A matter of style
gender and subject variation in Spanish
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v10i2.18325Keywords:
style, gender, syntax, variation, subject, interactionAbstract
The construction of sex/gender as a dynamic set of values in communicative interaction is a matter of ever growing interest, superseding traditional approaches based on socio-structural and/or biological factors. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the statistical patterning of linguistic choices across genders and the meaningful use of such elements in particular contexts. The main hypothesis is that large-scale patterns of variation are tightly connected to the dynamics of specific interaction: speakers are to some extent aware of the typical association of linguistic variants with social groups and interactional domains. In turn, their creative stylistic choices can help maintain or alter such associations. The variable expression of several Spanish subject pronouns is quantitatively and qualitatively analysed. The results indicate that male discourse usually shows higher rates of expressed subject pronouns, while women are more inclined to omission. But there are also differences in their respective preference for particular grammatical subjects, with men promoting the use of the singular first person and women that of the second one. A relationship is suggested between gendered styles and the discursive–cognitive continuum from objectivity to subjectivity, this being projected on a wide range of communicative possibilities.
References
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Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2008) Elección lingüística y situación comunicativa: un dilema teórico. Revista de Filología de la Universidad de La Laguna 26: 9–20.
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2010a) Las bases cognitivas del estilo lingüístico. Sociolinguistic Studies 4 (1): 115–44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/sols.v4i1.115
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2010b) El hablante en su discurso: expresión y omisión del sujeto de creo. Oralia 13: 7–38.
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2012) Towards a comprehensive view of variation in language: The absolute variable. Language and Communication 32: 80–94. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2011.07.001
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2013) Style in Syntax: Investigating Variation in Spanish Pronoun Subjects. Bern: Peter Lang. http://dx.doi.org/10.3726/978-3-0351-0448-6
Auer, P. (2007) (Ed.) Style and Social Identities. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Beaugrande, R. A. and Dressler, W. U. (1997) Introducción a la Lingüística del texto. Barcelona: Ariel.
Bell, A. (1999) Styling the other to define the self: a study in New Zealand identity making. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3: 523–41. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00094
Brannon, L. (2010) Gender: Psychological Perspectives. Boston: Pearson Education.
Bucholtz, M. (2011) Why be normal? Language and identity practices in a community of nerd girls. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 224–35.
Bucholtz, M. and Hall, K. (1995) Introduction: 20 years after Language and Woman’s Place. In M. Bucholtz and K. Hall (eds) Gender Articulated: Language and the Socially Constructed Self 1–24. New York: Routledge.
Cameron, D. (2011) Performing gender identity: young men’s talk and the construction of the heterosexual masculinity. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 250–62.
Cameron, R. (1997) Accessibility theory in a variable syntax of Spanish. Journal of Pragmatics 28: 29–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0378-2166(96)00074-4
Chambers, J. K. (2003) Sociolinguistic Theory. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Cheshire, J. (1982) Linguistic variation as social function. In S. Romaine (ed.) Sociolinguistic Variation in Speech Communities 153–75. London: Arnold.
Coates, J. (2003) Men Talk. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470755617
Coates, J. (2011) Gossip revisited: language in all-female groups. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 199–223.
Coates, J. and Pichler, P. (2011) Language and Gender: A Reader. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Coupland, N. (2007) Style: Language Variation and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511755064
Duszak, A. (2002) (Ed.) Us and Others. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Eckert, P. (1989) The whole woman: sex and gender differences in variation. Language Variation and Change 1: 245–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S095439450000017X
Eckert, P. (2000) Linguistic Variation as Social Practice. Oxford: Blackwell.
Eckert, P. and McConnell-Ginet, S. (1999) New generalizations and explanations of language gender research. Language in Society 28 (2): 185–201. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404599002031
Edelsky, C. (1981) Who’s got the floor? Language in Society 10: 383–421. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S004740450000885X
Edwards, J. (2009) Language and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511809842
Erickson, F. (2004) Talk and Social Theory. Oxford: Polity Press.
Gauntlett, D. (2008) Media, Gender and Identity. London: Routledge.
Germon, J. (2009) Gender: A Genealogy of an Idea. London: Palgrave. http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/9780230101814
Goldberg, A. E. (1995) Constructions: A Construction-Grammar Approach to Argument Structure. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Gordon, C. (2011) Conversation and interaction. In R. Mesthrie (ed.) The Cambridge Handbook of Sociolinguistics 108–21. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511997068.011
Guy, G. et al. (1986) An intonational change in progress in Australian English. Language in Society 15: 23–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500011635
Hall, K. (2011) Boy’s Talk: Hindi, moustaches and masculinity. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 384–400.
Henley, N. M. and Kramarae, C. (1994) Gender, power, and miscommunication. In C. Roman, S. Juhasz and C. Miller (eds) The Women and Language Debate: A Sourcebook 383–406. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Hernanz Carbó, M. L. (1990) En torno a los sujetos arbitrarios: la segunda persona del singular. In V. Demonte and B. Garza Cuarón (eds) Estudios de lingüística de España y México 151–78. Mexico DF: El Colegio de México.
Hirschman, L. (1994) Female-male differences in conversational interaction. Language in Society 23: 427–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500018054
Holmes, J. (2006a) Gendered Talk at Work. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470754863
Holmes, J. (2006b) Workplace narratives, professional identity and relational practice. In A. de Fina, D. Schiffrin and M. Bamberg (eds) Discourse and Identity 166–87. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584459.009
Holmes, J. and Schnurr, S. (2006) Doing femininity’ at work: More than just relational practice. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(1): 31–51. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-6441.2006.00316.x
Hopper, P. J. and Traugott, E. (2003) Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139165525
Jaspers, J., Östman, J.-O. and Verschueren, J. (2010) (Eds.) Society and Language Use. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Johnstone, B. (1996) The Linguistic Individual: Self-Expression in Language and Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Johnstone, B., Ferrara, K. and Bean, J. M. (1992) Gender, politeness, and discourse management in same-sex and cross-sex opinion-poll interviews. Journal of Pragmatics 18: 145–70. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0378-2166(92)90082-M
Kendall, S. and Tannen, D. (1997) Gender and language in the workplace. In R. Wodak (ed.) Gender and Discourse 81–105. London: Sage.
Labov, W. (1966) The Social Stratification of English in New York City. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446250204.n5
Lakoff, R. T. (2006) Identity à la carte: you are what you eat. In A. de Fina, D. Schiffrin and M. Bamberg (eds) Discourse and Identity 142–65. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584459.008
Langacker, R. W. (1994) The limits of continuity: discreteness in cognitive semantics. In C. Fuch and B. Victorri (eds) Continuity in Linguistic Semantics 9–20. Amsterdam: Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/lis.19.03lan
Langacker, R. W. (2009) Investigations in Cognitive Grammar. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110214369
Macaulay, R. K. S. (2009) Quantitative Methods in Sociolinguistics. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Maltz, D. N. and Borker, R. A. (2011) A cultural approach to male-female miscommunication. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 487–502.
Mühlhäusler, P. and Jarré, R. (1990) Pronouns and People. Malden, MA: Basil Blackwell.
Nichols, P. (2011) Black Women in the rural south: Conservative and innovative. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 49–66.
Rivas, J. (2008) La posición del sujeto en las construcciones monoactanciales del español: Una aproximación funcional. Hispania 91: 897–912.
Schilling, N. (2013) Sociolinguistic Fieldwork. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980541
Serrano, M. J. (2011) Sociolingüística. Barcelona: Ediciones del Serbal.
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2011) Syntactic variation and communicative style. Language Sciences 33: 138–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2010.08.008
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2012) Cuando tú eres yo: la inespecificidad referencial de tú como objetivación del discurso. Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica 60(2): 541–63.
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2013) Seguimos con la actualidad … The omission of nosotros ‘we’ across Spanish media genres. Discourse and Communication 7(2): 409–33. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1750481313494437
Silva-Corvalán, C. (2001) Sociolingüística y pragmática del español. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Swann, J. (2011) Yes, but is it gender? In Coates and Pichler (2011): 551–68.
Talbot, M. (2010) Language and Gender. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Trudgill, P. (1974) The Social Differentiation of English in Norwich. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
West, C. and Zimmerman, D. H. (2011) Women’s place in everyday talk: reflections on parent–child interaction. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 143–52.
Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2008) Elección lingüística y situación comunicativa: un dilema teórico. Revista de Filología de la Universidad de La Laguna 26: 9–20.
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2010a) Las bases cognitivas del estilo lingüístico. Sociolinguistic Studies 4 (1): 115–44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1558/sols.v4i1.115
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2010b) El hablante en su discurso: expresión y omisión del sujeto de creo. Oralia 13: 7–38.
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2012) Towards a comprehensive view of variation in language: The absolute variable. Language and Communication 32: 80–94. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2011.07.001
Aijón Oliva, M. A. and Serrano, M. J. (2013) Style in Syntax: Investigating Variation in Spanish Pronoun Subjects. Bern: Peter Lang. http://dx.doi.org/10.3726/978-3-0351-0448-6
Auer, P. (2007) (Ed.) Style and Social Identities. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Beaugrande, R. A. and Dressler, W. U. (1997) Introducción a la Lingüística del texto. Barcelona: Ariel.
Bell, A. (1999) Styling the other to define the self: a study in New Zealand identity making. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3: 523–41. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00094
Brannon, L. (2010) Gender: Psychological Perspectives. Boston: Pearson Education.
Bucholtz, M. (2011) Why be normal? Language and identity practices in a community of nerd girls. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 224–35.
Bucholtz, M. and Hall, K. (1995) Introduction: 20 years after Language and Woman’s Place. In M. Bucholtz and K. Hall (eds) Gender Articulated: Language and the Socially Constructed Self 1–24. New York: Routledge.
Cameron, D. (2011) Performing gender identity: young men’s talk and the construction of the heterosexual masculinity. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 250–62.
Cameron, R. (1997) Accessibility theory in a variable syntax of Spanish. Journal of Pragmatics 28: 29–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0378-2166(96)00074-4
Chambers, J. K. (2003) Sociolinguistic Theory. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Cheshire, J. (1982) Linguistic variation as social function. In S. Romaine (ed.) Sociolinguistic Variation in Speech Communities 153–75. London: Arnold.
Coates, J. (2003) Men Talk. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470755617
Coates, J. (2011) Gossip revisited: language in all-female groups. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 199–223.
Coates, J. and Pichler, P. (2011) Language and Gender: A Reader. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Coupland, N. (2007) Style: Language Variation and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511755064
Duszak, A. (2002) (Ed.) Us and Others. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Eckert, P. (1989) The whole woman: sex and gender differences in variation. Language Variation and Change 1: 245–67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S095439450000017X
Eckert, P. (2000) Linguistic Variation as Social Practice. Oxford: Blackwell.
Eckert, P. and McConnell-Ginet, S. (1999) New generalizations and explanations of language gender research. Language in Society 28 (2): 185–201. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404599002031
Edelsky, C. (1981) Who’s got the floor? Language in Society 10: 383–421. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S004740450000885X
Edwards, J. (2009) Language and Identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511809842
Erickson, F. (2004) Talk and Social Theory. Oxford: Polity Press.
Gauntlett, D. (2008) Media, Gender and Identity. London: Routledge.
Germon, J. (2009) Gender: A Genealogy of an Idea. London: Palgrave. http://dx.doi.org/10.1057/9780230101814
Goldberg, A. E. (1995) Constructions: A Construction-Grammar Approach to Argument Structure. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Gordon, C. (2011) Conversation and interaction. In R. Mesthrie (ed.) The Cambridge Handbook of Sociolinguistics 108–21. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511997068.011
Guy, G. et al. (1986) An intonational change in progress in Australian English. Language in Society 15: 23–52. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500011635
Hall, K. (2011) Boy’s Talk: Hindi, moustaches and masculinity. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 384–400.
Henley, N. M. and Kramarae, C. (1994) Gender, power, and miscommunication. In C. Roman, S. Juhasz and C. Miller (eds) The Women and Language Debate: A Sourcebook 383–406. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.
Hernanz Carbó, M. L. (1990) En torno a los sujetos arbitrarios: la segunda persona del singular. In V. Demonte and B. Garza Cuarón (eds) Estudios de lingüística de España y México 151–78. Mexico DF: El Colegio de México.
Hirschman, L. (1994) Female-male differences in conversational interaction. Language in Society 23: 427–42. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500018054
Holmes, J. (2006a) Gendered Talk at Work. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9780470754863
Holmes, J. (2006b) Workplace narratives, professional identity and relational practice. In A. de Fina, D. Schiffrin and M. Bamberg (eds) Discourse and Identity 166–87. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584459.009
Holmes, J. and Schnurr, S. (2006) Doing femininity’ at work: More than just relational practice. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(1): 31–51. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-6441.2006.00316.x
Hopper, P. J. and Traugott, E. (2003) Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139165525
Jaspers, J., Östman, J.-O. and Verschueren, J. (2010) (Eds.) Society and Language Use. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Johnstone, B. (1996) The Linguistic Individual: Self-Expression in Language and Linguistics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Johnstone, B., Ferrara, K. and Bean, J. M. (1992) Gender, politeness, and discourse management in same-sex and cross-sex opinion-poll interviews. Journal of Pragmatics 18: 145–70. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/0378-2166(92)90082-M
Kendall, S. and Tannen, D. (1997) Gender and language in the workplace. In R. Wodak (ed.) Gender and Discourse 81–105. London: Sage.
Labov, W. (1966) The Social Stratification of English in New York City. Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. http://dx.doi.org/10.4135/9781446250204.n5
Lakoff, R. T. (2006) Identity à la carte: you are what you eat. In A. de Fina, D. Schiffrin and M. Bamberg (eds) Discourse and Identity 142–65. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584459.008
Langacker, R. W. (1994) The limits of continuity: discreteness in cognitive semantics. In C. Fuch and B. Victorri (eds) Continuity in Linguistic Semantics 9–20. Amsterdam: Benjamins. http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/lis.19.03lan
Langacker, R. W. (2009) Investigations in Cognitive Grammar. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9783110214369
Macaulay, R. K. S. (2009) Quantitative Methods in Sociolinguistics. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Maltz, D. N. and Borker, R. A. (2011) A cultural approach to male-female miscommunication. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 487–502.
Mühlhäusler, P. and Jarré, R. (1990) Pronouns and People. Malden, MA: Basil Blackwell.
Nichols, P. (2011) Black Women in the rural south: Conservative and innovative. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 49–66.
Rivas, J. (2008) La posición del sujeto en las construcciones monoactanciales del español: Una aproximación funcional. Hispania 91: 897–912.
Schilling, N. (2013) Sociolinguistic Fieldwork. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511980541
Serrano, M. J. (2011) Sociolingüística. Barcelona: Ediciones del Serbal.
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2011) Syntactic variation and communicative style. Language Sciences 33: 138–53. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.langsci.2010.08.008
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2012) Cuando tú eres yo: la inespecificidad referencial de tú como objetivación del discurso. Nueva Revista de Filología Hispánica 60(2): 541–63.
Serrano, M. J. and Aijón Oliva, M. A. (2013) Seguimos con la actualidad … The omission of nosotros ‘we’ across Spanish media genres. Discourse and Communication 7(2): 409–33. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1750481313494437
Silva-Corvalán, C. (2001) Sociolingüística y pragmática del español. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Swann, J. (2011) Yes, but is it gender? In Coates and Pichler (2011): 551–68.
Talbot, M. (2010) Language and Gender. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
Trudgill, P. (1974) The Social Differentiation of English in Norwich. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
West, C. and Zimmerman, D. H. (2011) Women’s place in everyday talk: reflections on parent–child interaction. In Coates and Pichler (2011): 143–52.
Published
2016-07-15
Issue
Section
Articles
How to Cite
Oliva, M. A. A., & Serrano, M. J. (2016). A matter of style: gender and subject variation in Spanish. Gender and Language, 10(2), 240-269. https://doi.org/10.1558/genl.v10i2.18325
