COMMENTS:Omnia Ahmed Ali

In unit two the author tries to “look at the qualities and characteristics we associate with men and women…by looking at the language we use to describe the sexes”. The author starts doing so by using the notions of denotation and connotation through which he made it clear that denotation, “the dictionary definition of the word”, is never enough as connotation is needed because it reflects “who is using the terms and how they are deployed”. Then he provides a number of examples to simplify these abstract terms like how the words ‘bachelor’ and ‘spinster’ have different connotative meanings though they have the same denotative one. In the denotative meaning they both mean an unmarried male or female; however the word ‘bachelor’ has a rather positive connotation, meaning that the man is single by choice or “playing in the field”. The word ‘spinster’ on the other hand has a negative connotation, meaning that a woman has been “left on the shelf”. This could be related to how and why people use the same terms but in a completely different way about males and females. At the same time it could reflect the power of implicit meanings which reflects the speaker’s cultural values. Through implicitness the speaker can deliver a certain hidden message through the connotative meaning of the word. Having presented the idea of explicitness; the author very tactfully shifts to the notion of collocation. Through which he explains how certain words tend to occur more or even only with males and others with females. An activity elaborates the idea as it explains why speakers use different terms to describe males and females; for example why words like ‘hunk’, ‘physique’, and ‘handsome’ collocate only with males, whereas ‘buxom’, ‘figure’, ‘pretty’ and ‘long-legged’ collocate with females. At the same time it elaborates how even the words that could collocate with both males and females tend to have different connotations, for example ‘strong’ while it suggest physical ability when used with men; it implies a psychological strength when used with women. The author then makes use of a recent study to clarify the notion even further “based on the Cobuild corpus…words for physical attractiveness (pretty, sexy, glamorous) collocate most frequently with ‘women’, while terms to describe height, abilities and personality most frequently collocate with ‘man’”. This in fact sheds a light on the speaker’s cultural background; it reflects how male are perceived as being “logical, rational, aggressive…etc”, whereas women are thought to be “emotional, submissive, and empathic”. This can prove that language is gendered; that is when using a certain word to refer to a male or a female it reflects the speaker’s “social knowledge” about both genders. In fact this idea of socialization, which is the process of acquiring our social knowledge, explains a lot about the speaker’s linguistic behaviour which is the result of that long process that starts with the beginning of the person’s life.

EXCELLENT

COMMENTS: Omnia Ahmed Ali

Using anthropomorphism to prove that relation between language and thoughts is in fact a very successful choice by the authors. Through a number of examples they managed to prove the existence of that relation, like for example giving cars and ships female pronouns because “they are objects of status that have traditionally been under the control of men”.That makes it obvious that the chapter fulfilled its targets. It provided evidences proving (evidence for) the different relations between language, culture, thought and gender. As a matter of fact it managed to “suggest that language is not a neutral reflection of the world around us, but that, by using language, we project onto the world our own sense of reality”. This provides the basic knowledge needed for a beginner to understand the whole idea of the relation between language and gender.

GOOD

COMMENTS: Omnia Ahmed Ali

The book manages to establish a relation between language, culture and gender. The language used by one person is greatly affected by many factors not only the person’s gender. That is why through out(throughout) the book both Angela Goddard and Lindsey Meân Patterson provide examples to prove that the difference in the language used by males or females depends on many factors such as the age of the speaker, their social class and their sexual orientation. This could be perceived through the example they offer from a recent study made on gay men and straight men which proved that “ age was significant for straight men” that the term ‘girlfriend’ is more frequently used among youth where as ‘partners’ is more serious and denotes permanence in the relationship, while ‘lover’ denotes something less serious. This however is different from the way gay men use these terms as for them ‘boyfriend’ denotes permanence. This proves the idea that both conceptions, age, culture and gender all together forms people’s language. At the same time it shows that language is flexible as new terms can emerge according to people's needs like the word ‘partners’ which was used as a result of a new social relation. The authors use all that to reflect the role of language “which is clearly to validate and legitimize a person’s behaviour”, something which the authors could have elaborated in a more extended way. It could have been used to link between(delete) the role of the language and the reason language is used differently by different speakers, as each language user has his own concepts, believes and behaviours that he wants to validate which in its tern reflects his cultural background. This however was completely ignored by the authors and they moved to a completely different topic which is anthropomorphism through which he tries to establish another relation between language and thoughts.The book uses some exercises to simplify the concepts to the readers and make them familiar with the different uses of language and its relation to the speaker’s culture. At the same times it offers a number of pictures to illustrate some points which was very effective and greatly simplified some new terms like anthropomorphism.

EXCELLENT.

COMMENTS:Omnia Ahmed Ali

The writer is using an informal style; in fact he is trying to establish a conversation with the reader through which he attempts to prove the relation between language and gender. Concepts are clearly defined like the Sapir-Wharf hypothesis to which the author provided a clear and simple definition which a beginner can easily comprehend: “we are not simply passive recorders of what we find around us in language; rather, we impose our ideas on our environment as a result of the language we have”. Then, after preparing his reader, he provides (presents) the official (?) definition by Whorf “we dissect nature along lines laid down by our native languages…” Here the book is both introducing the reader to new concepts in simple words and authenticating these concepts by referring to its origins making the reader completely familiar with the new terms and providing him with a resource if he wanted to read more about the matter. He does not stop here; having introduced the concept to the reader he goes even further and he provides examples to prove the validity of the concept. For example he provides some evidence to prove (support) the existence(plausibility) of the Sapir-Whorf linguistics system (hypothesis) using the example of the color metaphors as they differ from one country to another which means form one culture to another.bFor example the ‘blue jokes’ in English are ‘green jokes’ in Spanish, however they are ‘red jokes’ in Mexican Spanish. All that means that they are “arbitrary: if we have associations for a particular colour(be consistent, use one spelling and stick to it) term, it is more likely to be because we put them there than because they occurred somehow ‘naturally’. If it occurred naturally, then everyone would have the same system”.

COMMENT: This is very good and simple. Just try to avoid very long sentences, by using punctuations whenever you can.