Lavender linguistics is a branch of linguistic studies that analyses speech in gay communities. One of the most used slangs among gay speech was Polari. Polari was prominent in the 1950’s and 1960’s and was principally used by gay men. These men used Polari to communicate among themselves and exclude heterosexual people from their conversations in a time that homosexuality was illegal. In 2010, the World Oral Literature Project labelled Polari as an endangered language. However, some linguists argue that Polari cannot be labelled a language, as it has not constructed its own grammar nor did it construct a comprehensive vocabulary. Although, people who heard fluently spoken Polari often thought it was a foreign language. To clarify the position of Polari an analysis will be given on the origins of Polari, its purpose, its decline in popularity, and whether there is a revival of Polari.
“The homosexual subculture of the Eighteenth Century mixed with the gypsies, tramps & thieves of popular song to produce a rich cross-fertilisation of customs, phrases and traditions” (Scott, 2013). This ‘cross-fertilisation’ had for effect that the gay community based Polari on a number of slangs from various stigmatized peoples. One of the slangs is ‘Cant’ and it was used by thieves in Great Britain during the Elizabethan era. Also, Polari is heavily based on the Mediterranean Lingua Franca, a pidgin that enabled travellers, merchants and sailors to communicate. It is probable that the gay sailor men (sea-queens) brought the Lingua Franca to the British ports. Chesney suggests, as quoted in Hancock’s Language in the British Isle page 395, that the link between homosexuality and sailors can be made as it is in the seaports that most male prostit...
... middle of paper ...
...la Among Languages." Web log post. View From A Fridge. 9 July 2013. Web. 16 Nov. 2013. .
Taylor, Heather. Polari: A Sociohistorical Study of the Life and Decline of a Secret Language. 2007. Web. 9 Nov. 2013. .
"The One Show." The One Show. BBC. N.d. Youtube, 17 Jan. 2010. Web. .
United Kingdom. Ministry of Justice. National Archives. Sexual Offences Act. N.p.: n.p., 1967. Sexual Offences Act 1967. Web. 17 Nov. 2013. .
William L. Leap PhD & Denis M. Provencher PhD (2011) Language Matters: An Introduction, Journal of Homosexuality, 58:6-7, 709-718. Web. 9 Nov. 2013 .
There are two forms of languages; public and private. The "private" language only spoken with family and close intimate relationships. The "public" language used in society, work, and school. Both of these help form two identities, that help us connect and communicate with one another. In the essay “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan and also in the article “Speech Communities” by Paul Roberts ,we will see how both private and public language demonstrate how we view, and grow from each language.
masculinity in men) indexes heterosexuality, while non-normative behavior (i.e. effeminacy in men) indexes homosexuality.” This states that the perception of heteronormative speech essentially goes undetected and sounds more natural or standard in conversation. n this study we aim to understand the functions of code-switching as it pertains to gay speech. One of the many reasons people code-switch is to fit so they are accepted in any social situation. Whether it’s amongst friends, or co-workers, one tends to adapt to their surroundings via linguistic variables such as meticulously articulated phonemes, and prescriptive or descriptive linguistic formalities. Previous research has shown that gay speech is self-managed, and gay men tend to code switch depending on context (CITE). Our research is aimed to understand the functions of code switching and how men who identify as gay, bisexual, and transgender change their speech depending on their environment. While complex, our goal is to address how race and region affects vocabulary and voice production. Our intent is to determine how and why the ability to hide (or project) one’s sexuality or gender identity and conform or reject dominant social lexical norms, and how it is replicated depending on what identity the speaker is trying to
Another difficulty cultures deal with is language and the way people speak. In some cases, people struggle to belong by making changes in the way they speak the English language just to be assimilated. They attempt to use words and letters, as well as body language that fit in the norm; all in an attempt to denounce their original intonation and style of pronunciation. One ...
It’s well known that men and women use language differently to perform their genders based on societal influences, but how does this gender performativity extend to people who feel less pressure to conform to societal gender expectations, such as LGBTQ+ individuals? While heterosexual men and women are expected to perform their gender in “masculine” and “feminine” ways, respectively, non-heterosexual people have more freedom in terms of gender performance: gay men can be effeminate and lesbians can be butch. How does this translate to language use? People will often say that a man “sounds gay” or has a “gay lisp,” but it’s unclear if there’s any validity to these claims. Various studies have examined whether homosexual individuals use language
The origins of gendered word and phrases are a debated topic. To clarify, a word that has a gendered meaning is an utterance that refers to a particular gender or is categorized to a particular gender. While some people believe that the interpretation of the listener is responsible for deriving the gendered meanings of words, others believe that the meanings of gendered adjectives and phrases originate from speaker intent. I believe, however, the context in which a word is used, how it is presented, and the context with which it is interpreted, affect its meaning. This “context” also includes the cultural background of both the speaker and the interpreter. From my perspective, gendered words gain their meanings from various sources, which include both the intentions of the speaker and the interpretations of the hearer.
Nilsen began this study of the dictionary not with the intention of prescribing language change but simply to see what the language would reveal about sexism to her. Sexism is not something that existing independently in American English or in the particular dictionary that she happened to read. Rather it exists in people's minds.
Crawford, James. “A nation divided by one language.” Guardian.co.uk. 8 Mar 2001. Web. 11 October 2014
The article The Strange Persistence of First Languages by Julie Sedivy was an intriguing and eye-opening piece of writing to read. The concepts she brought to life through her explicit writing revealed many things I had never heard of before. The further I read, the more I wanted to know and the deeper my interest became. As a monolingual, this article was insightful, captivating and ultimately provided me with a new perspective on language.
Cheech Marin’s film, Born in East L.A., spotlights many key issues brought upon mainly by immigration. This comedic production hits the hearts to many because while it may be humorous, it is also a reality to hundreds of thousands of people worldwide and so it hits close to home to many. Immigration is the main topic of this motion picture, but I want to focus on one subdivision of it only; language. The linguistic barriers in between a border is evident in the movie and especially a reality in our world.
The bestselling self-help books, such as "Men are from mars, women are from Venus" explain to their readers that there are fundamental differences between men and women, which determine the contrast in how both sexes speak. The author, John Gray uses the metaphor of the two planets and suggests that when men and women were united on Earth, they all suffered from 'selective amnesia'. As a consequence, "both the Martians and Venusians forgot that they were from different planets and were supposed to be different" , which resulted in gender conflict deriving from misunderstanding of intentions. Other authors of popular self-help books prefer less metaphorical theories and explain gender differences in language through evolution and biological characteristics of the sexes. However, modern sociolinguistics attempt to undermine these radical statements by approaching the question analytically drawing on evidence from the fields of anthropology, discourse analysis, dialectology, ethnography and social psychology to investigate whether women's and men's communication differs to the extent described in psychology books and what are the factors that could contribute to the development of what is known to be sex-preferential language patterns . From the linguistic point of view, It could be argued that the question itself imposes pre-conceptions of the gendered talk as it assumes that speakers are divided in two groups called "women" and "men"' and that because those groups unarguably differ, the language they use is shaped by their sex characteristics. In exploring the question whether women and men speak differently, it is necessary to focus on considering the notion of the andocentric approach to gender, the concept of 'acquiring' ...
Woolard, Kathryn A. “ Language Variation and Cultural Hegemony: Toward an Integration of Sociolinguistic and Social Theory.” American Ethnologist. Vol. 12, No. 4 (November 1985), pp. 738-748. 31 May 2010. Print.
Sexism in language takes many forms, though theses may be reduced to 3 types: language ignores, it defines and it deprecates women. Women and girls are hurt both physically and materially by it. Everyda...
...rles D. Fennig(eds). 2014. Ethnology: Languages of the world, Seventeenth edition. http://www.ethnologue.com/endangered-languages . Downloaded on the 4 May 2014
What language we use, how we use it, and why we use it are all essential in others perceptions of us. If a man’s first comment to somebody is “Hey Baby, how you doing?” with a gloating tone and boastful...
The book An Intorduction of Sociolinguistics is an outstanding introductary book in the field of sociolinguistics. It encompasses a wide range of language issues. In chapter 13, Wardhaugh provides a good insight to the relationship between language and gender. He explains gender differences of language-in-use with concise examples. Wardhaugh riases questions about sexist language and guides readers to look closer at how people use language differently because of their own gender in daily life. According to the Whorfian hypothesis, which indicates that the way people use language reflects their thoughts, different genders adapt different communication strategies.