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Language & Gender Post-midterm section

Language & Gender Post-midterm section. Questions? Tylers at stanford. Agenda. Midterm Questions/comments? Drag queens (Barrett 1999) Dude (Kiesling 2004). Barrett (1999). What’s the point? You can’t take things at face value (eg, drag queens don’t want to be white women).

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Language & Gender Post-midterm section

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  1. Language & GenderPost-midterm section Questions? Tylers at stanford

  2. Agenda • Midterm • Questions/comments? • Drag queens (Barrett 1999) • Dude (Kiesling 2004)

  3. Barrett (1999) • What’s the point? • You can’t take things at face value (eg, drag queens don’t want to be white women). • Identity isn’t simple. • Don’t try to shove people into one and only one box. • Think about “repertoires” of identity (Barrett uses “polyphonous”) • Performance! • We should look at how styles are juxtaposed

  4. Term potpourri • Cross-dresser • Drag king • Drag queen • Female impersonator • Glam queen • Transgendered • Transsexual • Transvestite

  5. Feminist scholars vs. queer theorists • Is drag inherently misogynistic? • A mockery, or at least a highly stereotyped image of femininity and womanhood • Used to reinforce a performer’s masculinity • Drag queens say it isn’t misogynistic—does that claim matter? • Is drag inherently transgressive? • E.g., a highly subversive act that deconstructs traditional assumptions concerning gender identity.

  6. Other words worth pursuing • “Messy” • Authenticness • Signifyin’ • White woman • Indexing

  7. Gender and ethnicity • These are big themes in life and in sociolinguistics • How does Barrett’s study connect the dots? • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-XH8WcXHpk&feature=related (ffwd to 4:10) • Throw in sexuality: what’s the “bind” that gay Black men find themselves in?

  8. Some sounds of AAVE • Americans are really accurate at identifying race based on a speech sample (80-90%) • British are really good at social class, not race • A few characteristic features: • These > dese • Tooth > toot or toof • Simplification of consonant clusters (first > fus)

  9. Dude • How does Kiesling (2004) summarize the use of “dude”? • What can we take away from the article? • Learn about a word by observing and asking • But it isn’t just a word we’re learning about! • Interaction is crucial • Indexing! • Discourse!

  10. Other terms? • Man • Like • Rising intonation • What else?

  11. What can “dude” do for you? • Solidarity/camaraderie • But not gay • Nonchalant, not-too-enthusiastic “stance” • Is cool ever enthusiastic? • Effortless • Or lazy • What’s the connection to masculinity here? • Surfer/druggie/skater •  Nonconformity

  12. Dudettes

  13. Fonting of /u/ • Across North America • Index youth (older speakers don’t front)? • Social meaning of the fronting has a lot to do with dude?

  14. Spicoli, Mr. Hand, “linguistic icons” • http://www.netwalk.com/~truegger/ftrh/pizza.html • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7RMiJUVDj8 • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f89WPMpniFl

  15. In interaction, what does he look at? • Where it occurs in a sentence (utterance initial or final position) • Who says it • Relationship to other words/variables (man, ing/in’) • What else?

  16. Kiesling’s 5 interactional functions • Let’s perform ‘em! • Marking discourse structure • Sharply falling intonation • Exclamation • Extremely elongated, falling in pitch (but not as sharply as (1) • Confrontational stance mitigation • Low pitch, rises slightly on a slightly elongated syllable • Marking affiliation and connection • Pitch is usually higher, often slightly rising • Signaling agreement • Very similar to (3) but with higher pitch

  17. Flexible to the point of meaninglessness? • Kiesling says, sure, I’ve posited a lot of different uses, but that’s okay. Indeterminancy is the name of the game (2004: 297). • “We should not confuse flexibility with meaninglessness”—indexing is a real thing, worth thinking about. • What do you think?

  18. Discourses! • “Cultural Discourses are similar to ideologies, yet leave open the possibility of contradiction, challenge, and change, and describe more than idea systems, including social practices and structures…I will always use a capital D with cultural Discourses to distinguish them from the linguistic notion of discourse, which is talk-in-interaction.” (Kiesling 2004: 302)

  19. One last point • “The very definition of prestige changes over time” (Kiesling 2004: 300).

  20. Drag queens & dudes • What do these articles share in common? • How are they different? • How does the use of ‘dude’ support heteronormativity? How’s it related to homophobia?

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