Language and gender

Abstract

This unit introduces you to the topic of language and gender. You may wonderwhyit is important to studytherelationships betweenlanguage and gender. Well, consider the following questions: e Do you think many people in our society still hold, perhaps subconsciously, some gender stereotypes -e.g., the ideas that women tend to be better as secretaries and assistants, and mentend to bebetter as managers and leaders, or that womenshould be more polite and modestwhilemen should be more aggressive and assertive? If people still hold some gender stereotypes, what does language have to do with it? Does language help to perpetuate or change such stereotypes? How can we have non-sexist and non-discriminatory language -e.g., language that doesnotperpetuate unfavorableattitudes towards women's abilities, roles and contributions in society? The language we use in our daily life is often taken for granted and we seldom pauseto critically think about it . In this unit you areencouraged to reflect onourlanguage and our language practices to seeif they reflect and perpetuate inequalities between the two sexes. Wealso discuss the question of whether men and women have different speech and communicative styles, and if yes, howand why. Finally we discuss sexist language and introduce the concept of 'symbolic violence', and discuss how we can heighten our awareness of it in the public media. Throughout this unit youwill find aseries ofbulleted questions designed to make you think about theconcepts being discussed and applythem in the Hong Kong context. Youmightfind it helpful to make notes of your ideas, as they will be useful for completing the final activity.