Analysis of Sex Differences in Expressives in Business Context.docx

analysis of sex differences in expressives in business context abstract：based on the theories of pragmatics, the current research makes an analysis of sex differences in expressives in business context from two aspects: grammatical differences and pragmatic differences. the differences are accounted for in terms of social factors, and their negative effects on business communication are explored too. some suggestions to deal with sex differences in expressives in business context are put forward. it is hoped that the study can shed light on the way of effective business communication and the teaching of business english. key words: sex differences business context expressives商务语境下表述语言的性别差异摘要：本文在语用学相关理论的基础上，从语法和语用两个方面分析商务语境下表述语言的性别差异，阐述性别差异产生的社会原因及性别差异对商务交流的影响。本文就如何减小性别差异对商务活动的影响提出了一些尝试性的建议。希望本文对如何提高商务交流效率和促进商务英语教学起一定的作用。关键词：表述语言 性别差异 商务语境 1. introductionthere is a consensus among sociolinguists that whatever language one analyzes, women and men will be found to speak differently in one way or another. this is hardly surprising when we consider that all known societies divide human beings into the categories of female and male and allot different statuses to them on this basis. so sex differences, as the fundamental fact of human life, have long been a fascinating research issue for numerous researchers. many academic fields have paid much attention to this issue. the 44th international linguistic association held in new york university of america in april 1999, took language and gender as the central issue and made a careful discussion about it. it indicates that gender differences have already become an important research issue of modern linguistics. however, little consideration has been given to the pragmatic perspective of sex differences in language use, especially in language use within business context. therefore, it is of significance to do a pragmatic study of sex differences in expressives in business context. the current research intends to analyze sex differences in expressives in business context. it is going to cover three aspects: 1) the analysis of how females and males use expressives differently in business context, especially in business negotiation, so as to get a better and deeper understanding about sex differences in speech act use from the pragmatic perspective; 2) the exploration of the causes and consequences of sex differences, so as to put forward some possible ways to minimize the negative effects of sex differences in business context; 3) the implications to improve the business english teaching on the business negotiation. 2. literature review2.1 related theories2.1.1 speech acts theory according to j.r searles theory, there are five types of speech acts, namely,(1)declarations;(2)representatives;(3)expressives;(4)directives;(5)comissives.expressives are one of the most important communication modes. they express psychological states and can be statements of pleasure, pain, likes, dislikes, joy, or sorrow. they can be caused by something the speaker does or the hearer does, and they are about the speakers experience.2.1.2 the cooperative principle (cp)grice (1975) points out that there exists a set of maxims and sub-maxims that guide and constrain the conversation of rational people. his well-known cooperative principle (cp) goes like this: make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged (grice, 1975, p. 45). that is to say, rational participants in conversation cooperate with each other in most circumstances.2.2 studies on sex differences early researchers usually got conclusions as to sex differences in language on the basis of casual observation and introspection rather than on the basis of empirical studies. in addition, the early empirical studies on gender and language commonly focused on gender differences in phonetics, intonation, vocabulary and grammar. with the passage of time, the sociolinguists began to work on real language data from a wider variety of aspects. the new trend in the study of gender differences shows an interest in communicative competence in conversations: the knowledge of when to speak or when to be silent, how to speak on different occasions, how to communicate and interpret the meaning of respect, seriousness, humor, politeness or intimacy and how to understand the social meaning of different linguistic varieties and different linguistic forms. furthermore, the study of gender differences also covers the range of language acquisition, verbal communication, language cognition, and so on. recent studies probe into significant sex differences of using interruptions, polite forms, turn-taking, linguistic hedging devices, verbosity. though it is accepted that females and males differ in their language use, how to explain such gender differences in communication remains a problem. different researchers have different views on the explanations of gender differences in communication. the first claim holds that females and males are biologically different and this difference causes gender differences in language use. the second claim emphasizes the importance of stereotypes in shaping these gender differences in interaction(atwater, 1983, p. 161; cannary and dindia, 1998, p. 73; song, 1998, p. 58-62). the third claim (usually defined as “dominance approach”) interprets the differences between females and males in communicative competence as the reflection of the females subordination and males power (coates, 1998, p. 413). the first scholar who made an academic study of gender differences in chinese is zhao yuanren. he noticed the potential gender differences in phonetics and tones. but it is until the 1980s that chinese linguists, such as cao zhiyun, hu mingyang, shi rujie, begun to study gender differences in china.since the 1990s, the study of gender differences in china has mainly been focusing on the translation and introduction of english works and theories about gender differences in english (qian, 2004, p. 47-50). chinese scholars have studied gender differences in terms of philosophy, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, pragmatics, lexicology, semantics, intercultural communication, psychology, sociolinguistics, and so on. though their studies cover a larger range, the number of the empirical studies in this field is limited, especially in business context. 3. sex differences in expressives in business context in this chapter, the author makes an analysis on the differences of expressives in business context. the topic is approached from the following aspects: 1) grammatical differences; 2) pragmatic differences. 3.1 grammatical differences in expressives3.1.1 lexical differences males and females differ lexically in representatives. several studies probe into the different adjectives used by males and females. the conclusions invariably indicate womens good command of descriptive words. women tend to use more so-called “empty adjectives”, which convey only emotion rather than specific information. those adjectives, such as adorable, charming, divine, lovely, neat and sweet, are commonly used by women but rarely used by men when making expressives. you may hear such expressives in business conversation:a: why not take a travel around this beautiful city when we finish the negotiation? b: a) what a terrific idea! b) what a divine idea! obviously, both a) and b) can be used by women. but for men, most of them only use a), if they use b), they will seem faggy.the following is another example. it is noticed that many female guests, after having a wonderful meal in a restaurant, would like to show gratitude to the waiter by saying:its a gorgeous meal. thank you.its beautiful. thanks a lot.the adjectives gorgeous and beautiful are seldom used to describe meals. but women use them here just to express their gratitude. it may be a little bit exaggerated for men to speak in this way.in business context, it is also found that women prefer to use mild words in expressives for something disagreeable or offensive, which makes them sound polite. look at the following example:male: your balance of 835 is delinquent. female: your balance of 835 is past due. in the above example, the woman uses more polite word “past due” to describe an offensive thing. on the contrary, men use more strong expressions “delinquent” to describe the same fact, taking no consideration of others face. 3.1.2 intonation differences intonation refers to the use of pitch or tone in a sentence to convey meanings or emotions. it is found that women use more rising tones and employ a larger variety of pitches in expressives in business context. 3.1.2.1 rising tonethis intonation differences can be explicated in two aspects. first, women tend to answer an inquiry in general question intonation. for example:boss: where is the layout?secretary: ohmaybe in the first drawer of your desk? according to the linguistic rules, the above answer should be given in a falling tone. but as marked with the rising arrow, females like to reply with the rising tone. that makes the answer sound like an inquiry. secondly, women like to use tag questions in rising tones. take the follow expressives as an example: oh, yes, its great, isnt it? what a fantastic idea, isnt it? some scholars take womens frequent use of tag questions as an indicator of their uncertainty, and others take it as a reflection of their politeness. 3.1.2.2 pitchesin addition, women use a wider range of pitches in expressives than men. womens speech is more dynamic and less monotonous. their greater variability in pitch can effectively show their feelings. in contrast, mens voice is considered as flat and they prefer to speak with few changes. it is found that the numbers of the fitches females use in business context are three times more than that used by males. 3.2 pragmatic differences in expressives according to grices cp (1975), participants should be cooperative in conversations, i.e., they should observe the maxims and sub-maxims of the cp, otherwise the conversation will be difficult to proceed. it is found that in business context, males and females differ in observing the cooperative principle. 3.2.1 sex differences in observing the maxim of quantitythe maxim of quantity requires the participants to try their best to make the contribution as informative as is required for the current purposes of the exchange but not to make the contribution more or less than what is required in conversations. in this sense, the acts of listening carefully, taking the turn smoothly and giving positive responses are all seen as observing the maxim of quantity, but the acts of refusing to take the turn, keeping silent or making delayed responses are seen as flouting the maxim of quantity. generally speaking, females tend to observe the maxim of quantity in conversations. they are talk-supporters. in business negotiation, it is found that females use more expressives as responses when they listen, such as oh, yes, great, mm, hmm, ssahh, which indicate their positive attention to the speaker. in this way, they indicate that they are attentive and encourage speakers to continue their speech. the number of positive responses in females expressives are four times than males responses. in the following examples, the dialogue between the two females and the dialogue between the female and the male illustrate the point well.1) female 1: there is an increasing demand for our product. female 2: mm, great. female 1: that is because of our competitive price. female 2: yes! female 1: i am sure we will have a much bigger market share in several weeks. female 2: mm mm.2) female: the product of this company is really very good! male : (no response) female: should we send them an offer? male: no, i dont think their price is reasonable. female: ok, i will contact other companies later. male: (no response)3.2. 2 sex differences in observing the maxims of quality and manner the maxim of quality requires participants to tell what they believe to be true or have adequate evidence, that is, to be responsible for what they say in conversations. the maxim of manner requires participants to express their ideas clearly, briefly and orderly. it is found that females tend to flout the maxim of manner and males frequently flout the maxim of quality in conversations. in business conversations, females dont like to perspicuously speak out their ideas either. their speech is usually equivocal or indecisive. for example, in lunchtime after a whole morning of business negotiation, the male manager asks his female client: “what would you like to eat for lunch?” the female client just answers: “anything is ok.” obviously the female clients speech doesnt clearly answer what she wants for lunch, and the male manager still knows nothing about what she wants. so from the pragmatic perspective, since she avoids clear expression in her conversation, the female client flouts the maxim of manner. males tend to flout the maxim of quality by boasting in conversations. for example, in a conversation about the coming guangzhou product exhibition, the male director says: “a piece of cake. i have made sufficient preparations. i dont think itll be a problem for us. our new product will surely attract many clients”. in this conversation, the male director says he has done sufficient preparations and that it is easy for them to succeed in the guangzhou product exhibition. but no matter how well they have prepared, it cannot be very easy to achieve success. whats more, since the guangzhou product exhibition hasnt been held, it is impossible for them to predict this unless they really do that. so according to the second sub-maxim of the maxim of quality- do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence- the male director flouts the maxim of quality in this conversation. 4. causes of the sex differencesmany scholars have studied sex differences in language, but they have not reached an agreement as to the causes. in this part i will explore the causes of sex differences in terms of social factors. most researchers see the linguistic differences between females and males as the result of the ways in which females and males are treated in society. females and males are treated differently at home, at school and in peer group since their childhood. in the family, parents have different expectations of boys and girls and thereforecultivate them to behave differently. generally speaking, fathers tend to be rude to boys while tender to girls. one typical example we often come across in daily life: when a little boy stumbles, his parents often say: “dont cry. you are a little true man.” when a little girl stumbles, her parents tend to comfort her. boys receive more encouragement as well as punishment from parents. boys and girls are given different styles of clothes and puppets almost from their birth. as the children grow up, they are trained to learn different life skills according to their sex; parents conversational styles also have great influence on children. in general, as it has been discussed before, as males fathers tend to be competitive; while as females mothers are cooperative and supportive. in fact, males and females learn to use the language not only by observing the way their parents talk at home but also by observing girls and boys interactions with each other at school. there are significant differences between boys and girls in their interactions. it is found that boys talk much more than girls in their interactions with each other. at school, boys and girls also learn from teachers some important, informal lessons about males, females and how they function with one another. teachers treat boys and girls differently. they hold different attitudes towards boys and girls. for example, teachers usually hold the opinion that boys can be boisterous, brave, while girls should be quiet and passive. also teachers have different expectations of boys and girls, i.e. boys are active and should achieve more in academic fields. besides teachers, gender bias exists in childrens textbooks and supplemental educational literature: the number of depictions of and references to males versus females and stereotypical role portrayals of male and female characters. according to qiang haiyan (2000), male characters dominate in chinese language textbooks in primary school. males in the school textbook are competitive, independent, and aggressive while females are tender, sensitive, soft, cooperative, and supportive. since teaching materials reflect social norms, the students regard them as models. numerical stereotyped behavior patterns and characteristics reflected in childrens literature teach girls to undervalue themselves and teach boys to believe that they must always be stereotypically masculine. the girls world and the boys world are embedded in the larger world of society, which is essentially male dominated. peer group is just one of the situations where social male dominance is reproduced and perpetuated. during the years when boys and girls acquire the basic part of their language usage patterns, they play in segregated single-gender peer groups and thus acquire different speech styles. in the process of socializing with peers, children generally tend to play with children of the same gender, resulting in different ways of creating rapport and negotiating status within group. much of our conversation style is learned from childhood play. they appreciate solidarity among peer grou