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How Men And Women Use Language Differently Essay

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Explain how men and woman use language differently. In order to understand how men and women use language differently, we must first understand the stereotypes in which society have created. As speakers of the English language, we are subject to grouping individuals based on characteristics and stereotypes made by society. Gender is one of those that is subject to the scrutiny of society. Researchers such as Lakoff and Wardhaugh have expressed the idea that men and woman use language differently.
This can be demonstrated by the children’s well-known nursery rhyme ‘what are boys made off?’ which gives way to the notion that gender is constructed by language and societal norms is. The rhyme plays on the stereotypes that people believe boys and girls fit into. “What are boys made of? Frogs and snails and puppy dog tails What are girls made of? Sugar and spice and all things nice”
(Coltrane and Adams 2008:169) On closer inspection, the phrase holds the idea that boys will play outside in the wilderness. This playing on the idea that men occupy a social space outside the domain of the household. Whereas ‘sugar and spice and all things nice’ connotes the idea that girls are sweet. The words ‘sugar and spice’ may hint at the idea that girls have specific roles to play such as cooking and keeping things ‘nice’. It may also play on the idea of ingredients in a jar and the preservation of those ingredients. Thus leading to the notion that women are precious and need to be

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