Performing Gender Identity: Young Men’s Talk and the Construction of Heterosexual Masculinity

Deborah Cameron 1998Part IV - Same-Sex TalkLanguage and Gender: A Reader Ping-Hsuan Wang

Intro to SociolinguisticsNov. 18 (Week 11)

Outline•Introduction•Data & Method•The Antithesis of Man•Cooperation•Competition•Deconstructing Oppositions•Conclusion•Q&A/ Discussion

IntroductionGeneralizations about men’s talk:

Competitive

Hierarchically organized

Centers on impersonal topics

Exchange of information

Speech genres: joking, trading insults and sports statistics

Introduction

•“As active producers rather than passive reproducers of gendered behaviour, men and women may use their awareness of the gendered meanings that attach to particular ways of speaking and acting to produce a variety of effects (272).”

MEN WOMENCompetitiveReport talk

CooperativeRapport talk

Data & Method•Al, Bryan, Carl, Danny, and Ed•White, middle-class American

suburbanites, aged 21, same university, same social network

•Watching sports at home on TV

•Conversation analysis

The Antithesis of Man• Bryan: uh you know that really gay guy in our

Age of Revolution class who sits in front of us? He wore shorts again, by the way, it’s like 42 degrees out, he wore shorts again [laughter]

• Ed: [that guy] • Bryan: it’s like a speedo, he wears a speedo to

class (.) He’s got incredibly skinny legs you know=

• Ed: [it’s worse] =you know like those shorts women volleyball players wear? It’s like those (.) it’s like

The Antithesis of Man•Establishing shared views: categorizing

people as gay →participation framework (C. Goodwin

1986)•Resembling ‘women’s talk’•Gossip: “affirming the solidarity of an in-

group by constructing absent others as an out-group (276).”

Cooperation• Ed: he’s I mean he’s like a real artsy fartsy fag

he’s like (indeciph) he’s so gay he’s got this like really high voice and wire rim glasses and he sits next to the ugliest-ass bitch in the history of the world.

• Ed: [and• Bryan: [and they’re all hitting on her too, like

four• Ed: [I know it’s like four homos

hitting on her• Bryan: guys [hitting on her

Cooperation•Markers ‘like’ ‘you know’•Latching and simultaneous speech →joint production of discourse

(cooperation)

Competition•Ed & Bryan: dominant speakers•Al & Carl: fewer and shorter turns•Danny: variable•Ed introduced the topic, attempted to keep

‘ownership’•Danny interrupted, contradicted; began the

gossip•“even if the speakers… compete, they are

basically engaged in a collaborative and solidary enterprise (279).”

Competition•A different analysis:

→verbal duelling

•How do we decide? →the problem with ‘competitive’ vs. ‘cooperative’

Deconstructing Oppositions•“Conversation can and usually does contain both

cooperative and competitive elements (279).”

•Agreement, respect, and support→cooperation?

•Women’s talk

• “It is gender-stereotyping that causes us to miss or minimize the status-seeking element in women friends’ talk, and the connection-making dimension of men’s (280).”

Conclusion•‘performative gender work’•“Men and women do not live on different

planets, but are members of cultures in which a large amount of discourse about gender is constantly circulating (280).” →Gender Knot (Johnson 1997)

•Gender is a relational term•“In these speakers’ understanding of gender,

gay men, like women, provide a contrast group against whom masculinity can be defined (281).”

Conclusion•“It is impossible to ‘transcend’ ideology,

but it is not impossible for language and gender scholars to be reflexive about the cultural resources that have shaped their own understandings, as well as the understandings of the people whose language use they study (Cameron 2003:465, emphasis in original).”

Q&A/ Discussion•How might the results of analysis turn out

differently if we observe different data?•What if we use quantitative approach to

examine our conversation? What would be your focus?

•Think about all the ‘a-ha moments.’ What exactly do they reveal (ideologically)?

•Can we venture into ‘linguistic relativity’ in terms of gender? (Deutscher 2013: 209-232)

Thank you!