#languageandgender

Language remains a window into the mind: the words we have constructed over the last couple of decades reflect our new uncertainties and our new possibilities.

This Twitter post plays on the assumed stereotypes and identifiable difference between male and female written language as depicted on social media. Here, males convey their friendship in a seemingly emotionless, plain way, whereas females enjoy sharing emotional and personal connections to provide evidence for friendship. The stereotype is that men are informative, and females are expressive. Female “rapport talk” versus male “report talk” is how Deborah Tannen would categorize this language-gender intersection. Rapport talk “establishes and maintains social relationships” while report talk “conveys straightforward information rather than emotion or gossip” (Tannen 1990:74ff). 

What makes this Twitter post humorous is that it is based on assumptions. Speaking for myself, I laughed out loud because of the commonality in which I have seen this pattern via Instagram or Facebook birthday posts. Scrolling through social media, my female friends are those whom I see posting long, “sappy” birthday messages. My male friends hardly post for their friends’ birthday. If they do post, it is very simplistic and direct as shown in the Twitter post here. This naturally makes me thinks that girls verbally share more, and guys verbally share less.