Gender Linguistics (Russian)

[Loren Billings]

> A student of mine is interested in anything that has been written on
> Russian which relates to gender linguistics.  I know there are articles out
> there and am familiar with a few of them, but would appreciate any input
> from others who are more competent in this field than I am.  What has been
> written?  Is there any article which summarizes the research which has been
> done or is being done in this area?

Olga Yokoyama taught a course on gender linguistics in Slavic back in 1993
(which I attended).  She may have something written up on this in the meantime.

Also, Richard Brecht et al. did a detailed study of why there is a difference
in L2 gain between male and female American students studying on semester-long
programs in Russia.  I was involved as a research assistant in that project
and, although I haven't seen the finished report (citation follows), the
study's participants do mention numerous gender-linguistic issues in the
journals that they compiled in connection with the study.

PREDICTORS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE GAIN DURING STUDY ABROAD Authors: Richard D.
Brecht, Dan Davidson, and Ralph B.
        Ginsberg, 1993 ($5.00)
        Until recently, the impact of study abroad was gauged from intuition
and subjective observations and had not been properly assessed.
        This paper presents the first large-scale statistical study of the
predictors of language gain in the study-abroad environment. It identifies
        significant predictors of successful language learning of students
going abroad.

This study can be ordered from the National Foreign Language Center's web site
<http://www.nflc.org/publications/>.  For ordering information:


Ms. Elizabeth Gamero

phone: 202-667-8100 ext. 22

fax: 202-667-6907

E-mail: egamero at nflc.org

According to Ms. Gamero, this study has not appeared subsequently in any other
publication.
--
Loren A. Billings, Ph.D.
<loren.billings at colorado.edu>

Linguistics Department
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0295 U.S.A.