Blog #4 "Performing Gender Identity: Young Men's Talk and the Construction of Heterosexual Masculinity"

I thought it was interesting how Cameron says that we perform our gender roles instead of having a gender role. This distinction highlights the dynamic, fluid nature of male and female identity. In arguing her point, Cameron claims that men actively participate in gossip when around close male friends, and avoid it when in the presence of women and acquaintances. I have experienced performances of gender in my relationships with other men. I spent most of my teenage years with the same small group of males. When together, we did talk a lot about women, wine, and sports, but we also spent an incredible amount talking about other men and how gay they were. I never thought about it as a way to separate us from other definitions of gender. However, now that I reflect on those years, we did tend to think of ourselves as the “masculine” group and the other guys as the “gay” group. Not one of those “gay” men really turned out to be homosexual, but in the process we defined or performed what we wanted to see as masculine. According to Cameron, we were simply performing what we expected to see in other American heterosexual men without realizing we were participating in the stereotypical female activity of gossip.

Blog #10 "Sex differences in parent-child interaction"

Gleason makes a point that really caught my attention. She claims, much as other linguistic experts, that language differences between adult men and women arise in childhood. What makes her claim stand out is that she states “the most likely context of their development lies in the arena of parent-child interaction” (190). The rest of the reading I have done so far says that children learn to speak a particular way from their young peers, but Gleason thinks it has much more to do with the child’s parents. This just makes sense. Parents are the people a child interacts with most for the first few years of their lives when language is being developed. Parents teach their children about the world around them using language.

I have a four month old daughter, and I cannot imagine that as her parent I do not have a major role in teaching her how to speak. Once my daughter is four or five and attending school, I can see her learning to hone her gender specific language skills on the playground, but she must learn the basic skills at home before she can even play with the other kids. I know I speak to her in a certain way because she is a girl, and when I have a boy my language towards him will be different. If sex-linked language differences are partly a product of the environment, I have to agree with Gleason that girls and boys must learn their language related gender roles from their parents.

Blog #3 "Talk Control: An Illustration from the Classroom of Problems in Analysing Male Dominance of Conversation"

Joan Swann's article was fascinating to me because I have found her claims of male dominated class rooms to be true in my life. Women get a bad rap for talking so much, and I have even heard on television that women use twice as many words as men during a 24 hour period. However, in the classroom setting, men talk much more than women. I have experienced this to be especially true in college classrooms. Just last night in my health behavior class, I paid close attention to number of answers and comments by males and females. In a 3 hour long class, only one female offered a comment/answer without being called on by the teacher, and only 2 other females spoke when asked their opinion by the teacher. On the other hand, 8 different males answered on their own accord and 4 answered when called on by the teacher. I was shocked at the ratio! The class was completely dominated by males when there are more females enrolled in it. Since last night, I have been pondering why there is such a big sex-linked difference. I have come to the conclusion that males are more often encouraged by others, including teachers, to be leaders and to voice their opinion. Also, women do not want to be known as a know-it-all while men pride themselves on the amount of facts and knowledge they can present to other people. I will definitely be observing my other classes this spring to find out if they are also male dominated.

Blog #2 "Talk in the Intimate Relationship: His and Hers"

Deborah Tannen's article stood out from the others this week because it seemed to describe every misunderstanding between men and women I have ever experienced. Reading it was like reading a script of my parents conversations and now my own marriage. Just the other night, my wife basically said "after all this time, you should know what I want without my telling you". I could not believe what I was hearing! I knew her whole argument was flawed because I was convinced of the logic of my position and the illogic of hers. Then I read Tannen's article and saw a replay of our conversation.

It is amazing to realize how such small differences in the way men and women approach talking and what they expect out of a conversation can quickly escalate into arguments and hurt feelings. Now I know the biggest source of conflict in my marriage is so called "metamessages". For example, last night, my wife said "your Toyota is probably going to be recalled", and I avoided eye contact, used a negative tone, and said "my car is fine". My wife got really mad because she read my message as "you are never right and I think you are stupid", but I was simply making a statement about the health of my car. Unfortunately, telling her that my communication flaws are the result of learning how to have conversations with boys only just further infuriated her. Needless to say, I will be rereading this article.