Peter Trudgill and Robin Lakoff

These two researchers look into language and gender and what they discovered.

Peter Trudgill, 1970's

Trudgill wanted to find out how people's ways of speaking varied and how so used Norwich speech as an example. One of the variables he looked at was the gerund ending of "ing" in words like "walking" and "running" and he found in Norwich that they missed this out on the end of words like "walking" to say "walkin" making it sound like there was an "n" on the end of the sentence. He also found that it wasn't just unique for Norwich as he says:

"Nearly everywhere in the Eng-speaking world we find this alternation between higher-class/formal ng and lower class/informal n. It goes back to the fact that in Old English (and later) there were two forms, a gerund ending in -ing (walking is good for you) and a present participle ending in -end (he was walking). The -end form was the ancestor of -n' and -ing (obviously) of -ing. "

The two have been merged and sorted into two terms in forms of prestige and "correctives" has happened in the last 300 years. Upper class Edwardian said words like "huntin", "finshin" and "shootin" which shows just how recent it is.

His study discovered:

1. In all social classes, the more careful the speech, the more likely people were to say walking rather than walkin'. 2. The proportion of walkin' type forms was higher in lower social classes. 3. The nonstandard -in' forms occurred much more often in men's speech than in women's, and this was true for all social classes. 4. When women were questioned about what they thought they were saying, they tended to say they used the standard -ing forms more often than they really did. 5. When men were questioned about what they thought they were saying, they tended to say they used the nonstandard -in' forms more often than they really did.

Robin Lakoff, 1975 

Lakoff did a study into language and specifically women's. She wrote a book called "Language and Women's Place" that looked at the woman's language is often now common place.Her work looks at attention to class, power, and social justice in addition to gender.








Lakoff says that women's speech can be distinguished from men in a number of ways:

1. Hedges: Phrases like "sort of", "kind of", "it seems like"
2. Empty adjectives: "divine", "adorable", "gorgeous"
3. Super-polite forms: "Would you mind..." "...if it’s not too much to ask" "Is it o.k if...?"
4. Apologise more: "I'm sorry, but I think that..."
5. Speak less frequently
6. Avoid coarse language or expletives
7. Tag questions "You don't mind eating this, do you?".
8. Hyper-correct grammar and pronunciation: Use of prestige grammar and clear articulation
9. Indirect requests: "Wow, I'm so thirsty." – really asking for a drink
10. Speak in italics: Use tone to emphasis certain words, e.g., "so", "very", "quite"

She also developed the idea of the "politeness principle", which has three maxims that are usually followed in interaction, which we look at also in language and power. These are: Don't impose, give the receiver options, and make the receiver feel good. If any of these are not used, then it called "flouting the maxims" and she says that you need these follow them to have a good interaction.