GENDER BIAS A term in sociology and women's studies for bias associated with sexual roles in society and gender terms in LANGUAGE. It extends the grammatical term GENDER to cover language-related differences in the behaviour of women and men and in perceptions of that behaviour. Such perceptions are expressed through casual stereotyping, as in: ‘Well, she's supposed to be back by now but she's probably stopped off somewhere to gossip. You know how women are.’ There are many such generalizations: for example, that the tone of women's voices is or should be soft and feminine, while men's tones are or should be deep and masculine; that in female gatherings (hen parties), voices are shrill or cackling; that women's intonation is often (like that of children) whining or nagging. In contrast, many men are said to sound gruff, speak roughly, and have hard, even harsh voices, and at times bark out commands.

Views of gender and language

Women and men have been stereotyped as using language in the following ways, among others: (1) Women tend to use such words as adorable, cute, lovely, sweet in describing people and objects and such vocatives as my dear, darling, sweetie. (2) Men tend to be more direct, less inclined to show their feelings, and more likely ‘to call a spade a spade’. Tradition also requires them to be laconic: men of few words; the strong, silent type. (3) Women have often engaged in an ‘overflow’ of adjectives and adverbs, found in an extreme form in the usage of society women between the world wars: My dear, it's just too simply wonderful to see you! (4) Women are often eager to talk about feelings and emotions in a way thought of as ‘gushing’, while many men are almost tongue-tied in such matters. (5) Women frequently use so, such, quite: as intensifiers (It's been so nice to see you again, and such a pleasure to meet the children—I'm really quite thrilled), or as qualifiers (Well, he's so, you know, so helpful, and it's such a shame he can't be here—I'm well, quite upset about it). (6) Women are considered to be more polite, using phrases such as could you please, and more concerned about ‘correct’ and ‘proper’ grammar and pronunciation. (7) In conversations, women are said to be by turn insecure and hedging (as shown by tags such as do you? or isn't it?, and qualifiers such as I think) and overbearing, talking and interrupting more than men do. (8) Women's ‘delicate sensibilities’, especially in the middle classes, have traditionally kept them from using obscene or blasphemous language, and restricted its use by men in their presence. (9) Women are more likely to use polite euphemisms for topics such as death and sex.(10) Men typically talk about ‘important’, ‘worldly’ topics such as politics, sports, and war, whereas women's talk is ‘trivial’ and usually ‘gossip’.

A masculine norm

There appears to be some basis in fact for some of these assumptions, but sorting out fact from unsupported STEREOTYPE is complex and much work remains to be done in this area. Overall, such stereotypes associated with women's speech tend to be viewed negatively even by many women. This generally negative judgement of women's styles of speech appears to be linked to lower social status in relation to men, but it is a circular question whether lower status leads to negative opinions or certain speech characteristics lead to lower status. For example, although behaviour such as a high rate of tag questions such as isn't it? may be more typical of women than men, it is also common among lower-status men speaking to higher-status men. Indeed, much language that is currently characterized as female may be more general, and may represent the language that any lowerstatus person might use in the circumstances.

One problem in assessing gender-linked speech patterns is that men's speech is typically taken as the norm against which women's speech is measured; alternatively, women's speech is ignored. For example, the filters on older traditional spectrographs, used to analyse physical properties of speech such as pitch, were based on male voice ranges; consequently, women's average higher-pitched voices (a result of generally smaller vocal cords) could not be clearly displayed and were not studied by most researchers. Related to gender-linked speech patterns is a variety of speech sometimes used for identification and communication by some homosexual men. It is characterized in part by higher pitch, elongation of words, increased nasality, and specialized vocabulary, such as queen (any male homosexual, or one considered ‘flamboyant’ or ‘effeminate’) and butch (stereotypically or exaggeratedly masculine in appearance or behaviour), and the use of female pronouns to refer to men.

Social factors

Recent studies suggest that in many situations, women seem to be more concerned than men about using educated language as a means of social mobility. The fact that so many teachers of especially younger children are women may also make their role as ‘language correctors’ more salient. This factor varies greatly with location, social class, and level of education: for example, many more British working-class men than women seem to use non-standard language as a badge of identity. Sometimes stereotyped behaviour appears to be gender-linked in terms of frequency, but other interpretations of its significance are possible: for example, tag questions such as isn't it? may indicate hesitancy, insecurity, or deference, but could also encourage conversation, in a non-aggressive way inviting the listener to respond. Such a strategy might be linked to women's greater use of minimal responses, such as mmhm, which indicate active listening, encouragement, or agreement. Both strategies can be characterized by hostile men as ‘nagging’ or ‘pushing’, if they are interpreted as inappropriate insertions in their conversation turn. Men's typically louder voices, less frequent uses of minimal responses, and greater use of obscenities can be seen as means of manipulating and dominating conversations. See FEMINISM, GENERIC PRONOUN, INCLUSIVE LANGUAGE, SEXISM.