FACULTY OF EDUCATION AND BUSINESS STUDIES Department of Humanities Gender differences in the use of modal adverbs as hedges Reyyan Ayhan 2020 Student thesis, Bachelor degree, 15 HE English Upper Secondary Teacher Education Programme English 61-90 HE Supervisor: Henrik Kaatari Examiner: Kavita Thomas Table of contents 1 Introduction ..................................................................................................... 2 1.1 Aim and research questions ......................................................................................... 3 2 Theoretical Background .................................................................................. 3 2.1 Language and gender ................................................................................................... 3 2.1.1 Women’s language and politeness ....................................................................... 4 2.2 Grammatical background ............................................................................................ 8 2.2.1 Definition of hedges ............................................................................................. 8 2.2.2 Modality and modal adverbs ................................................................................ 9 2.2.2.1 Categorisation of modal adverbs .................................................................... 11 2.2.2.2 Placement of modal adverbs ........................................................................... 12 3 Material and method ...................................................................................... 13 3.1 Material ...................................................................................................................... 13 3.2 Method ....................................................................................................................... 14 3.3 Validity and reliability ............................................................................................... 14 4 Results ............................................................................................................ 15 4.1 Frequency across gender ........................................................................................... 15 5 Discussion ...................................................................................................... 20 5.1 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 21 References ............................................................................................................ 22 1 Abstract The aim of this essay is to investigate the claims made by Robin Lakoff regarding women’s language, where she claims that women use hedges more than men. The aim of this essay is to investigate whether this statement is true. To put it differently, this essay aims to look at gender differences in the use of modal adverbs as hedges. As a method, a frequency analysis has been conducted, where data from the British National Corpus 2014 (BNC2014) has been used. Since hedging involves various linguistic forms, this essay focuses on the modal adverbs presented by Huddleston and Pullum. The results show that women do use more hedges than men. Regardless, there are not any major dissimilarities across genders. Although there were some findings that supported Lakoff’s claims, there were also some that contradicted her claims. Key words: hedges, politeness, modality, modal adverbs, gender, women’s language 2 1 Introduction The way one expresses oneself through language is crucial to be able to communicate with other people. According to Coates, various studies show that men and women have communicative skills that vary from each other and that they use language differently (2016: 86). For instance, one stereotype is that women talk more compared to men and use overall polite language (Coates 2016: 86). Men, on the other hand, show their dominance and power through their language use (Coates 2016: 6). Differences in how men and women utilize language have been of interest for many researchers throughout the years. One linguist who has studied gender differences in linguistic behaviour is Robin Lakoff. Her book Language and Woman’s Place (1973) has been used as groundwork for many studies on this topic. Her controversial claims have been criticised a lot and also influenced a lot of projects where Lakoff’s statements have either been confirmed or refuted (Holmes 1990: 185). Lakoff states, for example, that women use more polite language than men (Lakoff 1973: 56). Moreover, they use a language in which “strong expression of feeling is avoided” whereas “expression of uncertainty is favoured” (Lakoff 1973: 45). This linguistic behaviour is a part of, so-called, ‘women’s language’ and it exists because society conditions women to express themselves as powerless and marginalised, according to Lakoff (1973: 45). One way of showing politeness and uncertainty is through the use of hedges (Holmes 2013: 64). Hedges are linguistic forms used to show “certainty or uncertainty” in statements (Coates 2016: 88), as well as showing politeness (Holmes 2013: 64). According to Lakoff, hedging is part of women’s language (Holmes 1990: 185). One way of hedging is by using modal adverbs, which this study will focus on. A modal adverb is a lexical marker that is used to assert modality, that is, to illustrate different levels of certainty and uncertainty (Suzuki & Fujiwara 2017: 827). For example, the modal adverbs obviously and possibly indicate two different levels of certainty, with the former expressing certainty and the latter expressing uncertainty (Suzuki & Fujiwara 2017: 829). Lakoff claims that hedges are mainly used by women because they are “socialised to believe that asserting themselves strongly isn’t nice or ladylike, or even feminine” (Lakoff 1975: 54). This indicates that even if women are certain about a fact expressed in a statement, they still use hedges to refrain from behaving in a way that goes against feminine traits (Holmes 1990: 185). Thus, this essay will look at gender differences in the use of modal adverbs as hedges in terms of their frequency across gender. 3 1.1 Aim and research questions Based on Robin Lakoff’s claims (that are further presented in section 2), the author hypothesises that women use more hedges than men and they specifically use hedges that express uncertainty to refrain from asserting oneself strongly. Therefore, the author wants to test whether her statements hold by analysing a selection of modal adverbs used as hedges. In other words, the aim of this study is to look at the gender differences in the use of modal adverbs as hedges. More specifically, it will investigate whether men or women use hedges more. The following research question will be answered in this project: • Are there any frequency differences across gender in the use of modal adverbs as hedges in conversation? 2 Theoretical Background This section will present previous studies regarding the topic of the essay and give definitions of the key concepts that are relevant to this project. It is divided into two main subsections; the first subsection focuses on language and gender, and the second subsection contains a grammatical background on hedges and modal adverbs. 2.1 Language and gender In Language and Woman’s Place (1973), Robin Lakoff discusses the association between gender and language, where she bases her claims on her own observations as well as gender stereotypes and the English language that exists in American society. She points out how society establishes women to being marginalized, which also affects the language they use, and the language used towards women (Lakoff 1973: 45). Lakoff explains that girls get educated at an early age to use a language that is appropriate for females whereas boys do not (Lakoff 1973: 47). She further remarks that women have a significant role during a child’s first language acquisition around the early years of their upbringing, which leads to children learning so-called ‘women’s language’ (Lakoff 1973: 47-48). However, as children develop their language knowledge and communication skills, they acquire different ways of speaking. Girls continue to use women’s language, whereas boys adopt a new way of speaking that is described as “rough talk”, which differs from women’s language (Lakoff 1973: 47-48). As a 4 consequence, a woman gets criticised and ridiculed if she talks in a way that is considered “unfeminine” (Lakoff 1973: 47-48). Thus, the expectations put on women in terms of language use leads to them not being able to “speak precisely or to express herself forcefully” as well as being unable to “take part in a serious discussion” (Lakoff 1973: 48). According to Lakoff, this results in women not being taken seriously later in life because “this special style of speech will later be an excuse others use to keep her in a demeaning position” (Lakoff 1973: 47). She further explains that this creates problems in society since “women are systematically denied access to power, on the grounds that they are not capable of holding it as demonstrated by their linguistic behavior along with other aspects of their behavior” (Lakoff 1973: 48). Moreover, men do not use women’s language in order not to risk harming “his reputation” since women’s language is seen as inferior to men’s language (Lakoff 1973: 52). Holmes argues that because women are viewed as subordinate to men, their language is constructed in a way that