English 186: Language, Gender, and Culture
COURSE DESCRIPTION
The relationship between language and gender has been a widely researched and debated
topic in sociolinguistics, English language studies, and linguistic anthropology since the early
1970s when Robin Lakoff published Language and Woman’s Place. Since then, the intersections
of gender, race, class, sexuality and other social categories have informed these critical
conversations. In this course, students explore the questions researchers have asked
regarding these relationships: How do patterns of speaking and interpreting reflect,
perpetuate, and create our experience of gender? How does gender interact with sexual
identity, race, class, socioeconomic status, age, occupational and social/familial roles,
institutional settings, and other factors in terms of how we speak? Does gender connect to
language change? What do controversies about sexism and other biases in language suggest
about the connections between language, thought, and socially situated political struggles?
No background in linguistics is required; a genuine interest in the workings and power of
language is highly recommended.
Students leave this class with enhanced research skills: an ability to find non-internet sources
and use scholarly academic internet resources; the acumen to synthesize both historiography
and literary criticism; and the conviction to formulate original arguments about the subject
of classes in literature.
COURSE GOALS
Class time and assignments are structured to develop several skills: the ability to
identify the ways in which speakers perform identity (especially gender identity) through
speech; an understanding of the myriad historical contexts that shaped and were shaped by
the development of language; a working knowledge of basic socio-linguistic theory and
practice; and the capacity to do advanced practical research in the field of sociolinguistics.
COURSE LEARNING OUTCOMES (CLOS):
After engaging with this course actively and thoughtfully, students will be able to do the
following. These items are linked to the Program Learning Outcomes expected of all majors:
1. Identify and understand the way speakers perform identity, especially gender
identity, though speech. (Addresses PLO 1)
2. Empathize with historical, geographic, and cultural diversity by understanding
how all varieties of English are linguistically equal, but how social meaning is
ascribed to linguistic variation (for example, accent discrimination). (Addresses
PLO 3)
3. Define several concepts related to the study of language and gender, like gender
performativity, linguistic relativity, and language ideology.
4. Practice advanced research skills: do a literature review of sociolinguistic
scholarship; conduct sociolinguistic research by recording, transcribing, and
analyzing live conversation; write a paper supported by that research; and
document that research according to academic standards. (Addresses PLOs 1 and 4
and 5)
5. Articulate your evaluations of transcriptions of speech as well as to the work
of other sociolinguists, in speech and writing, cogently and with sensitivity to
context. (Addresses PLOs 1 and 2 and 5)
6. Apply interpretive strategies and research skills developed in linguistic study to
other academic and professional contexts. (Addresses PLO 4)
All above CLOs are applicable to the Literature and English Major, and to the General
Education program as well.
PLANNED LEARNING OUTCOMES (PLOS) FOR THE ENGLISH MAJOR
1. Interpret texts with due sensitivity to both textual and contextual cues.
2. Articulate an appreciation of the aesthetic qualities of texts by the standards of their
times and places.
3. Demonstrate historical, geographic, and cultural empathy by reading texts written in
other times, places, and cultures.
4. Apply interpretive strategies developed in literary study to other academic and
professional contexts.
5. Write cogently and with sensitivity to audience.
GENERAL EDUCATION GUIDING PRINCIPLES
This course particularly emphasizes the following four General Education Guiding
Principles:
Communication: analyzing the history of the English language and the way in
which communication is shaped by social constructions of gender.
Creativity: responding creatively to the class’s material by conducting original
research and writing about it.
Appreciation of diverse perspectives in both global and community contexts:
learning about how language diversity is related to social factors, especially gender, and is
contingent upon time, place, class, and sex.