Female Sociolinguists

[Emma Moore]

Yes, I've realised that asking for names perhaps wasn't the smartest
move, but all of your responses and the subsequent discussions have
really helped me to think about what I want to say in the review, so
thank you.

All this has really made me think about the kind of action we ought to
be taking as linguists to address the blatant inequality of
representation in the field. If we accept that listing names is not a
productive (or indeed especially collaborative) way to assert the
profile of female/minority-identity researchers, how do we deal with the
fact that naming is a practice which helps to construct the research
paradigm as we know it? I guess it comes down to opposing a current
practice within the limits of the ideology that constructs it or simply
not engaging with practices of the ideology. In the latter case, aren't
we likely to be left out in the cold in terms of visibility?

Best,
Emma.
*********************************************************************
Dr Emma Moore
Lecturer in Sociolinguistics; Admissions Tutor
Department of English Language and Linguistics
University of Sheffield
5 Shearwood Road
Sheffield
S10 2TN
UK

Phone: +44 (0)114 222 0232
Fax: +44 (0)114 222 0240
E-mail: e.moore at sheffield.ac.uk
Webpage: http://www.shef.ac.uk/english/language/staff/emmam.html

********************************************************************


> -----Original Message-----
> From: International Gender and Language Association [mailto:GALA-
> L at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG] On Behalf Of Penny Eckert
> Sent: 26 May 2005 21:24
> To: GALA-L at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
> Subject: Re: Female Sociolinguists
>
> I agree with Miriam that this kind of thing ends up as a weird
popularity
> contest or worse - now we know who happens to be in some people's
radar
> today, and the more names that pile up the more glaring the omissions.
But
> above all, I think that Emma's request has resulted in a nice object
> lesson in academic politics. The name request is at the heart of the
old
> boy system - Harvard uses it to initiate searches, CASBS uses it to
> develop a list of potential fellows - and we know how badly (or how
well,
> depending on your perspective) it works in those kinds of cases.
>
> pe
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> "It hurts too bad when you only have a linguist to talk to."
> Marie Smith, last speaker of Eyak.
>
> "I like to change my fourth wife every year." Saleh al-Sayeri.
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> Penelope Eckert                              phone: (650)725-1564
> Professor, Department of Linguistics         fax:   (650)723-5666
> Director, Program in Feminist Studies
> Stanford University
> Stanford CA 94305-2150
> http://www.stanford.edu/~eckert