1 / 11

“Gay” Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

“Gay” Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community. Sean McLennan Linguistics / Cognitive Science Indiana University OutRights Calgary, Alberta April 3, 2007. Language and Gender. gender-based differences in how people speak differences in how gender is talked about

benjamin
Download Presentation

“Gay” Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. “Gay” Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community Sean McLennan Linguistics / Cognitive Science Indiana University OutRights Calgary, Alberta April 3, 2007

  2. Language and Gender • gender-based differences in how people speak • differences in how gender is talked about • not always attached to social-inequality issues • in and of themselves, linguistic observations have nothing to say about discrimination although they can be used to build a case "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  3. Language and the GLBT Community Interesting fields of inquiry • language used to denigrate women is historically related to that used to denigrate homosexual men • language use within the gay community has distinguishing characteristics – even innovative • language reclamation used to diffuse social power "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  4. Male-As-Generic Bias in English Man / Woman Actor / Actress Heir / Heiress Hero / Heroine Man-hours Brotherhood Fellowship Masterpiece Generic “he” Dictionary Examples Again – this is an observable pattern; not an argument for social-inequality "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  5. “Gay” • probably the most widely used, unaddressed Male-As-Generic "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  6. A Little Study Counts from Outlooks, March 2007 "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  7. A Little Study – Phrases "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  8. A Little Study – Other Indicators "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  9. “Guys” • Similar on the surface, but quite different • syntactically predictable • distribution is not correlated with gender • historical evolution of the words are different "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  10. Distribution of “Guy” "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

  11. Interpretation More questions than answers • is this indicative of social inequality? • why is it unaddressed (or is it indirectly)? • unique case of linguistic bias that is unattached to social power? • GLBT community provides a unique sociological window that is not recognized "Gay" Sexism: Linguistic Sexism in the GLBT Community

More Related