Language and gender

• Baker (2010)


  Found that since 1961 there has been a marked decrease in male pronouns and a marked increase in female ones; also looked at titles Mrs/Miss/Ms/Mr and found that over time these are dying out and suggests that they could fall out of use within thirty years
• Binary


  Relating to, composed of, or involving two things; gender is traditionally seen as a binary concept; more recently views on gender as a spectrum have begun to emerge
• Cameron: '"The idea that men and women [... use language in very different ways and for very different reasons is one of the great myths of our time."'
• Cameron


  • Associated with the DYNAMIC model; criticises the idea that there are innate language differences and contests that this is a myth that we perpetuate; she says that we conduct ourselves in line with socialised expectations of our gender; refutes the idea that it is our biology that dictates our language use and instead suggests that we construct and perform gendered identities
• Won-standard)


  Looked specifically at certain grammatical variations in the speech of young children; considered the frequency of: non-standard '—s', non-standard 'has', non-standard 'was', multiple negation, non-standard 'never', non-standard 'what', non-standard 'do', non-standard 'come', use of ain't
• Cheshire (1982)


  • Found that boys used the non-standard forms more frequently than girls did; concluded that "[...] variation is governed by both social and linguistic factors. In boys' speech, variation is governed by norms that are central to the vernacular culture and are transmitted through the peer group. Variation in girls' speech appears to be a more personal process, and less rigidly controlled by vernacular norms."
• Coates (1989)


  • Associated with the DIFFERENCE model; argued that girls and boys then to belong to same-sex friendship groups growing up and subsequently develop different styles of speaking; theorises that female language is cooperative in single-sex conversations; views tag questions and modality as making women's talk support and cooperative
• Danish Toys 'R' Us (2013) made a clear attempt to challenge gender stereotypes, displaying children of both genders playing with a variety of ordinarily stereotyped toys