Language and Gender

The 3rd edition of Language and Gender was published in November 2019.

Since its first publication in 1998, Mary Talbot’s Language and Gender has been a leading textbook, popular with students for its accessibility and with teachers for the range and depth it achieves in a single volume. This anticipated third edition has been thoroughly revised and updated for the era of #MeToo, genderqueer, Trump, and cyberhate. 

The book is organized into three parts. An introductory section provides grounding in early ‘classic’ studies in the field. In the second section, Talbot examines language used by women and men in a variety of speech situations and genres. The last section considers the construction and performance of gender in discourse, reflecting the interest in mass media and popular culture found in recent research, as well as the preoccupation with social change that is central to Critical Discourse Analysis. Maintaining an emphasis on recent research, Talbot covers a range of approaches at an introductory level, lucidly presenting sometimes difficult and complex issues. Each chapter concludes with a list of recommended readings, enabling students to further their interests in various topics. 

Language and Gender will continue to be an essential textbook for undergraduates and postgraduates in linguistics, sociolinguistics, cultural and media studies, gender studies and communication studies.

Published by Polity Press and available here. The first edition appeared as Language and Gender: An Introduction in 1998. An Arabic edition was published by Shahrayar Books, Iraq, in 2022 (translated by Mahmoud Ahmed). Huazhong Normal University Press, China, published a Simplified Chinese edition in 2004 (translated by Ai Xiaoming).

Critical acclaim for the 2nd edition (Polity, 2010)

“This new edition of an indispensible textbook provides a clear and engaging overview of foundational research and current trends in the interdisciplinary study of language, gender and sexuality. Theoretically informed and empirically grounded, this text will serve as an essential guide for new generations of students. It is also a valuable resources for researchers seeking to update themselves on recent developments in this dynamic field”.

Professor Mary Bucholtz, University of California

“Mary Talbot’s book provides a comprehensive, theoretically sophisticated and accessible introduction to the field of language and gender. Unlike other language and gender textbooks, Talbot foregrounds the importance of language and gender studies in the analysis of popular culture and mass media ‘texts’. Thus, Talbot’s book will appeal not only to students and scholars of linguistics, but to anyone with a serious interst in cultural studies”.

Professor Susan Ehrlich, York University, Toronto

“The author moves smoothly and coherently from more traditional approaches to language and gender through to very recent research in areas such as discourse and consumerism, and language, gender and sexuality. Different approaches, including Critical Discourse Analysis and social constructionism, are demonstrated, and difficult concepts are clearly and comprehensibly presented. Mary Talbot’s own research enriches and enlivens the discussion throughout. The text is extensively illustrated with interesting examples, many of which are taken form recent published research, thus introducing students to relevant and authentic material”.

Professor Janet Homes, Victoria University of Wellington

“I just wanted you to know that your book, though required, is one of the most inspiring books I’ve ever read. Your insights are revolutionary and I have greatly enjoyed reading them…I feel it is necessary to give respect where it is due. So, thank you very much for providing a light of inspiration”.

Email from Amy, student in San Diego

“Without doubt the book will serve as an excellent textbook for upper undergraduate and postgraduate students”.

Discourse Studies

“The book is engagingly written and remains a key textbook for students and junior researchers in the field”.

Discourse and Communication

 

3rd edition Contents

PART 1          Airing Stereotypes and Early Models

 1          Language and gender

About this book

Linguistic sex differentiation

Sex versus gender

Sex and gender as troublesome dichotomies

Further reading

2          Talking proper

Women, men and ‘standard’ English

            Social stratification studies

           Accounting for the differences

           Some problems

          Market forces and social networks

           Gender signals

Sex, gender and voice quality

Further reading

3          ‘Women’s language’ and ‘man made language’

Early interest

Sexism

‘Women’s language’

‘Man made language’

Conclusion and lead-in to Part 2

Further reading

PART 2          Interaction Among Women and Men

 4          Telling stories

Studying stories

Story content

A couple tell a story

At the family dinner table

             Comparing two cultures

            ‘Father knows best’

Generalising from research findings

Further reading

5          Conversation

Conversation as a genre

The conversational division of labour

Miscommunication

Politeness

Men’s and women’s interactional styles

Equal but different?

Further reading

6          Difference-and-dominance and beyond

Deficit, dominance and difference

The trouble with ‘dominance’

The trouble with ‘difference’

          The suppression of power

         Overemphasis on miscommunication

         Fake neutrality

The reification of gender as ‘difference’

Beyond difference: the influence of post-structuralism

Further reading

PART 3          Discourse and Gender: Construction and Performance

 7          Critical perspectives on gender identity

Why critical?

Discourse and discourses

             Discourse as social practice

Gender identity and subject positioning

The discursive construction of maternity

Examining constructions of gender identity

Further reading

8          Consumerism

Femininity

Women and consumerism

Multiple voices in magazines

            Power relations

           Text population

The voice of a friend

Men as consumers

Further reading

9          New men and old boys

Masculinities

Dominance and control

            A fraternity hierarchy

            Representations

            Men’s work

The importance of being hetero

            The ‘antithesis of man’ among US college students

            Real men in working-class Catalonia

‘Guilt over games boys play’

Change, resistance and resilience

             Media containment

            Masculinity under threat?

Further reading

10       Professionally speaking

Women and the public sphere

Politics

Broadcast interviews

Women in charge: dealing with the double-bind

Resistance and reprisal

            Media representations of working women

           Gendered cyberhate

Further reading

11       Language, gender and sexuality

Queering gender

Heteronormativity

            The conversational backdrop: a clamorous heterosexuality

Homosociality among male university students

The sexual politics of consent

            A Canadian tribunal case

           Contestation and struggle in indigenous African communities

LGBTQ: Resisting heteronorms

Further reading

12       Reclaiming the language

Modes of struggle

           Resistance and contestation

          Struggles over access

          Interventions

Counter-resistance

          The media

          Academia

The Phantom Menace

‘PC’: its use and origins

            ‘Political correctness must be crushed!’

Further reading