rity. Often evaluated with men s language as the norm, misunderstanding of women s speech intentions is common. There are problems, however, with any research that attempts to define characteristics of men s or women s speech. First is the interpretation of differences. Associations that are found between specific feature use and women s language should not be assumed to take place in all situations or contexts. Gender differences are not absolute. Secondly, many conversational features, such as tag questions and interruptions, do not have set functions (not to mention researcher s varied definitions). An interpretation of a particular feature, in addition to a speaker s intention, can only be done within the setting of the interaction.There was an interesting finding on interaction of status and gender based on non-verbal communication. Nancy Hoar [1992] pointed out that women s high pitch voices connote childhood rather than adulthood. And this connotation suggests the lower status and power, for children are typically concerned with trivial matters, whereas adults are concerned with more serious matters. Also, children are expected to defer to adults. She convinced this finding with the fact that women who aspire to influential positions are often adviced to cultivate lower pitched voices, ones that communicate authority. Other non-verbal aspects such as how often women smile, how much they listen and give more eye contact, are among other non-verbal aspects that may contribute to the studies of gender.
The most consistent difference found between men and women is a tendency for women to speak in a way that is closer to the prestige standard. In colloquial terms, they speak «better» than men. No one is quite sure why this is so, and several explanations have been proposed, which may all be partially right. [Aitchison J., 1992]. For example, women may be pressurized by society to behave in a «ladylike» manner, and «speaking nicely» may be part of this. Or because they are the main child-rearers, they may subconsciously speak in a way which will enable their children to progress socially. Or they may tend to have jobs which rely on communication, rather than on strength. Women «s speech has been said to be more polite, more redundant, more formal, more clearly pronounced, and more elaborated or complex, while men» s speech is less polite, more elliptical, more informal, less clearly pronounced, and simpler. All these factors, and others, appear to be relevant. Of the social causes of gender differentiation in speech style, one of the most critical appears to be level of education. In all studies, it has been shown that the greater the disparities between educational opportunities for boys and girls, the greater the differences between male and female speech. Children soon pick up the social stereotypes that underlie this discrimination. They learn that women «s talk is associated with the home and domestic activities, while men» s is associated with the outside world and economic activities.for the children s speech we can conclude, that different children use different strategies for acquiring speech. For example, some seem to concentrate on the overall rhythm, and slot in words with the same general sound pattern, whereas others prefer to deal with more abstract slots. Children have to learn not only the syntax and sounds of their language, but also the meaning of words. This tu...
