[Corpora-List] FW: Gender differences in language

[Dr DJ Hatch]

Actually, the genitalia comparison sucks. As far as I'm aware there growth
is purely down to biological factors. (No learning can possibly be
involved.)


And the problem, as usual is that almost all biologists are bad sociologists
and almost all sociologists are bad biologists ­ perhaps the 'almost' is a
dreadful understatement.
And the problem is that the language-biology idea has been contaminated by
latter-day Chomskians, in that they come very, very close to arguing that
1st language acquisition is biological (almost no learning is involved ­ is
the gist).

The best argument still seems to be that language competence comes along
with a host of physical, mental and (especially) social skills we learn in
our infancy and childhood, though for which we may well have a biologically
based capacity ­ eg, we have a larynx and we obsessively find almost every
feature of our world (potentially) meaningful, etc, etc

And it is more than possible that (some/many/most ­ here is the sociological
part of the research) females learn some/many/most social skills quicker
than males, and if so then ...

As for 'socially constructed', at the moment I can't quite see that. Could
it be possible for a culture to treat humans as being one of more than two
genders?  A good example of a social construct, and one I typically use is
that of 'race' ­ especially in the US. Thus where on the continuum between
purely 'black' African and 'white' European is the question. The 'one drop'
(of African 'blood') solution, as currently used, could be reversed so that
anyone seeming to have 'one drop' of European 'blood' (or, in more modern
terms one European ancestor) would be deemed 'white'. So racial categories
are socially constructed (in the US and the UK at least).

PS I'm not sure that using or correcting the use of Latin is a sign of much.

And I seem to remember that Bertrand Russell was irked by the persuasive
power supposedly gained the use of Latin by followers of Descartes. Russell
argued that cogito ergo sum (if I remember it correctly) was obviously
wrong, and that the correct statement would be 'There is thought.' I'm not
sure it was his best joke, but ...


David Hatch




On 26/3/08 13:57, "maxwell at umiacs.umd.edu" <maxwell at umiacs.umd.edu> wrote:

> M.Eleonora Sciubba, of the Università Roma Tre, wrote:
>> gender differences in language are acquired during the
>> socalled "socialization age", that is when small children
>> learn to speak and to interact with the people around them,
>> _so_ gender differences are social constructs.
> 
> [emphasis added]
> 
> This is a non sequitur, related to the post hoc, ergo proctor hoc fallacy
> (to use a couple phrases formerly used in Rome :-)).  One might as well
> argue that the genitalia mature because of socialization during the
> adolescent years.
> 
> Now I have no clue to what degree gender differences in language or first
> or second language learning ability is genetic vs. due to socialization
> (and maybe other aspects of the environment).  So I'm not claiming that
> the "gender differences are social constructs" claim is wrong, just that
> it cannot be demonstrated based on the evidence currently available.
> 
>    Mike Maxwell
>    CASL/ U MD
> 
> 
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