saw the sea, the wife said “the azure sea is so beautiful!”while the husband said “the blue sea looks nice!” The same sea was expressed by these two people in two absolutely different ways. In view of this, it is natural that color words have become part of women’s vocabulary. Once a man dresses colorful and uses many ornaments, people think he is strange and abnormal.

2.1.3Hedges and Fillers

Hedges are cautious notes expressed about how an utterance is to be taken. The italicized phrases in utterances like,

(4)It is sort of hot in here.

(5)I guess that man over there is her father.

(6)It seems like you are in a good mood.

All belong to hedges. In single-gender talks, women use more hedges than men do, they often use some vague words, such as, “I think”, “You know”, “I mean”, and some sound pause.

Fillers refer to the words or phrases that are used to redeem silent situation, such as: “er”, “well”, “um”, “you know”, “let me see”. In daily communication, women use more frequently fillers than men.

2.1.4Colloquialism and Professional Words

Saying spoken English, swearing foul language in most cases is from the mouth of men, such as “Damn it”,“Damn”or “Shit”. Women rarely used them; they tend to use some weak words as “Oh dear”, “Good Heavens”, and “thank Goodness”.

In people’s daily life, men and women often talk about different topics, they care about different things, and have different hobbies, and so they use different professional words. Such as: women care about their inner-word, personal mood, living interests more than

men, so emotional words often appear in their speech. On contrary, men often use words in relation to policy, economy, sports, machine, wine, and car and so on.

2.2Syntactic Structure

Besides vocabulary difference, syntactic difference also is an aspect of showing gender differences. Women prefer to use tag questions to express a personal point of view, on the one hand, people want to listen to their views, on the other hand, the tone of uncertainty weaken their views of power, ease the tough tone of rude, but also a polite argument. Men in general, rarely used anti-tag question, which are often used in declarative and imperative sentences. So the next part will show the topic in imperative sentences, declarative sentences, and tag-questions.

2.2.1Declarative and Imperative Sentence

In daily life, declarative sentence is a kind of common sentence style, which is used by different people with different aims and ways. Women are used to using more statement question like “Dinner will be ready at five o’clock?” (With a rising intonation at the end), while men often use more statement like “It will be useful.” This can also be seen when women convey apologies, they always say: “I am sorry, excuse me. I beg your pardon? Pardon me?” This kind of intonation is more intimate, kinder.

Imperative sentences are used to give orders, commands or directives. The traditional men’s are concerned with positions of order-giving or directive-giving, so it is the preferred speech pattern by male.(Coates. 1986) Coates makes an experiment among the group of boys and girls who play together in a street. Here goes the example,

(7)Michael: Give me the pliers. (Lily gives pliers to Michael)

(8)Huey: Get off my steps. (Lily moves down steps)

Michael, the group leader, is more likely to use explicit commands a lot. In these examples, the man speakers like many orders as swearing words. Instead, girls like to use pronouns

like we, or let’s into the scope of operations.

2.2.2Tag Questions

Lakoff stated the main difference between male and female in syntactic style lies in the use of tag questions. Women speakers tend to get some from listeners’ cooperation or support. And it is a strategy that women use to keep the conversation smooth. Fishman analyzes most women will use the questions as to ensure a way of conversation continues too, but for most men, they use question seems only to obtain information just.(Fishman. 1980) Men like to express the tone of direct command and requires. So that more women are more tactful in communication than men.

“A tag midway between an outright statement and a yes-no question; it is less assertive than the former, but more confident than the latter. It is polite to leave a decision open, not impose your mind, view, and claims on anyone else.” (Coates, Jennifer. 1986)

2.3Difference in Content

Besides the two aspects, gender differences between male and female speech also illustrates in content. This part mainly states the differences from topic, amount of talk, turn talking regulations, strategies.

2.3.1Difference in Topic

Similar to professional words, in daily communication, women and men focus on different topics and content. In talks, women prefer to talk about their family, husband, children, and personal feelings and so on. Whatever they talk about, personal thing are always the main topics. However, men tend to have impersonal topics such as politics, economics, agriculture, military affairs, war and sports. On the other hand, men focus on the exchange of important information and put forward personal ideals and views. When describing events, they tend to talk the result of it and ignore the details, while women pay more attention to details and inner-relationship. This aim of women is to build intimate and

harmony relationship, not on the content.

For women, talking is the primary way to become closer to another person, for men, shared goals and accomplishing tasks is the primary way to become close to another person. So, women talks more topics in conversation and the topics are more concerned about personal things and details, they tend to talk at length about one topic, while men concern different things and tend to jump from one topic to another.

2.3.2The Number of Talk

About this topic, there is a common and fixed opinion that women talk more than men. And in many English dictionaries, such words like “hobble”, “chatter”, “gab”, “gossip”, “nag”, “prattle” and so on, with the meaning of talkativeness are all used to refer to women. However, the real social interaction proves this is not true, many researchers found the opposite conclusion. These show that, in judging speech act people have different standards for men and women.

Women are said to be the winners among gossipers. The reason probably lies in the topic of conversation, which is often of emotional nature, involving relationships, emotions, moods, feelings. Besides, when hearing something new, men and women will have different reactions. Women tend to gossip about it in the man’s view. This opinion can be found in the following humorous story,

(9)Woman: If you tell one man something, my words will come into one ear

and go out from the other ear.

(10)Man: If you tell a woman something, your words will come into both of

her ears and then come out from her mouth.

This humorous story makes a contrast between men’s and women’s different reactions to the newly-heard news. From this story, we know that it has been stereotyped that women are interested in talking about trivial cases more than men do.

Many people have said and believed that an average woman uses two to three times as many words as a man in the same period of time. There will show a joke.

(11)A man and his wife were having a conversation about an article she has

read that women speak twice as much as men do. The women said to her

husband, “Honey, did you know the average woman speaks about 5000

words a day, compared to the average man who speaks only 2500, only

half as much?” She went to say, “The reason why women speak twice as

much as men was because thy always have to repeat what they say.”

(12)To which her husband replied, “What?”

From this story, we could conclude that women are the talkative, whereas men are less talkative. When it comes to problems, men try to solve problems analytically, while women initiate their emotions. Women often tend to identify with a person who has problems, thus revealing private and intimate pieces of information, which is often a source for gossiping.

2.3.3Turn-talking Regulations

The turn talking of speakers, which is the people taking part in the conversation, will speak in turn. In conversation, women pay more attention to the hearers’reaction than men. Women are polite, kind and demure. Women are more inclined to face each other and make eye contact when talking, while men are more likely to look away from each other. Generally speaking, women do not like to control the topic and interrupt others. On the contrary, men like to control topic and challenge others. In addition, women prefer to observe other’s reaction and feelings in conversation; however, men like to control the conversation to show their ability and greatness.

2.3.4Difference in Speech Strategies

Most people think men’s importance represents in interruption, volubility, silence, topic rising, while women play main role in indirectness, taciturnity and tag questions. These

mainly lie in that women perform more cooperation than men in conversation. In a conversation, women tend to refer what the former people have said, and try to say something associated with it, and they concern the reaction of the hearers.

On the other hand, when listening, women are frequently used “mm-hmm”, “uh-huh”, “yeah”, to show they are listening or interested in the topic, while men are likely to listen silently. Besides, when women want to interrupt others, they prefer to use such kind of words like “maybe”, “I guess”to suspect other’s view indirectly. On the contrary, men often showed strong competitiveness, tend to control the subject by their own choice and the opportunity to speak, and would not give up easily.

3Influence on Cross-cultural Communication

When meet different genders, people often make some mistakes in daily communication. “You are what you say”. (Hu. 2001) Language itself is expressed by different people; therefore, people of different gender tend to have their own expression style. Women are more care about details, while men are not. When they begin their talk, they are not easy to get smooth communication. Sometimes, men can not understand why women use tag questions so often, whether there are some underlying meanings, whether they agree them. Therefore, the good master of gender differences is helpful for people in setting up a harmonious relationship with others. It is better known that people with better cultural knowledge have more chances to success than people with less foreign cultural knowledge. After knowing the differences between male and female speech, they can understand each other better and can be easily to success.

4Conclusion

This thesis discuss the different communication between male and female, how they behave in conversation and in other situations, what influences them and why they react in a gender-specific way. What about the thesis shows the causes of gender differences in male and female speech, which emphasizes that language is the reflection of society. The

study of gender differences has been a favorite subject of sociolinguistics.

This paper show the differences that exist between male and female in daily communication, the reasons that cause these differences and give some suggestions to people who would take some cross-cultural communication. And this paper points out the fact of the existence of gendered language by giving some examples and theories, and hopes to help people have an overall understanding of the gendered langue.

References

Coates, Jennifer. 1986. Women, Men and Language. London: Longman.

Dittmar, N. 1976. Sociolinguistics: A Critical Survey of Theory and Application. London: Edward Arnold Ltd.

Fishman, P. 1980. Conversational Insecurity. Language: Social Psychological Perspectives.

Oxford: Pergamon Press.

Hu, Zhuanglin. 1995.Cohesion and Coherence of the Language. Shanghai: Shanghai Foreign Language Educational Press.

Hu, Zhuanglin. 2001. Linguistics, A Course Book. Beijing: Beijing University Press.

Jesperson, Otto. 1922. Language: Its Nature, Development and Origin. London: Allen and Unwin.

Peter, Trudgill. 1974. The Social Differentiation of English in Norwich. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Robin, Lakoff. 1975. Language and Woman’s Place. New York: Harper & Row.

Romine, S. 1994. Language in Society: An Introduction to Sociolinguistics.Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Song, Haiyan. 1998. Xingbie Yuanxingzai Yuyan Jiaoyude Fanying. [The Reflection of Sex on Language Teaching]. Journal of Foreign Language Newpaper, February: 58-63.

Tannen, Deborah. 1990. Sex and Conversation. Washington: Washington Press.

Wang, Duqin. 2002. Yingyu Jiaoxue Zhanshi. [The Demonstration of English Teaching] Beijing: Foreign Teaching and Research Press.