Evaluate the idea that spoken interactions between men and women are characterised by miscommunication [30 marks

Evaluate the idea that spoken interactions between men and women are characterised by miscommunication [30 marks]

The idea that men and women are characterised by miscommunication has been researched for many years. It is proven that men and women have physical differences obviously, however there may be some underlying differences which are difficult to uncover about the use of spoken language between the two genders. The topic of men and women using language differently is a highly controversial topic and it is the ideal research topic for many linguists to either, support, oppose or create a new idea completely.

One language theory that supports the main idea that men and women are different is the Deficit Model, Robin Lakoff. Lakoff provided a vision and a template for generations of further research, she suggested that women are more polite and have a poorer sense of humour than men. It was also proposed that men speak more than women. It was also suggested that specific linguistic and discoursive features marked the powerlessness of women within society and their subservient role to men. An example of these is tag questions, for example “this is nice, isn’t it?” and the use of hedges, “I’m not an expert but, you might want to restart your computer”. The use of a hedge is to lessen the impact of an utterance.

Lakoff’s theory is supported by the data in the table above. It is evident in the first column of the table that men do speak more than women, the average turns per meeting for women was 9.9 whereas  the male average turns per meeting was 24.7 which is a staggering difference of 14.8 turns on average.

A contradictory view point of the deficit theory is the work done by William O'Barr and Bowman Atkins in 1980. They analysed courtroom cases and witnesses' speech. The result that they found challenges Lakoff's view on women's language. In researching what they describe as 'powerless language' they show that linguistic patterns depend on the situation, specific authority or power, not gender. This could relate to the data in the table above as the men may be the higher authority within the meeting room and women lower, for example the men may be managers and the women staff. This could then explain the anomalies in the table like woman D and man E who do not comply too the ‘norms’ of their gender average so as an example woman D could be a manager and man E being an apprentice.

The dominance model is another theory which was founded by Zimmerman and West in (1975). They found that men interrupt conversations more than women, whom they concluded from their study of 11 conversations between men and women where men interrupted a total of 46 times compared to the women which was a total of 2. They concluded that since men interrupt more they are dominate or trying to gain dominance.

As demonstrated in the table above, women were recorded to interrupt between 0 and 2 times per meeting compared to an astonishing difference of 2 and 8 for men. These findings also support the theory of the Dominance Model as the men are interrupting more than the women. However, it can be seen in the table that the men are interrupting the other men as well as the women. This could be said to show that the men were worrying about their social hierarchy within the meeting and wanted to show confidence and dominance to make them respected. This idea would also explain the anomaly of woman D; the men could be seeing her as more of a threat as she is talking at the same levels as the other men. If they were to see her as a threat to their dominance it would clarify why she is being interrupted more than everyone else. This is a theory that is not mentioned within the dominance theory. This means that the data in the table goes further to show the difference in miscommunication amongst the two genders than the theory itself. 

The third and final model is the difference model by Deborah Tannen in 1990, 'You Just Don't Understand'. The difference theory states that men and women belong to different subcultures, this approach avoids blaming or being prejudiced towards men or women, it merely suggests that they communicate differently. She has come up with a series of 6 contrasts which are: Status vs support, Independence vs Intimacy, Advice vs understanding, information vs feelings, orders vs proposals and conflict vs compromise.  In status vs support the difference approach suggests that men seek to achieve dominance over others in the conversation whereas women prefer supporting and giving conformation to the others. This would be supported by the data in the table as the women do not tend to interrupt anyone meaning they may try to be supportive and not discouraging to the others. In independence vs intimacy the difference approach suggests that men are focused on keeping their place in the hierarchy so refuse to ask if things are okay with their significant other whereas women indulge in the fact they console with their partners as a sense of intimacy. In advice vs understanding Tannen suggests that men would try and find a solution to the problem whereas women would give emotional support and stability. In information vs feelings the difference approach suggests that men only talk about informative subjects and that there conversations have a meaning behind them whereas women talk more about feelings and things that are not instructions or facts. In orders vs proposals men would tend to use direct imperatives when women say "shall we...” and "lets...”. This is disputed by the data in the table above as if men were only using direct imperatives then their seconds per turn would be lower than the women, but this is not the case. In conflict vs compromise Tannen suggests men will announce their problem vocally whereas women would comply but complain a substantial amount.

There has been a recent story in the media, 31^st May 2016, about Kit Harrington accusing the film industry of ‘sexism against men’. Harrington says that he accepts attitudes of sexism towards women in the industry however there isn’t much recognition for sexism towards men. He believes that if a woman said she did not appreciate being called a babe people would respect that whereas with him people laugh and say he is being silly or egotistical. Some bloggers have been criticising this as it would be argued that he was only employed for Game of Thrones because of his looks. Female blogger Jezebel pointed out that what Harington is talking about is feeling objectified, which is not something that just sticks with one gender. Harington’s comments have been ridiculed by many, including Jezebel who was quite clearly using sarcastic words when saying “wants the world to know there is more to him than being really, really, really ridiculously good-looking”.

Overall all the linguists that have research the differences between male and female speech all have valid, well-argued points however each of the arguments cancel out the other. There still needs to be an extensive amount of further research to actually prove whether men and women speak differently, nevertheless it may always be a matter of opinion. Many factors could affect many different people with the way they use language, nature, nurture and also people may face speech problems due to disabilities or issues. It is hard to separate the reasons why we talk how we do, it is also hard to tell what factors impact in different ways in how we use language.