Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-xbtfd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-15T02:10:04.592Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Women's derogatory terms for men: That's right, “dirty” words*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Barbara Risch
Barbara Risch
Affiliation:
Department of English, University of Cincinnati
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Much of the research concerning “women's language” has focused on differences in pitch and intonation, expressions of uncertainty, and politeness and correctness of form; all predicated on the assumption that women are socially and linguistically conservative and therefore more likely to use standard or prestige forms. This is a study of the derogatory terms (“dirty” words) that women use to refer to men. The frequency and variance of response that results from the study calls into question the assumption that women are more prone to use standard forms of speech, and suggests that the standard/nonstandard distinction is more appropriately applied to the contrast between public versus private discourse than to that of the speech patterns of women versus the language use of men. (Women's language, linguistic taboos, response suppression, prestige forms, public and private discourse)

Type
Articles
Information
Language in Society , Volume 16 , Issue 3 , September 1987 , pp. 353 - 358
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Baroni, M. R., & D'Urso, V. (1984). Some experimental findings about the question of politeness and women's speech. Language in Society 13:67–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benyman, C. L. (1980). Attitudes toward male and female sex-appropriate and sex-inappropriate language. In Berryman, C. & Eman, V. (eds.), Communication, language, and sex. Rowley, Mass.: Newbury House. 195–216.Google Scholar
Crosby, P., & Nyquist, L. (1977). The female register: An empirical study of Lakoff's hypotheses. Language in Society 6:313–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dubois, B. L., & Crouch, I. (1975). The question of tag questions in women's speech: They really don't use more of them, do they? Language in Society 4:289–94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edelsky, C. (1979). Question intonation and sex roles. Language in Society 8:15–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lakoff, R. (1973). Language and woman's place. Language in Society 2:45–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maltz, D. N., & Barker, R. A. (1982). A culturel approach to male-female miscommunication. In Gumperz, J. (ed.), Language and social identity. New York: Cambridge University Press. 196–216.Google Scholar
Paivio, A., & Begg, I. (1981). Psychology of language. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Spender, D. (1980). Man made language. Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Thorne, B., & Henley, N. (1975). Language and sex: Dominance and difference. Rowley, Mass.: Newbury House.Google Scholar
Trudgill, P. (1972). Sex, covert prestige, and linguistic change in the urban British English of Norwich. Language in Society 1:179–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trudgill, P. (1974). Sociolinguistics: An introduction to language and society. New York: Penguin.Google Scholar
Zajonc, R. B. (1962). Response suppression in perceptual defense. Journal of Experimental Psychology 64:206–14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed