Deborah Tannen's Article: The Power Of Talk Who Gets Heard And Why?

COMM 105-003
Assignment #2 – Linguistic Preferences and Gender Differences

For any career, communication is an integral component to ensuring professional success. Deborah Tannen’s article “The Power of Talk – Who Gets Heard and Why” explores the idea that the differing linguistic styles of men and women affect their performances in the workplace. Since 1974, Tannen has researched the influence of linguistic preferences on human relationships and conversations, observing significant differences between the styles of young girls and boys that prove to be reflected in their later professional lives. Article Summary

Communication, as a social behaviour, is shaped differently for every individual based on their social and cultural experiences. People possess varying linguistic preferences from directness to word choice that make it hard to accurately decipher what another may be trying to convey. Through her studies, Tannen has observed that boys and girls may develop different linguistic styles, as children generally interact with others of the same sex. Her research has shown that “girls tend to learn conversational rituals that focus on the rapport dimension of relationships whereas boys tend to learn rituals that focus on the status dimension” (1995, p.140).

Tannen’s studies showed that young girls usually adopt

Women in professional careers tend to avoid putting others in one-down positions and as they have grown up doing, are likely to downplay their certainty. Their conversational rituals include “apologizing, mitigating criticism with praises, [and] exchanging compliments,” making them seem less capable (Tannen, 1995, p.144). Contrarily, men tend to be “sensitive to the power dynamics of interaction,” speaking in ways to position themselves above others (Tannen, 1995, p.141). Mimicking their childhood-learned behaviours, they prefer to emphasize their strengths and take credit where