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Presentations of TEaGIRL research | |
Neutralising person and the personing of neutral inclusivity: tracing morphological change.Annual Conference of the Australian Linguistics Society, Monash University, Melbourne, September, 2005.Jo Winter and Anne PauwelsThe University of Western Australia.AbstractFeminist linguistic reforms are part of planned social language change seeking to ensure inclusivity and equality in the linguistic representation of women and men. Gender-neutralisation has been promoted as the preferred strategy for gender-inclusive representations in English. The strategy has included options such as lexical replacement, e.g., flight attendant instead of hostess; neologisms such as firefighter for fireman and morphological compounding with zero morphs chairØ and compounds with –person. Interestingly, some -person compounds have emerged into the gender-inclusive language landscape that were not promoted or supported as part of feminist language planning/guidelines e.g., waitperson. Our discussion focuses on the gender-neutral morphological compounding evident in a number of occupational nouns. Drawing upon on-line survey data (www.teagirl.arts.uwa.edu.au) we trace the spread and diffusion of –person compounds through lexical ‘fields’ and the (non-) uptake patterns for self-identified (non-)users of gender-inclusive language. Our findings reveal that degrees of social-gender loading and occupational prestige interact with positions about gender-inclusivity in confounding ways. Gender-neutralisation through the adoption of –person compounds faces challenges from so-called PC debates about linguistic prescriptivism and the availability of zero morph compounding through the creation of neologisms, e.g., chair. | |
MISSING ME AND MSING THE OTHER: COURTESY TITLES FOR WOMEN IN ENGLISHESNational Congress of The Applied Linguistics Association of Australia, Melbourne University, September 2005Jo Winter & Anne Pauwels, The University of Western AustraliaAbstractThe introduction and spread of Ms as the courtesy address title for women is a cornerstone of feminist linguistic planning for English. Its introduction aimed to eradicate the discriminatory inequity in the address system that exposed women through their (non)marital relationship with men. Ms is viewed as a replacement for Mrs and Miss. The understanding, use and impact of the courtesy title are fairly well documented, particularly for Englishes of Australia (e.g., Pauwels 1987, 1998, 2001, 2003); US and Britain (Romaine 2001) and New Zealand (Holmes 2001). Trends from these locales have shown almost universal awareness of the form, an increased uptake of the courtesy title over time, especially by professional women and increasing understanding of its promoted meaning, i.e., a courtesy title for women. We have less knowledge of the form’s spread, impact and use by speakers for whom English is not the dominant language but forms part of their linguistic repertoire. Graddol (1997) argues that English-speaking bilinguals will outnumber first language speakers and ‘increasingly will decide the global future of the language’ (p.10). Such contexts of English – second/third/foreign – usage loosely align with locales Kachru (1997) identified as ‘expanding circles’ and to some extent many of the ‘outer-circle’ Englishes, e.g. Hong Kong. In our presentation we explore the practices of courtesy title use for women for English-speaking bi-/multilinguals. We draw upon on-line survey data (www.teagirl.arts.uwa.edu.au) to probe respondents’ strategies for addressing unknown women as well as women’s use of courtesy titles for themselves. Our findings show that Ms use maps with locale and regional conditions associated with the status and function of English. Our mapping reveals an unexpected pattern of diffusion with implications for planned social language change and language policy. In relation to Ms the implementation of feminist linguistic policy does not cohere with a pattern of inner ‘ outer ‘ expanding ‘circles’ or ‘first language’ ‘ ….. ‘’foreign language speaker spread. | |
Occupying chairs and taking up speaking positions: Gender-inclusive language in public contexts.Presentation in Linguistics Public Seminar Series @ The School of Languages, Cultures and LinguisticsMarch 2005Monash University | |
MEN STAYING AT HOME LOOKING AFTER THEIR CHILDREN: FEMINIST LINGUISTIC REFORM AND SOCIAL CHANGE.Presentation to The Department of Linguistics and Applied Linguistics Seminars @ The School of Languages | |
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Presentation to the Congress of the International Federation of University Women. August, Perth 2004
Powerpoint presentation [download] | |
Paper presented in Berlin 2004
GenderKompetenz -Zentrum | |
Paper presented @ Applied Linguistics Association of Australia Congress 2003Gender inclusive language reform in the English of Singapore and the Philippines | |
Paper: International Gender and Language Association [IGALA] 2004
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