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Before the field of language and gender emerged, folk linguistics–rather than research–had dominated people’s perception of men and women’s language, their roles and identity formation (Litosseliti 2006). In the early twentieth century, the linguist Jeperson (1922) argued that
women’s language was lacking in authority. This was followed by the variationist trend in language and gender research (e.g. Trudgill 1974; Labov 1966), which used the biological category of ‘sex’ rather than the socio-cultural construct of ‘gender’ as a core variable and indicator of individual language use. However, over the past three decades, research in the field of language and gender has been primarily conducted within the following frameworks: deficit, dominance, gender difference, and social constructionist.
To start with, the deficit perspective in language and gender represented and maintained the early view of women’s language as uncertain and lacking in authority. Within this framework, women are viewed as disadvantaged language users whose linguistic practices reflect their social powerlessness and lack of confidence (Talbot 1998). Lakoff’s (1975) classic monograph ‘Language and the women’s place’ identifies various characteristics of women’s language that distinguish it from the presumed norm (men’s language): the use of hedges tomitigate the effect
of their utterances,boosters and empty adjectives for emphasis, rising intonations and tag questions to indicate uncertainty, hypercorrect grammar, and generally highly polite language.37
In the early 1980s, research in language and gender took a turn into the dominance
perspective. This framework marked the beginning of (consciousness raising) feminist research regarding prevailing gender inequalities and the division of power between men and women. These inequalities were perceived as having been constructed and maintained by men and women’s distinctive use of language.Men were thought to use a range of dominance strategies (e.g. display talk, interruptions, banter and teasing, boasting, verbal harassment, accusations, insults, putdowns). In contrast, women were thought to use supportive strategies (e.g. listening, tag questions, use of minimal responses) (Cameron 1992) Within the dominance perspective, research in language and gender (e.g. the classic work of Spender 1980, and Fishman 1978) sought to expose language bias by investigating the use of sexist language (e.g. the generic use of the pronoun ‘he’ for men and women).
The third and perhaps the most popular (among non-linguists) perspective is the view of language as a polarised set of characteristics and speech styles denoting men’s and women’s language; or what linguists refer to as the ‘gender difference’ perspective. Research within the gender difference perspective (e.g. Coates 2004; Holmes 1990; Tannen 1990) perceived the distinction between men and women’s linguistic practices as resulting from different
socialisation processes and/or cultural dispositions. According to Tannen (1990), men and women display different but complementary speech styles. While men use goal-oriented, direct and assertive ‘report talk’, women use process-oriented, indirect and cooperative ‘rapport talk’.38
37 This era (the 1970s) also witnessed the emergence of the assertiveness movement in the 1970s, which
mainly aimed at developing women’s communication skills and training them to use direct and assertive language (Crawford 1995).
38 Despite the popularity of the difference framework, it was hugely criticised for its role in perpetuating
Finally, and most recently, language and gender research has been mainly conducted within the social constructionist framework with its view of identity (including one’s gender) as performed, constructed, maintained, and negotiated through language (e.g. Butler 1990; Crawford 1995; Holmes 2006; Mullany 2007). This perspective is based on the post-structuralist notion of the multiplicity and multi-dimensionality of identities; a person’s gender is just one of many elements which he/she enacts through written and spoken language. According to Mullany (2007), the social constructionist approach to gender has been widely embraced by feminist linguistics, which reflects the high level of dissatisfaction with the dominance and difference paradigms. Moreover, fundamental to the social constructionist view of gender is Butler’s (1990) notion of performativity, influenced by Foucault’s discourse theory. Butler (1990) perceives gender as a process or a performative social construct. Based on this view, individuals ‘do’ or ‘perform’ being a ‘man’ or a ‘woman’ by displaying language and behaviour which conform to/or resist the ‘perfect model’ perpetuated by the dominant gendered discoursesin the particular organisation or community of practice. Mullany (2007:23) further explains that ‘[m]asculinity and femininity are effects we perform by the activities in which we partake, not predetermined traits we possess’.
Many language and gender researchers (e.g. Baxter 2010, Mullany 2007, Sunderland 2004, Litosseliti 2006; Wodak and Benke 1997) adopt Butler’s view of gender as a set of performative social constructs because this theory allows for some degree of speakers’ agency. Women are no longer viewed as victims trapped by societal norms; they can conform to or resist their subject positioning. However, Butler (1990:33) claims that every interaction takes place within ‘rigid regulatory frames’39 where certain gender-related discourses impose various expectations,
attitudes, ways of talking, and so on upon men and women (Sunderland 2004). Yet Holmes
39 Ehrlich (2003) and McElhinny (2003) discuss how Butler’s ‘rigid regulatory frames’ are critiqued for
(1997) argues that speakers can always transgress and subvert gender stereotypes through resisting these discourses.40 Sunderland (2004) refers to such gender-related discourses as
‘gendered’. This will be discussed next.
3.2.1.1 Gendered Discourses
According to Sunderland (2004:6) discourses are ‘ways of seeing the world’. She argues that gender-related discourses should be described as ‘gendered’ because ‘gender is already a part of “the thing” which gendered describes’ (2004:20-21). Various dominant gendered discourses are identified in the research literature. Drawing on Walsh (2001), Mullany argues that there are persistent ‘hegemonic discourses’ of masculinity and femininity that are embedded in the discursive practices of any community. For example, the discourse of ‘Gender Difference’ is considered a ‘masculinist hegemonic discourse’ where differences between men and women in society are emphasised (Sunderland 2004). Further, Mullany (2007:35) points out ‘[the]
dominant discourse of gender difference seeks to emphasize homogeneity within singular categories of femininity and masculinity, stressing instead the differences between women and men, as opposed to the differences within groups of women and groups of men’.
Also, the discourse of Masculinisation identified by Baxter (2003) in her management study (see section 3.1.1.2) shows that both discourses of Gender Difference41 and Masculinisation promote stereotypical constructs of masculinity such as hierarchy, order, structure, competitiveness, rivalry, aggression and goal-oriented action as the unmarked normative characteristics of the language and interactional practices of men in society.
There are many other gendered discourses identified in literature, especially in language and gender research in Western organisations. For example, Mullany and Litosseliti (2006) identify a
40 Mills (2002) and Mullany (2007) and many others adopt a modified version of the performativity theory
where they acknowledge the effect of stereotyping and moulding on individuals but equally believe that these stereotypes can be challenged and altered.
discourse of female emotionality/irrationality in which women are perceived as emotional and incapable of making logical judgments or decisions.42 According to Mullany (2007), this is a sub-
discourse of gender difference along with other hegemonic discourses of femininity such as the discourse of Image and sexuality, which emphasises the perception of successful working women as physically slim and attractive.
Here, the notion of communities of practice is essential. Cameron (1996) relates gendered discourses to the notion of communities of practice. She suggests that different communities operate under a different set of ‘prevailing gendered norms’, which inform and determine individuals’ choices of language and behaviour. Cameron (1996:45) states:
Throughout our lives we go on entering new communities of practice: We must constantly produce our gendered identities by performing what are taken to be the appropriate acts in the communities we belong to – or else challenge prevailing gender norms by refusing to perform those acts.
Holmes (2006) notes that in any community of practice, gender and gendered discourses are constantly produced, reproduced, contested and negotiated as members interact with each other. In interactions, individuals may behave in ways indexing43 masculine or feminine ‘styles' of speaking depending on the norms of the community of practice they belong to, or they could also resist and challenge these norms.
Furthermore, Eckert and McConnell-Ginet (1992) argue that communities of practice can be labelled as ‘gendered’ constituting and constituted by multiple masculinities and femininities. Equally, Holmes and Meyerhoff (1999) point out that CofP is a dynamic concept and is
42Mullany and Litosseliti (2006) point out that this discourse could be damaging for women, especially
those seeking management positions, because it contrasts with this discourse of scientific modernism which requires managers and leaders to be rational and unemotional. This ultimately leads to women’s exclusion from leadership positions and the boardroom in corporations.
compatible with the social constructionist view of gender as a set of constantly changing social constructs. In this research study, I adopt Eckert and McConnell-Ginet’s (1992) dynamic concept of gendered CofP to study the ways in which senior women enact leadership in their gendered communities.
In the next section, I preview the vast field of leadership research from a language and gender perspective.