Relationship between language,power and gender Essay

Relationship between language,power and gender - Essay Example Language, power and gender are highly related to each other. In order to understand the relationship between language, power and gender, let’s analyze their relationship with the other individually. Many scholars have commented on the relationship between language and the power people have on it. Writers have written many novels and stories on the issue the examples of which include Leslie Marmon Silko's short story Lullaby, Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of King Richard II and The Tempest, Frederick Douglass’s Learning to Read and Write, and Gloria Anzaldua’s How to Tame a Wild Tongue. All of these works convey the same message that language and power are interrelated to each other and one cannot survive without the other.Patel states in his article that â€Å"the way a person speaks or writes determines that person's power in the world.† Elaborating on this will give the whole idea how easy it is to define the social status of an individual while consi dering the language with which he defines himself.An analysis of languages spoken in different regions in the world shows that there are some languages which are recognized and spoken internationally, while there are other which are only spoken within a limited are like within a country. Even inside a country,there are many forms of that one language by which that country is known.This is a sad truth that for a country to progress in this competitive world and to eventually come in power,it is important to get acknowledged with the internationally known languages so as to facilitate the trade and business. Just getting acknowledged is not sufficient but to inculcate that language in the educational curricula is vital to raise the nation with an intense knowledge of that language so that the people of the country can read, write and speak that foreign language just like they easily go with their own mother tongue. This brings power. The relationship between power and gender raises qu estions like whether one gender is given advantage over the other so that one gendered is empowered and the other is left discriminated. The gender differences in many countries makes power stay stuck to only one gender like men are politically preferred to women. Similarly, there are gender discriminations at occupational workplaces due to which men are given chances to get better jobs and women are told to stay at home in front of the stove all day. â€Å"Although women have made gains in the workplace, with more women working than in the past and women possessing approximately a third of all management positions† (Colwill, as cited in Carli, 1999). Male children are also preferred to get higher education which later on offers them high paying jobs within and across the border. This reduces power for the female gender. The difference in social power between the two genders has given rise to the feminist theories which fought for the liberation of women so that they come out of their houses and stand on equal status as men to enjoy the different luxuries of life. Beeching (2004) affirms that the relationship between language and gender gives rise to man linguistic issues. According to her, â€Å"Men's and Women's Talk have arguably been demonstrated to show differences at the phonetic, syntactic, lexical and discourse levels.† Gender socialization affects the overall structure and use of a language. Language has defined the changing responsibilities and roles of the men and women in different walks of life, nationally and internationally. Simkins-Bullock and Wildman (1991, p. 149) have studied in their research the differences in gender in the use of a language and have come to the conclusion that there is much inconsistency among the scholars in agreeing whether or not the two genders use the same language differently. They state that scholars suggest that there are several ways in which the males and females make use of a language but other as pects should also be considered besides gender in