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2016
In this proseminar, we will analyze a variety of different but intertwined aspects of gender in the English language. In our analysis, we will distinguish between grammatical, lexical, referential, and social gender. Briefly looking at the loss of grammatical gender in English, we will discover that the lack of grammatical gender in a language does not mean that " gender " in the broader sense cannot be communicated. We will examine the ways in which gender can be expressed in English today and investigate how pronominalization is used as a powerful strategy of communicating gender. Our analysis will also focus on nouns that are, in contrast to the great majority of human nouns in English, formally marked for lexical gender, and we will analyze how this gender marking morphologically takes place. We will discuss cases in which this gender marking leads to semantic derogation. Gendered and non-gendered forms of address and their usage are also part of our analysis. We will deal with false generics as well as with gender-related structures and messages, analyzing areas of implicit discursive negotiation of gender such as metaphors and proverbs. Furthermore, we will search for possibilities of expressing non-binary genders in English and also for ways of excluding gender from language, i.e. of formulating in gender-neutral ways. We will conclude by working our way towards a gender-fair use of language.
This article explores a gender-equality postmethod approach to teaching English as a Foreign Language. It describes and analyzes an action research project performed with an EFL class in Italy, in which the students were encouraged to think critically about sexism and English language use.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition
Role of Grammatical Gender and Semantics in German Word Production2004 •
Why do adult language learners typically fail to acquire second languages with native proficiency? Does prior linguistic experience influence the size of the “units” adults attend to in learning, and if so, how does this influence what gets learned? Here, we examine these questions in relation to grammatical gender, which adult learners almost invariably struggle to master. We present a model of learning that predicts that exposure to smaller units (such as nouns) before exposure to larger linguistic units (such as sentences) can critically impair learning about predictive relations between units: such as that between a noun and its article. This prediction is then confirmed by a study of adult participants learning grammatical gender in an artificial language. Adults learned both nouns and their articles better when they were first heard nouns used in context with their articles prior to hearing the nouns individually, compared with learners who first heard the nouns in isolation, prior to hearing them used in context. In the light of these results, we discuss the role gender appears to play in language, the importance of meaning in artificial grammar learning, and the implications of this work for the structure of L2-training.
MA by Research Thesis
Predictive Processing of Grammatical Gender in Welsh-English Bilingual Adults2019 •
2011 •
Why do adult language learners typically fail to acquire second languages with native proficiency? Does prior linguistic experience influence the size of the “units” adults attend to in learning, and if so, how does this influence what gets learned? Here, we examine these questions in relation to grammatical gender, which adult learners almost invariably struggle to master. We present a model of learning that predicts that exposure to smaller units (such as nouns) before exposure to larger linguistic units (such as sentences) can critically ...
English Historical Linguistics 2010: Selected Papers from the Sixteenth International Conference on English Historical Linguistics (ICEHL 16), Pécs, 23-27 August 2010
Gender Change from Old to Middle English2012 •
Journal of experimental psychology. General
Grammatical gender effects on cognition: implications for language learning and language use2005 •
Routledge
Pronominal Gender in English - A Study of English Varieties from a Cross-Linguistic Perspective.2008 •
Anarchist Developments in Cultural Studies
[2018] Graphic Representations of Grammatical Gender in Spanish Language Anarchist Publications2018 •
Frontiers in Psychology
A Language Index of Grammatical Gender Dimensions to Study the Impact of Grammatical Gender on the Way We Perceive Women and Men2019 •
2006 •
Folia Linguistica
From lexical to referential gender: An analysis of gender change in medieval English based on two historical documents.2011 •
Proceedings of Canadian Association of Linguistics conference
There are many ways to be gendered2012 •
Currently under review for the volume Gender across languages, vol. 4 (eds. Marlis Hellinger and Heiko Motschenbacher), Amsterdam: John Benjamins
Gender in Kurdish: structural and socio-cultural dimensionsYale University (Phd dissertation)
A Jewel Inlaid: Ergativity and Markedness in Nepali2019 •
Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics
Linguistic features of fragrances: The role of grammatical gender and gender associations2019 •