The 3Ds

When talking about gender spoken language the 3Ds need to be included: dominance, difference and deficit.

Dominance: 

• Jennifer Coats says our identification is represented by how we speak. She says we live in a patriarchal society, a male dominate world (mostly mild-aged) and male dominated position of power. 
• There are more CEOs named John then there are women in a position of power even though our population is 51% female. 
• There are two different types of power: influential and instrumental. Influenced power is using language to influence someone's decision and instrumental power is using imperative language making somebody do something.  
• Pamela Fishman (1983) said that tag questions are used more by females and use them to gain conversational power, they are also used to set the agenda and she says females use 'conversational shittalk' (phatic talk and fillers). 

Difference:

• Women belonging to 'different sub-cultures' who are differently socialised from childhood onwards: girls play with dolls and using loving words and language and boys play with cars and guns and use the opposite types of language. 

• Deborah Cameron (1995): verbal hygiene, language is gender. 
• Lakoff and Spencer see gendered language in terms of power; throughout western culture the masculine has been unmarked normal language, the feminine the marked for. 
• Unmarked; 'Manager' and 'Usher' 
• Marked; 'Manageress' and 'Usherette' 

• Stereotypically men use instrumental power and female use influential power. 
• We are raised this way from a child, more praise is given to a girl for being polite and respectful than boys. 
• Political correctness; eliminating suffix e.g. Headmistress to Headteacher, mark forms politically incorrect  and so language is becoming equal, society is becoming more equal.

• Deborah Tannen's view (1990) 
• men do speak differently to women.'The desire to affirm that women are equal has made some scholars reluctant to show that they are different' 
• Status V Support, Independence V Intimacy, Advice V Understanding, Information V Feeling

Deficit: 

• Cameron challenges the two different contrast language between male and female. 
• Women are socialised to speak in a certain way; passive and subordinate. 
• The way men and women speak in conversation may reveal the effect of things such as class or social economic status. 
• Lakoff is the theorist for deficit. He said that women's language is less important and they speak less than men, but there is no statistical data to support this 'It is my impression, though I do not have precise statistical evidence' and there has been many changes between the years relating to gender language. 
• Jenny Cheshire (1983) said that boys use more non-standard forms than girls such as taboo and slag language. 

Why Do I Make Less Than My Male Co-Stars

https://www.facebook.com/JenniferLawrence/posts/10153012783811793:0

Jennifer Lawrence posted this status on the social media platform 'Facebook.' It was published to spark debate and put her opinion across. The status explains how she thinks it is unfair that she gets paid less than her male co-stars due to the fact that she is a women. The post is directed to people who follow Jennifer Lawrence who tend to be females who watch her films between the ages of 15 and 30. 

There are both male and female language used in this status. The language used to describe men are words such as 'fierce' and 'tactical' because they negotiate with the price they should be paid. Whereas, if women were to do the same thing, they would be described as 'spilt', 'difficult' and a 'brat'. 

In Grammar There Isn’t Always One Right Answer

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/nov/03/morgan-grammar-test-right-answer-spag-english-spelling-punctuation-grammar

This article was written by Michael Rose, he explains how he feels that Key Stage 2 English spelling, grammar and punctuation tests are used to grade the children and not to test their language skills. 

Why English Is Weird

Seeing these reasons it is very clear to why people who are new to the English language can get confused as words can have a completely different meaning if they are pronounced slightly different. However, people who speak English and know it very well don't even need to think about how to pronounce the word as it just comes naturally. 

1) We know the difference between a noun and a verb which means we know how to pronounce the words differently to make the sentence make sense. 

2) The first 'produce' in the sentence is the verb in the sentence and the second is the object of the sentence, this leaves the 'farm' to be the subject of the sentence. 

3) In this sentence we are aware that we need to emphasise 're' in the first refuse as this would make the sentence understandable. 

4) We know the difference between a noun and and verb which is how we know which way to pronounce 'polish' even though they are spelt exactly the same.

5) The verb normally comes before the noun and this homophone usage follows the same pattern. 

6) 'Desert' and 'dessert' are both spelt differently, 'desert' is the verb and 'dessert' is the noun. 'Desert' is the subject of the sentence and there is more emphasis. 

7)The first 'present' relates to time and the moment, the second is relating to giving someone something and the final 'present' is a gift. 

8) 'Bass' and 'bass' are spelt the same way yet have two different ways to pronounce the word. 

9) Similar to 'bass', 'dove' are spelt the same but are pronounced differently and have different meanings. 

10) The first 'object' is the verb which then means the second 'object' is the noun of the sentence. 

Are Emojis The New Language?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/32793732/uks-fastest-growing-language-is-emoji

Emojis are one of the fastest growing languages according to this article, it shows that emojis could have been used in the past in the form of  hieroglyphics and therefore are not a completely new concept. It states that  '72% of 18 to 25-year-olds' find it easier to explain how they feel through using emojis than using actual words. 

The article also includes a video with students trying to explain easy and complex situations only using emojis and it was shown that it can be done fairly easily. 

 

Mispronunciation

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/11/pronunciation-errors-english-language

This article explains how mispronouncing words is very common, it goes through the most common mispronounced words and why they are said incorrectly. 

It states that one of the main reasons for people saying words incorrectly could be all down to how the words are spelt which relates to a previous article posted http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20150605-your-language-is-sinful. There are 8 main reasons why we mispronounce words which are explained throughout the article such as 'words which used to begin with 'n'.'

English Language Is A Mess?

http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20150605-your-language-is-sinful

In this article it explores how the English language has become very confusing and how spelling has become so complicated to understand. It says that we only have ourselves to blame for this due to the fact we have taken words and spellings from places all around the world and putting them into our own language and this has been going on for centuries starting from the Romans.

The writer uses a poem to explain how many variations of spellings there are and how that it is complex to understand. He states that the issue starts right at the beginning of the English Language; the alphabet.