This study examines the linguistic expression of Finnish nonbinary individuals' gender identities. Data came from a 2023 Finnish-language online survey of genderqueer, gender-nonconforming, and nonbinary Finns, analyzed with qualitative thematic analysis and coded for the following themes: pronouns, gendered terms, names, terminology, features of Finnish, and the role of English. Findings show that the Finnish gender-neutral third-person pronoun h & auml;n can conceal gender while also enabling less gendered language. Some respondents used the English pronoun they/them to express gender. In lexical gender, participants used gendered nouns opposite to assigned sex at birth, opted for gender-neutral alternatives (e.g., vanhempi "parent"), or coined new terms. Names were used to communicate and legitimize identity within the community and before the state and the law. In our study, the most popular Finnish terms were muunsukupuolinen "othergender" and ei-bin & auml;& auml;ri "nonbinary," while English terms popular among respondents were queer and genderfluid. Muunsukupuolinen was employed for its widespread use and legibility, while queer was used because of its broad scope and connections to the queer community and history. Genderfluid was chosen because Finnish lacked a suitable alternative. Some respondents found Finnish terms (vanhempi) and terminology (muunsukupuolinen) unwieldy or artificial. Theoretically, this study draws on assemblage: nonbinary Finns assemble their repertoire of identity expression by creating or rejecting Finnish terms and using English when preferred. This dynamic range grants semiotic agency and self-determination.
This experimental sociolinguistic study investigates implicit attitudes relating to female football commentators. Several high-profile sports-media figures have claimed that women's voices are "too high-pitched" for commentary on men's football, a domain in which traditional, heteronormative gender relations remain especially dominant. With this critique in mind, we conducted a social perception experiment using voices artificially manipulated for pitch to investigate the interaction of pitch and gender stereotypes in this context. Contrary to the male-centred meta-discourse surrounding female commentators, our results show that listeners actually judge female commentators with lower-pitched voices less favourably compared with higher-pitched female voices. Male listeners, in particular, prefer gender-typical voices and male voices generally. These results support previous claims about the influence of stored stereotypes on the social evaluation of speech, how evaluations are dependent upon the specific gendered dynamics of a given domain, and the pervasiveness of a "double-bind" that female commentators are faced with.
This article contributes to the study of gendered aspects of parliamentary discourse by looking at the parliaments of Bulgaria, Poland, and Slovenia during the COVID-19 pandemic. Combining corpus linguistic and discourse-oriented approaches, the analysis looks into the interests of Members of Parliament (MPs) by establishing the key debating issues, topics, and social representations, following some recent claims on distinct contributions of female MPs in crisis time. Although some differences are observed, mainly pertaining to the topic of health, there is little trace to suggest that men and women discuss issues of health during the crisis in qualitatively different ways. However, when looking at gendered representations in general, the data show how gender carries a particular symbolic power that is leveraged in discussions about varied sociopolitical anxieties amplified during a crisis, be it regarding reproductive rights, immigration, or the social role of men.
Social change and increasing transnational contact in Mainland China have resulted in a proliferation of masculine styles and in discourse contesting their acceptability. In this study, we examine the construction and satirization of "fizzy voice," a newly enregistered masculine vocal style associated with low pitch, narrow pitch range, and creaky phonation. Through multimodal content analysis of videos shared on Chinese social media, we demonstrate the association of fizzy voice with stances and personae that carry both positive connotations of attractiveness and negative connotations of excessive competitiveness and inauthenticity. While fizzy voice is recruited in the construction of a "warm man" persona intended to appeal to women, women are often portrayed as skeptical recipients of this style and men who adopt it as manipulative and/or misguided. The case of fizzy voice exemplifies the intensifying discourse surrounding authenticity in the construction of masculinity. (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic), (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic), (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic),(sic)(sic)(sic),(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic), (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic),(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic), (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic), (sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic)(sic)"(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic)(sic).
This study examines how translators exercise political agency to bolster revisionist perspectives on Japanese military "comfort women." It analyzes five trans-editing techniques identified in ten excerpts from the first Korean compilation of J. Mark Ramseyer's works on the comfort women issue. The findings indicate that these techniques were strategically employed to defend Ramseyer and to enhance the argumentative power of his claims in the sociopolitical context of South Korea. The study sheds light on various aspects of translation that support far-right beliefs about Korean comfort women, a topic that is seldom covered in existing scholarship. In particular, it explores the collaborative relationship between the author and the translator/editor, demonstrating how the translator's rewriting can reinforce certain ideological positions.
This article discusses the contributions to this special issue within the context of the current turn to right-wing authoritarianism across much of the world and the dangers this presupposes for addressing gender and sexual diversity in second language education. The article focuses on four main topics arising from the globally diverse contributions appearing in the issue: (a) the current robustness and methodological sophistication of the field of language teaching materials analysis; (b) the way in which, despite decades of scholarly critique, the representation of gender and sexual diversity remains problematic for educational publishers and materials writers; (c) the pitfalls of limited “progress” in textbook representational repertoires, specifically the incursions of the discourse of neoliberal feminism; and (d) the extent of work still to be done in terms of the treatment of gender and sexual diversity in actual classrooms and the role that materials might play. The article concludes with a short discussion of the concept of “educated hope” as essential in the present moment for those who are committed to progressive education while also bearing in mind the need for what might be called “pedagogic humility”; namely, a strategically deferred acceptance of limitation, an understanding of context, and a concern for safety.
In this farewell essay, the coeditors of Gender and Language reflect on leading the journal through a 6-year period marked by escalating global crises and rising hostility toward feminist, queer, and trans scholarship. Drawing from their previous Editorials on refusal, hope, and potency, the coeditors explore yet another affect that animated their tenure: stubbornness. This essay suggests that stubbornness, as more than mere obstinacy, must be reclaimed within a transqueerfeminist ethics as a rebellious insistence on caring, persisting, and imagining otherwise. From this perspective, stubbornness is uniquely suited to counter the political numbness of what Heyes terms “anaesthetic time.” Everyday editorial labor is presented as a microactivist gesture of concern that can sustain the language, gender, and sexuality community amid global turmoil.
Gender, language, and education studies have highlighted gender insensitivity and provided frameworks for progressive textbooks. However, studies into teachers and learners' perceptions of gender and classroom practices appear scanty in Sub-Saharan Africa. This investigation attempts to address this gap through examining English as a Second Language (ESL) classes in Nigerian primary and secondary schools. Recordings from 3 teachers and 58 learners' classroom interactions in 3 lessons, 18 student essays, and interviews with teachers were analyzed using two analytical approaches. Analysis revealed that the girls showed more gender awareness and negotiated their takeaway from textbooks, whereas the boys aligned with "normal" renderings of their gender identity. The teachers favored gender-equality ideology, and their classroom practices suggested that they subverted insensitive gender portrayals in textbooks in different ways. These findings stress that learners and teachers are active users engaging with gender portrayals in textbooks. They negotiate what to take from texts in consonance with their gender ideologies.
Adopting a social constructionist perspective, this article explores the localization of the cultural content of global ELT textbooks from a critical gender perspective that foregrounds the role of the market in the production of gender identities in educational media. It compares constructions of gendered identities in ELT textbooks for adult learners in Saudi Arabia before and after the country's 2016 economic shakeup. Localization in pre-2016 rentier Saudi Arabia meant, broadly, resisting the neoliberal discourses that mediated gendered representations in the textbooks. This study explores how post-2016 localization processes responded to pro-neoliberal discourses and women's empowerment initiatives embedded in the economic shakeup. The findings confirm a shift in the outcomes of textbook localization processes, with growing acceptance of globalized neoliberal discourses on gender, indexing larger shifts in discourses of gender in the local context.
Gender and sexual diversity in language education in general and in educational media in particular continues to be a vibrant field of research. Studies thus far have focused on gender representations in and around educational media, and, more recently, on their intersections with parameters such as sexuality, ethnicity, and class. This special issue of Gender and Language links this research field with theoretically and methodologically innovative research on the meaning, production, and usage of gender and sexuality in educational media in diverse geopolitical contexts. These range from Uruguay, Saudi Arabia, and Nigeria to the Netherlands and Belgium. Though this issue mainly addresses gender and sexuality in formal second and/or foreign language educational contexts, it also features contributions on educational media involving both second language learners and native mono- or multilingual speakers.
This study investigates the process of the production of a local English language teaching textbook series in Uruguay. Drawing on ethnographic approaches to critical discourse analysis, the study examines how the sexuality of a male character-initially conceived as openly gay-becomes semiotically regulated at different stages of textbook production, so that his (sexual) identity is managed, controlled, and backgrounded. In addition to the textbooks themselves, data come from observations of authors' meetings, focus groups, and individual interviews with textbook authors. The analysis identifies four main strategies through which (homo)sexuality becomes watered down. The findings confirm the complex politics of inclusion of sexual diversity in textbooks, and show how heteronormative ideology and the heterosexual gaze permeate the representation of (homo)sexuality. The findings also shed new light on the complex and tangled processes of textbook production. Este art & iacute;culo estudia el proceso de producci & oacute;n de una serie local de libros de texto para la ense & ntilde;anza de ingl & eacute;s como lengua extranjera en Uruguay. A trav & eacute;s de un enfoque etnogr & aacute;fico del an & aacute;lisis cr & iacute;tico del discurso examina la regulaci & oacute;n semi & oacute;tica -en diferentes etapas del proceso de producci & oacute;n editorial- de la sexualidad de un personaje concebido como "abiertamente gay" de manera de regular, controlar y relegar a un segundo plano su identidad. Las observaciones en reuniones de autores, la realizaci & oacute;n de grupos focales y entrevistas individuales con autores y el an & aacute;lisis de las representaciones en la versi & oacute;n publicada de la serie permite identificar cuatro estrategias discursivas a trav & eacute;s de las cuales la (homo)sexualidad del personaje se "lava". Los resultados dejan en evidencia la compleja pol & iacute;tica de diversidad sexual en los libros de texto, i.e., c & oacute;mo la ideolog & iacute;a heteronormativa y la mirada heterosexual permean las representaciones de la (homo)sexualidad. Los resultados tambi & eacute;n arrojan luz sobre el complejo proceso de producci & oacute;n de libros de texto.
Textbook authors are pivotal in shaping discourses about ethnic, gender, and sexual diversity in second or foreign language education. Yet, language textbook authors have hardly been examined, let alone their perspectives on diversity. We therefore interviewed 10 authors of Dutch language textbooks and interpreted their responses within three ethnic diversity models: assimilation, hierarchy, and pluralism. Views on gender and sexual diversity were analyzed, including perceived hindrances around representing diversity in textbook production. Authors supported pluralism but simultaneously made hierarchical statements that favored white ethnic majority perspectives. The inclusion of gender diversity was considered important, whereas the inclusion of sexual diversity was viewed as problematic. Interviewees reported obstacles in representing diversity through a perceived necessity to comply with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR), licenses with picture databases, and limited budgets. We discuss how the results of this study relate to theory and policies and consider how authors could address barriers to match textbook content with their views on diversity. Lesboekenauteurs spelen een centrale rol in het vormgeven van discoursen over etnische, gender- en seksuele diversiteit in het tweede- of vreemdetalenonderwijs. Toch zijn auteurs van taalboeken nauwelijks betrokken in onderzoek, laat staan hun perspectieven op diversiteit. We interviewden daarom tien auteurs van lesboeken Nederlands en interpreteerden uitingen in drie modellen van etnische diversiteit: assimilatie, hi & euml;rarchie en pluralisme. Opvattingen over gender en seksuele diversiteit werden geanalyseerd, inclusief ervaren belemmeringen rond het representeren van diversiteit in tekstboeken. Auteurs steunden pluralisme, maar deden tegelijkertijd hi & euml;rarchische uitspraken die witte, etnische meerderheidsperspectieven bevoordeelden. Het opnemen van genderdiversiteit werd belangrijk gevonden, terwijl seksuele diversiteit als problematisch werd gezien. Ge & iuml;nterviewden meldden obstakels bij het weergeven van diversiteit door de noodzaak om te voldoen aan het Gemeenschappelijk Europees Referentiekader (ERK), licenties met beeldbanken en beperkte budgetten. We bespreken hoe de resultaten zich verhouden tot theorie en beleid en gaan na hoe auteurs belemmeringen kunnen adresseren om de inhoud van lesboeken beter af te stemmen op hun pluralistische opvattingen over diversiteit.
This article examines the language of r/MensLib, a community dedicated to discussing men's issues in a profeminist manner on the content aggregation site Reddit. The language of profeminist men is relatively under-researched compared to that of antifeminist men, and so this article explores the salient topics of r/MensLib, the specific language used within the community and how r/MensLib orient themselves to feminism. The 50 most upvoted posts of all time and their associated comment threads were collected from r/MensLib, totaling a corpus of 925,153 words, and then a keyword analysis was conducted using Sketch Engine. The study found that r/MensLib explicitly support a range of LGBTQ+ identities, critique socially constructed gender roles, and discuss how they orient to feminism and a variety of other topics, such as the manosphere, sexual violence, abortion, body shaming, and pornography.
Neopronouns are new pronouns created to address perceived gaps in the standard pronoun system. In the German language, neopronouns have neither stabilized around norms of usage nor has any singular neopronoun risen to prominence over others. However, many sources available to educators and researchers in a US context have foregrounded the neopronoun xier based on a small number of resources. To address this possible misrepresentation in the current pedagogical and linguistic literature, we conducted a study on nonbinary pronoun usage by German speakers on Twitter. Our findings indicate several neopronouns in use, with they, xier, dey, and sier being the most frequent. Further analysis indicated that these pronouns are often used in different ways by different speakers. These results document the unstable nature of neopronouns in the German-speaking world and provide a foundation for future neopronoun research.
