A discursive approach to structural gender linguistics
theoretical and methodological considerations
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v10i2.25525Keywords:
structural gender linguistics, language and gender theories, poststructuralist approach, discourse, discursive materialisation, de-essentialisation, language policyAbstract
This article addresses the current marginalisation of structural gender linguistics within the field of language and gender. Traditional, structuralist-minded approaches to language and gender are briefly reviewed, and it is argued that a revitalisation of the study of gendered language structures can only be achieved when such analyses reflect recent theoretical developments within the field. More specifically, this necessitates a reconceptualisation of (gendered) language structures in the light of discursive or poststructuralist theories, namely as the result of processes of discursive materialisation in language use. Also discussed at a methodological level is how de-essentialisation as a central driving force of discursive approaches to language and gender can be operationalised in various types of structural linguistic analysis. Four basic dimensions of deessentialisation are distinguished for this purpose: first, the contrastive linguistic dimension (de-essentialisation across languages); second, the historical linguistic dimension (de-essentialisation across time periods); third, the lexicogrammatical dimension (de-essentialisation across linguistic gender categories); and fourth, the pragmatic dimension (de-essentialisation across usage contexts). A contrastive sample analysis of the complexities of pronominalisation in English and German complements the discussion.
References
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Bodine, A. (1975) Androcentrism in prescriptive grammar: singular ‘they’, sex-indefinite ‘he’, and ‘he or she’. Language in Society 4(2): 129–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500004607
Butler, J. (1990) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.
Butler, J. (1997) Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative. New York: Routledge.
Bybee, J. and Hopper, P. (2001) Introduction to frequency and the emergence of linguistic structure. In J. Bybee and P. Hopper (eds) Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure 1–24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/tsl.45.01byb
Cameron, D. (1995) Verbal Hygiene. London: Routledge.
Cralley, E. L. and Ruscher, J. B. (2005) Lady, girl, female, or woman: sexism and cognitive busyness predict use of gender-biased nouns. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 24 (3): 300–14. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0261927X05278391
Davis, J. L., Zimman, L. and Raclaw, J. (2014) Opposites attract: retheorizing binaries in language, gender, and sexuality. In L. Zimman, J. L. Davis and J. Raclaw (eds) Queer Excursions: Retheorizing Binaries in Language, Gender, and Sexuality 1–12. Oxford: Oxford University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199937295.003.0001
Derrida, J. (1988) Limited Inc. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Ehrlich, S. and King, R. (1992) Gender-based language reform and the social construction of meaning. Discourse & Society 3(2): 151–66. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0957926592003002002
Ehrlich, S., Meyerhoff, M. and Holmes, J. (eds) (2014) The Handbook of Language, Gender, and Sexuality. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781118584248
Hall, K. (2013) ‘It’s a hijra!’ Queer linguistics revisited. Discourse & Society 24(5): 634–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0957926513490321
Hall, K. and Bucholtz, M. (eds) (1995) Gender Articulated: Language and the Socially Constructed Self. New York: Routledge.
Hardman, M. J. (1999) Why we should say ‘women and men’ until it doesn’t matter any more. Women and Language 22(1): 1–2.
Harrington, K., Litosseliti, L., Sauntson, H. and Sunderland, J. (eds) (2008) Gender and Language Research Methodologies. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Harvey, K. (2002) Camp talk and citationality. A queer take on ‘authentic’ and ‘represented’ utterance. Journal of Pragmatics 34(9): 1145–65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0378-2166(01)00058-3
Hellinger, M. (2006) Sexist language. In E. K. Brown (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics: Volume XI 265–72. Amsterdam: Elsevier. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B0-08-044854-2/01476-0
Hellinger, M. (2011) Guidelines for non-discriminatory language use. In R. Wodak, B. Johnstone and P. Kerswill (eds) The Sage Handbook of Sociolinguistics 565–82. London: Sage. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446200957.n38
Hellinger, M. and Bußmann, H. (2001) Gender across languages: the linguistic representation of women and men. In M. Hellinger and H. Bußmann (eds) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume I 1–25. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.9.05hel
Hellinger, M. and Bußmann, H. (eds) (2001–3) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volumes I–III. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Hellinger, M. and Motschenbacher, H. (eds) (2015) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume IV. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.36
Hellinger, M. and Pauwels, A. (2007) Language and sexism. In M. Hellinger and A. Pauwels (eds) Handbook of Language and Communication: Diversity and Change 651–84. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110198539
Hollmann, W. B. (2009) Semantic change. In J. Culpeper, F. Katamba, P. Kerswill, R. Wodak and T. McEnery (eds) English Language: Description, Variation and Context 301–13. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Holmes, J. and Meyerhoff, M. (eds) (2003) The Handbook of Language and Gender. Oxford: Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942
Hopper, P. J. (1998) Emergent grammar. In Michael Tomasello (ed.) The New Psychology of Language: Cognitive and Functional Approaches to Language Structure 155–75. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Hornscheidt, A. L. (2011) Feminist language politics in Europe. In B. Kortmann and J. van der Auwera (eds) The Languages and Linguistics of Europe: A Comprehensive Guide 575–90. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110220261.575
Johnsen, O. R. (2008) ‘He’s a big old girl!’ Negotiation by gender inversion in gay men's speech. Journal of Homosexuality 54(1–2): 150–68. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00918360801952044
Lakoff, R. (1975) Language and Woman’s Place. New York: Harper & Row.
Leap, W. L. (2015) Review of The Handbook of Language, Gender, and Sexuality, eds Susan Ehrlich, Miriam Meyerhoff and Janet Holmes. Journal of Language and Sexuality 4(1): 174–82. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/jls.4.1.06lea
Livia, A. and Hall, K. (1997) ‘It’s a girl!’ Bringing performativity back to linguistics. In A. Livia and K. Hall (eds) Queerly Phrased: Language, Gender, and Sexuality 3–18. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Maltz, D. N. and Borker, R. A. (1982) A cultural approach to male–female miscommunication. In J. J. Gumperz (ed.) Language and Social Identity 195–216. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
McConnell-Ginet, S. (2003) What’s in a name? Social labeling and gender practices. In Holmes and Meyerhoff (2003): 69–97. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942.ch3
Mills, S. (2004) Third wave feminist linguistics and the analysis of sexism. Discourse Analysis Online 2. Retrieved on 3 June 2016 from http://extra.shu.ac.uk/daol/articles/open/2003/001/mills2003001.html.
Mills, S. (2008) Language and Sexism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511755033
Motschenbacher, H. (2008) Structural linguistic gender categories and discursive materialization: a deconstructionist analysis. Indiana University Working Papers in Linguistics 8(3): 21–46.
Motschenbacher, H. (2010a) Language, Gender and Sexual Identity: Poststructuralist Perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.29
Motschenbacher, H. (2010b) Female-as-norm (FAN): a typology of female and feminine generics. In M. Bieswanger, H. Motschenbacher and S. Mühleisen (eds) Language in its Socio-Cultural Context: New Explorations in Gendered, Global and Media Uses 35–67. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.
Motschenbacher, H. (2012) An Interdisciplinary Bibliography on Language, Gender and Sexuality (2000–2011). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/z.177
Motschenbacher, H. (2013) Gentlemen before ladies? A corpus-based study of conjunct order in personal binomials. Journal of English Linguistics 41(3): 212–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0075424213489993
Motschenbacher, H. (2014) Grammatical gender as a challenge for language policy: the (im)possibility of non-heteronormative language use in German versus English. Language Policy 13(3): 243–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10993-013-9300-0
Motschenbacher, H. (2015) Some new perspectives on gendered language structures. In M. Hellinger and H. Motschenbacher (eds) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume IV 27–48. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.36.02mot
Motschenbacher, H. (2016) A poststructuralist approach to structural gender linguistics: Initial considerations. In J. Abbou and F. Baider (eds) Gender and the Periphery: Grammatical and Social Gender from the Margins 65–88. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Nakassis, C. V. (2013) Citation and citationality. Signs and Society 1(1): 51–77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/670165
Norri, J. (1998) Gender-referential shifts in English. English Studies 79(3): 270–87. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00138389808599131
Pauwels, A. (2003) Linguistic sexism and feminist linguistic activism. In Holmes and Meyerhoff (2003): 550–70. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942.ch24
Queen, R. (2006) Heterosexism and/in language. In E. K. Brown (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics: Volume V 289–92. Amsterdam: Elsevier. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B0-08-044854-2/01477-2
Sarrasin, O., Gabriel, U. and Gygax, P. (2012) Sexism and attitudes toward gender-neutral language: the case of English, French, and German. Swiss Journal of Psychology 71(3): 113–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1024/1421-0185/a000078
Schulz, M. R. (1975) The semantic derogation of woman. In B. Thorne and N. Henley (eds) Language and Sex: Difference and Dominance 64–75. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Silverstein, M. (2005) Axes of evals: token versus type interdiscursivity. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 15 (1): 6–22. http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/jlin.2005.15.1.6
Spender, D. (1980) Man Made Language. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Tannen, D. (1990) You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation. New York: William Morrow.
Thorne, B., Kramarae, C. and Henley, N. (eds) (1983) Language, Gender and Society. Rowley: Newbury House.
Baker, P. (2015) Two hundred years of the American man. In T. M. Milani (ed.) Language and Masculinities: Performances, Intersections, Dislocations 34–52. New York: Routledge.
Baron, D. (1986) Grammar and Gender. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Barrett, R. (2002) Is queer theory important for sociolinguistic theory? In K. Campbell-Kibler, R. J. Podesva, S. J. Roberts and A. Wong (eds) Language and Sexuality: Contesting Meaning in Theory and Practice 25–43. Stanford, CA: CSLI.
Bing, J. M. and Bergvall, V. L. (1996) The question of questions: beyond binary thinking. In V. L. Bergvall, J. M. Bing and A. F. Freed (eds) Rethinking Language and Gender Research: Theory and Practice 1–30. London: Longman.
Bodine, A. (1975) Androcentrism in prescriptive grammar: singular ‘they’, sex-indefinite ‘he’, and ‘he or she’. Language in Society 4(2): 129–46. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500004607
Butler, J. (1990) Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.
Butler, J. (1997) Excitable Speech: A Politics of the Performative. New York: Routledge.
Bybee, J. and Hopper, P. (2001) Introduction to frequency and the emergence of linguistic structure. In J. Bybee and P. Hopper (eds) Frequency and the Emergence of Linguistic Structure 1–24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/tsl.45.01byb
Cameron, D. (1995) Verbal Hygiene. London: Routledge.
Cralley, E. L. and Ruscher, J. B. (2005) Lady, girl, female, or woman: sexism and cognitive busyness predict use of gender-biased nouns. Journal of Language and Social Psychology 24 (3): 300–14. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0261927X05278391
Davis, J. L., Zimman, L. and Raclaw, J. (2014) Opposites attract: retheorizing binaries in language, gender, and sexuality. In L. Zimman, J. L. Davis and J. Raclaw (eds) Queer Excursions: Retheorizing Binaries in Language, Gender, and Sexuality 1–12. Oxford: Oxford University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199937295.003.0001
Derrida, J. (1988) Limited Inc. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Ehrlich, S. and King, R. (1992) Gender-based language reform and the social construction of meaning. Discourse & Society 3(2): 151–66. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0957926592003002002
Ehrlich, S., Meyerhoff, M. and Holmes, J. (eds) (2014) The Handbook of Language, Gender, and Sexuality. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781118584248
Hall, K. (2013) ‘It’s a hijra!’ Queer linguistics revisited. Discourse & Society 24(5): 634–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0957926513490321
Hall, K. and Bucholtz, M. (eds) (1995) Gender Articulated: Language and the Socially Constructed Self. New York: Routledge.
Hardman, M. J. (1999) Why we should say ‘women and men’ until it doesn’t matter any more. Women and Language 22(1): 1–2.
Harrington, K., Litosseliti, L., Sauntson, H. and Sunderland, J. (eds) (2008) Gender and Language Research Methodologies. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Harvey, K. (2002) Camp talk and citationality. A queer take on ‘authentic’ and ‘represented’ utterance. Journal of Pragmatics 34(9): 1145–65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0378-2166(01)00058-3
Hellinger, M. (2006) Sexist language. In E. K. Brown (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics: Volume XI 265–72. Amsterdam: Elsevier. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B0-08-044854-2/01476-0
Hellinger, M. (2011) Guidelines for non-discriminatory language use. In R. Wodak, B. Johnstone and P. Kerswill (eds) The Sage Handbook of Sociolinguistics 565–82. London: Sage. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446200957.n38
Hellinger, M. and Bußmann, H. (2001) Gender across languages: the linguistic representation of women and men. In M. Hellinger and H. Bußmann (eds) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume I 1–25. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.9.05hel
Hellinger, M. and Bußmann, H. (eds) (2001–3) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volumes I–III. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Hellinger, M. and Motschenbacher, H. (eds) (2015) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume IV. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.36
Hellinger, M. and Pauwels, A. (2007) Language and sexism. In M. Hellinger and A. Pauwels (eds) Handbook of Language and Communication: Diversity and Change 651–84. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110198539
Hollmann, W. B. (2009) Semantic change. In J. Culpeper, F. Katamba, P. Kerswill, R. Wodak and T. McEnery (eds) English Language: Description, Variation and Context 301–13. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Holmes, J. and Meyerhoff, M. (eds) (2003) The Handbook of Language and Gender. Oxford: Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942
Hopper, P. J. (1998) Emergent grammar. In Michael Tomasello (ed.) The New Psychology of Language: Cognitive and Functional Approaches to Language Structure 155–75. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Hornscheidt, A. L. (2011) Feminist language politics in Europe. In B. Kortmann and J. van der Auwera (eds) The Languages and Linguistics of Europe: A Comprehensive Guide 575–90. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110220261.575
Johnsen, O. R. (2008) ‘He’s a big old girl!’ Negotiation by gender inversion in gay men's speech. Journal of Homosexuality 54(1–2): 150–68. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00918360801952044
Lakoff, R. (1975) Language and Woman’s Place. New York: Harper & Row.
Leap, W. L. (2015) Review of The Handbook of Language, Gender, and Sexuality, eds Susan Ehrlich, Miriam Meyerhoff and Janet Holmes. Journal of Language and Sexuality 4(1): 174–82. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/jls.4.1.06lea
Livia, A. and Hall, K. (1997) ‘It’s a girl!’ Bringing performativity back to linguistics. In A. Livia and K. Hall (eds) Queerly Phrased: Language, Gender, and Sexuality 3–18. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Maltz, D. N. and Borker, R. A. (1982) A cultural approach to male–female miscommunication. In J. J. Gumperz (ed.) Language and Social Identity 195–216. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
McConnell-Ginet, S. (2003) What’s in a name? Social labeling and gender practices. In Holmes and Meyerhoff (2003): 69–97. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942.ch3
Mills, S. (2004) Third wave feminist linguistics and the analysis of sexism. Discourse Analysis Online 2. Retrieved on 3 June 2016 from http://extra.shu.ac.uk/daol/articles/open/2003/001/mills2003001.html.
Mills, S. (2008) Language and Sexism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511755033
Motschenbacher, H. (2008) Structural linguistic gender categories and discursive materialization: a deconstructionist analysis. Indiana University Working Papers in Linguistics 8(3): 21–46.
Motschenbacher, H. (2010a) Language, Gender and Sexual Identity: Poststructuralist Perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.29
Motschenbacher, H. (2010b) Female-as-norm (FAN): a typology of female and feminine generics. In M. Bieswanger, H. Motschenbacher and S. Mühleisen (eds) Language in its Socio-Cultural Context: New Explorations in Gendered, Global and Media Uses 35–67. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang.
Motschenbacher, H. (2012) An Interdisciplinary Bibliography on Language, Gender and Sexuality (2000–2011). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/z.177
Motschenbacher, H. (2013) Gentlemen before ladies? A corpus-based study of conjunct order in personal binomials. Journal of English Linguistics 41(3): 212–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0075424213489993
Motschenbacher, H. (2014) Grammatical gender as a challenge for language policy: the (im)possibility of non-heteronormative language use in German versus English. Language Policy 13(3): 243–61. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10993-013-9300-0
Motschenbacher, H. (2015) Some new perspectives on gendered language structures. In M. Hellinger and H. Motschenbacher (eds) Gender Across Languages: The Linguistic Representation of Women and Men, Volume IV 27–48. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/impact.36.02mot
Motschenbacher, H. (2016) A poststructuralist approach to structural gender linguistics: Initial considerations. In J. Abbou and F. Baider (eds) Gender and the Periphery: Grammatical and Social Gender from the Margins 65–88. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Nakassis, C. V. (2013) Citation and citationality. Signs and Society 1(1): 51–77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/670165
Norri, J. (1998) Gender-referential shifts in English. English Studies 79(3): 270–87. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00138389808599131
Pauwels, A. (2003) Linguistic sexism and feminist linguistic activism. In Holmes and Meyerhoff (2003): 550–70. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470756942.ch24
Queen, R. (2006) Heterosexism and/in language. In E. K. Brown (ed.) Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics: Volume V 289–92. Amsterdam: Elsevier. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B0-08-044854-2/01477-2
Sarrasin, O., Gabriel, U. and Gygax, P. (2012) Sexism and attitudes toward gender-neutral language: the case of English, French, and German. Swiss Journal of Psychology 71(3): 113–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1024/1421-0185/a000078
Schulz, M. R. (1975) The semantic derogation of woman. In B. Thorne and N. Henley (eds) Language and Sex: Difference and Dominance 64–75. Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
Silverstein, M. (2005) Axes of evals: token versus type interdiscursivity. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 15 (1): 6–22. http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/jlin.2005.15.1.6
Spender, D. (1980) Man Made Language. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Tannen, D. (1990) You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation. New York: William Morrow.
Thorne, B., Kramarae, C. and Henley, N. (eds) (1983) Language, Gender and Society. Rowley: Newbury House.
Published
2016-07-15
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Section
Articles
How to Cite
Motschenbacher, H. (2016). A discursive approach to structural gender linguistics: theoretical and methodological considerations. Gender and Language, 10(2), 149-169. https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v10i2.25525
