Facultat de Filosofia i Lletres

Memòria del Treball de Fi de Grau

A linguistic analysis of the representation of Kate

Middleton and Meghan Markle in the British press:
A corpus-based study

Aina Fullana Ribot

Grau d’Estudis Anglesos

Any acadèmic 2018-19

DNI de l’alumne: 41583168L

Treball tutelat per Lucía Loureiro Porto

Departament de Filologia Espanyola, Moderna i Clàssica

Autor Tutor
S'autoritza la Universitat a incloure aquest treball en el Repositori
Institucional per a la seva consulta en accés obert i difusió en línia, Sí No Sí No
amb finalitats exclusivament acadèmiques i d'investigació

Paraules clau del treball:

gender discourse, royal women, cultural difference approach, corpus linguistics
Abstract
The study of gender discourse has mainly focused on the differences in the speech produced by
men and women. However, there has been comparatively less discussion about the language
used to represent either gender, not to mention the influence that the cultural background of
people belonging to the same gender exerts on their representation. With the aim of contributing
to filling this gap, this dissertation focuses on the representation of two females who belong to
the same social group (the British royal family), as found in present-day British online press.
These women are Kate Middleton, the Duchess of Cambridge, and Meghan Markle, the
Duchess of Sussex. Although they share gender and rank, their cultural backgrounds set them
apart and that is hypothesized to influence their representation in the press. Therefore, the aim
of this paper is to reveal if there is a defamatory and disparaging discourse towards one of the
two women. For this purpose, a balanced corpus has been compiled taking two main extra-
linguistic variables into account: the political stance of the newspaper as well as the sex of their
authors. Likewise, several intra-linguistic variables are analysed: names and epithets, binomial
expressions and adjectives in reference to both Middleton and Markle. In doing so, this thesis
is intended to point out which the social tendencies and attitudes are in today’s British press.

Keywords
gender discourse, royal women, cultural difference approach, corpus linguistics

2
Table of Contents
1. Introduction……………………………………………………………………….…p. 4
2. Theoretical Background………………………………………………………….….p. 5
3. Methodology………..…………………………………………………………….…p. 8
4. Data and Discussion....………………………………………...…………….………p. 10
4.1. Names and Epithets………………………………….…………………….p. 10
4.2. Binomial Expressions……………………………………………………...p. 14
4.3. Adjectives………………………………………………………………….p. 17
5. Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………...p. 23
6. Works Cited……………………………………………………………….…………p. 25

3
1. Introduction
The study of gender discourse has mainly focused on the differences in the speech produced by
men and women. Therefore, a large amount of linguistic researchers have been carrying out
corpus-based studies in order to present a reliable analysis of the communication features
presented in both male and female speech. Additionally, other studies have been focusing on
the differences in language use that exist when representing both men and women in a corpus
(Baker 2014; Norberg 2016). However, there has been comparatively less discussion about the
language used to represent either gender, not to mention the influence that the cultural
background of people belonging to the same gender exerts on their representation. Although
there is not an extensive amount of coverage regarding the female representation, it has been
claimed that “women experience linguistic discrimination in two ways: in the way they are
taught to use language, and in the way general language use treats them” (Lakoff 1973, 46).
Thus, with the aim of contributing to filling this gap, this dissertation focuses on the
representation of two females who belong to the same social group, the British royal family, as
found in present-day British online press. These women are Kate Middleton, the Duchess of
Cambridge, and Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, who have generated great interest
amongst Britain’s readership. Although they share gender and rank, their cultural backgrounds
set them apart and that is hypothesised to influence their representation in the press. Therefore,
the aim of this paper is to reveal if there is a defamatory and disparaging discourse towards
either of the women.
For this purpose, a balanced corpus has been compiled taking two main extra-linguistic
variables into consideration: the political stance of the newspaper as well as the sex of their
authors. The data for this corpus has been compiled from a total of six different British online
newspapers raging from 2010 to 2019. Following the classification presented by YouGov
(2017), I have selected The Guardian, The Independent and The Mirror on behalf of left-wing
newspapers, and The Daily Express, The Daily Mail and The Sun in place of right-wing ones.
Concerning the analysis of the corpora, a first reading of the corpus was carried out in order to
pinpoint the three intra-linguistic variables explored in this study: names and epithets, binomial
expressions and adjectives in reference to both Middleton and Markle. Subsequently, a more
in-depth analysis of the results from this first reading was carried out with AntConc version
3.5.8 (Anthony 2019). Thus, a quantitative analysis of the most frequently used names and
epithets and binomial expressions is presented. Moreover, a qualitative analysis of the
adjectives with the highest frequency found in the corpus has been carried out taking Biber et

4
al.’s semantic classification of adjectives (Biber et al. 1999, 508). Finally, I briefly present some
thought-provoking examples using the adjective black in reference to Markle. In doing so, this
thesis is intended to point out which the social tendencies and attitudes are in today’s British
press.

2. Theoretical Background
A rather large amount of researchers have been approaching the study of gender and language
from two different perspectives: “the ‘cultural difference’ approach, as opposed to a ‘power’ or
‘dominance’ approach” (Tannen 1994, 9). According to Tannen, the latter implies that there is
an established set of hierarchical relations between the two genders (9). Therefore, she pinpoints
the groundless claim “that women’s and men’s styles can be understood in the framework of
cultural difference are represented as denying that dominance exists” which refutes by stating
that the cultural difference approach contributes to the explanation of how dominance is created
in face-to-face interaction (9-10). Gender dominance can be explicit but in most of the cases it
is so seamlessly integrated and rooted in our own culture that it goes unnoticed. Likewise,
following Butler’s words, “there is a ‘doer’ behind the deed” (Butler 1990, 25). As a
consequence of this dominance, social inequality emerges from what Tannen calls the “negative
stereotyping of minority cultural groups” (Tannen 1996, 9). For this reason, it is necessary to
consider Middleton and Markle’s cultural background who as females belong to a minority
group. Additionally, in Markle’s case, apart from being discriminated against for her sex, she
is also disfavoured by her ethnicity.
Lakoff, in turn, asserted that women suffer a linguistic discrimination in two different
ways: “in the way they are taught to use language, and in the way general language use treats
them” (Lakoff 1973, 46). Unlikely other studies (described in more detail further on in this
section), this essay presents a comparative study case of the language used in reference to two
females in the current online British press. Butler defines female representation within politics
as “the normative function of language which is said either to reveal or distort what is assumed
to be true about the category of women” (Butler 1990, 1). This, as she claims, has been central
in feminist theory since depending on the cultural background a woman belongs to, that woman
would be “either misrepresented or not represented at all” (1). Thus, for the purpose of this
present paper, I will focus on the written representation of Middleton and Markle to reveal if
there is a real distorted discourse towards one or another, or both. Although they share gender

5
and rank, their cultural backgrounds set them apart and that is hypothesised to influence their
representation in the media.
As reported by Tannen, the analysis of conversation is the main key to prove that
subordination and dominance arise from interaction (Tannen 1994, 10). There are four
principles which are fundamental to interactional sociolinguists:
(1) roles are not given but are created in interaction; (2) context is not given but is
constituted by talk and action; (3) nothing that occurs in interaction is the sole doing
of one party but rather is a “joint production,” the result of the interaction of
individuals’ ways of speaking; […] (4) linguistic features (such as interruption,
volume of talk, indirectness, and so on) can never be aligned on a one-to-one basis
with interactional intentions or meanings, in the sense that a word can be assigned a
meaning (Tannen 1994, 10).
Lakoff stated that the main reason why the two main types of linguistic discrimination
mentioned above take place is due to a clear deep-rooted preconception of women there is in
our culture (Lakoff 1973, 49), which is closely connected to the “negative stereotyping”
previously mentioned (Tannen 1994, 9). Therefore, the context established by what Tannen
calls “talk and action” (10) will play a very important role in the data analysis of this paper. In
Gregory Bateson’s book Steps to an Ecology of mind published in 1972 and in Erving
Goffman’s book Frame Analysis published in 1974 (quoted in Tannen 1994, 11) “no language
has meaning except by reference to how it is ‘framed’ or ‘contextualized’”. This idea was
acknowledged later on by Kendall and Tannen’s “context-sensitive” feature (Kendall and
Tannen 2001, 551). They claim that the gender-related variations found in language use are in
all likelihood to due to this context-sensitive feature (551). For this reason, this paper presents
a linguistic analysis of the language used to refer to both duchesses to reveal whether certain
words, which at a glance present a neutral connotation, can shift into a negative meaning.
In Lakoff’s own words, “women are discriminated against (usually unconsciously) by
the language everyone uses” (49). To date, there is still a deeply engrained custom in our culture
to unceasingly identify a woman in relation to a man. Lakoff refers to it as the sexual definition
of women which inquires “that a woman in most subcultures in our society achieves status only
through her father’s, husband’s, or lover’s position” (62-65). Therefore, the data analysis in this
thesis includes a section that focuses on the examination of the main binomials used regarding
both royal women. According to Kopaczyk and Sauer, binomials are defined as “a coordinated
pair of linguistic units of the same word class which show some semantic relation” (Kopaczyk
and Sauer 2017, 3). For the purpose of the paper, I will explore the most frequently used

6
gendered binomials. That is to say, binomial expressions that follow either the male-female or
the female-male pattern (e.g. William and Kate, Meghan and Harry).
Even though this thesis focuses on the comparison of how these two duchesses are
represented in online British press, it is interesting to add “another type of gender bias” (Baker
2014, 92). In Freebody and Baker’s The Construction and Operation of Gender in Children’s
First School Books’ in Women, Language and Society in Australia and New Zealand published
in 1987 (quoted in Baker 2014, 92) they refer to “male firstness”, which claims that in cases
where both sexes are being mentioned the male is more likely to occupy the first position. Thus,
the order of any possible gendered binominals regarding both duchesses will be closely
analysed as well.
As Lakoff infers “we can interpret our overt actions, or our perception, in accordance
with our desires, distorting them as we fit. But linguistic data are there, in black and white, or
on tape, unambiguous and unavoidable” (Lakoff 1973, 46). Consequently, corpus-based studies
have been increasing over the past decades to give a real representation of current gender issues
and language use, and show that linguistic imbalances are worth studying since they offer a real
representation of the inequities there are in the world today (73). Thus, in the last part of this
section, I explore which are the main gender discourse studies that have been carried out most
recently, and from which I will base my own. Lakoff (1973), Baker (2014) and Norberg (2016)
focus not only on the speech and communication differences between males and females, but
also on the analysis of collocational patterns used in reference to both genders.
In Lakoff’s study, linguistic evidence is presented to reveal the inequity between the
roles of men and women (Lakoff 1973, 46). In order to do so, she focuses on both the way
women speak by exploring the lexicon, the syntactic structures and the type of language used
to refer to the two genders (45). Thus, she explores the following pairs of words: lady: woman,
master: mistress, widow: widower, and Mr.: Mrs., Miss, to study the differences in connotation
these present (45). In turn, Baker (2014) and Norberg (2016) focus on how male and female are
distinctively represented in corpora. Baker’s book is aimed to both corpus linguists and gender
researchers. Thus, he presents a thorough introduction to what gender studies are and what the
way to approach them using corpora is. The two main analysis given in his book from which I
have based my own are: the analysis of the discourse prosodies used by the Daily Mail in the
representation of gay men in this newspaper and the study of collocational patterns of the
lemmas BOY and GIRL (Baker 2014). The latter corpus-based study found in Baker’s book has
been expanded in Norberg’s study in which she examines “what verbs collocate with lemmas
BOY and GIRL as subject and object and what words modify them in a worldwide corpus of

7
English” (Norberg 2016, 2). For the purpose of this paper I have followed a similar
methodology used in the above mentioned studies. Although these two papers analyse how both
male and female are differently represented in a corpus and I focus on the representation of two
females, I explore whether Middleton and Markle’s cultural background differences influence
on their representation in the press.

3. Methodology
The data for this study has been compiled from a total of six different British online newspapers.
Two main variables have been taken into account in order to gather the articles that form this
corpus: the political stance of the newspaper – left-wing and right-wing – and the sex of their
authors. In order to select and classify these six newspapers, I followed a recent survey taken
in February of 2017 in which the British audience was asked their views on “where mainstream
national newspapers sit on the left-right political spectrum” (YouGov, 2017). Following their
classification, I have chosen the three newspapers that fell in each side of the spectrum.
Therefore, left-wing articles have been gathered from The Guardian, The Independent and The
Mirror. In turn, right-wing articles have been compiled from The Daily Express, The Daily
Mail and The Sun.
Consequently, I have built a balanced corpus of articles raging from 2010 to 2019. All
the articles in this corpus were individually gathered from the already mentioned newspapers’
webpages by typing the names of the duchesses (e.g. Kate Middleton, Meghan Markle) in the
search bar. Thus, the most recent articles would load directly. I would like to emphasise that
the coverage given by left-wing and right-wing newspapers is counterbalanced. Left-wing
newspapers do not tend to write as much articles about the royal family as frequently as right-
wing ones. Additionally, I have noticed that the current coverage on Markle, in both left-wing
and right-wing newspapers, is wider than the one on Middleton. For this reason, I had to expand
the period back to 2010 in order to have a similar amount of articles and words for each duchess
and maintain my corpus balanced in that respect. However, although I tried to maintain the
same number of articles in regard to the sex of their authors, the lack of male columnists in both
left-wing and right-wing newspapers has made it impossible to maintain this extra-linguistic
variable balanced in the corpus. In sum, this corpus amounts to a total of 361 articles and a total
of 222,520 words (see Table 1).

8
 In order to carry out the analysis of the corpora, I did a thorough reading of the articles.
In doing so, I wrote down the most frequently used epithets and adjectives that collocated with
the first names (e.g. Kate, Meghan), full names (e.g. Kate Middleton, Meghan Markle) and/or
official royal titles (e.g. Duchess of Cambridge, Duchess of Sussex) of both duchesses. Besides,
a list of the most used binomial expressions (e.g. Duke and Duchess, Harry and Meghan,
William and Kate) was gathered at the same time. The main reason for this highly time-
consuming first manual analysis was the impossibility of carrying out an automatic analysis
due to the variety of names and epithets these women are given by the different columnists.
Subsequently, a more in-depth analysis was carried out with AntConc version 3.5.8 (Anthony
2019).
For the purpose of this paper, a quantitative analysis of the most frequently used names
– first name, full name and official royal title – comparing both left-wing and right-wing articles
will be presented along with the most frequently used epithets (e.g. Catherine, Meg) for each
one of the duchesses. Additionally, a similar quantitative analysis is given in regard to the
fifteen most frequently used binomial phrases (e.g. William and Kate, Meghan and Harry, Kate
and Meghan). Plus, in this section, I will explore the order in which gendered binomials
following a male-female and a female-male pattern are presented. Finally, I will carry out a
qualitative analysis of the adjectives with the highest frequency found in the corpus for both
Middleton and Markle. To do this, Biber et al.’s semantic classification of adjectives has been
followed (Biber et al. 1999, 508). Their classification includes the following types of adjectives:
(i) color, (ii) size/quantity/extent, (iii) time, (iv) evaluative/emotive and (v) miscellaneous
descriptive (508-9). However, I have only focused on one of the semantic groups, namely on

9
the evaluative and/or emotive adjectives particularly. To close the analysis, I briefly present
some thought-provoking sentences using the adjective black with the aim of exploring the
“negative stereotyping of minority cultural groups” (Tannen 1996, 9), since it presents a rather
high frequency when making reference to Markle.

4. Data and Discussion

4.1. Names and Epithets
To start with the analysis, frequency data for the most used names examined in reference to
both duchesses are presented in Table 2.

The total number of times both duchesses’ first name is used in the corpus is very close,
1455 for Kate and 1799 for Meghan. However, a chi-square test discloses that the difference
between the absolute frequency of Meghan is significant (c2 = 18.2285; p < 0.00002). Given
these results, this could indicate the fact that Meghan Markle’s recent marriage to Prince Harry
in 2018 has been the main focus of newspapers in the UK. Besides, there is a slight difference
in the total number of hits for Duchess of Cambridge in comparison to Duchess of Sussex. Thus,
as it has been shown by a second chi-square test, the disparity between the absolute frequency
of Duchess of Cambridge is significant (c2 = 17.4379; p < 0.00003). Considering this, it could
be mentioned that Duchess of Cambridge has been acknowledged by the public since Prince
William and Kate Middleton’s wedding in 2011. Consequently, she has been on the British
national landscape with that royal title for more than eight years. Thus, it is reasonable that the
number of hits for Duchess of Cambridge nearly doubles the number of hits for Duchess of
Sussex, whose engagement with Prince Harry was made public in 2017.

10
 In addition, it is interesting to see the disproportion between the numbers for Meghan,
considering that left-wing newspapers have a total of 680 hits compared to a total of 1,119 hits
in right-wing newspapers. Hence, a third chi-square test reveals that the difference between the
absolute frequency of Meghan in left-wing and right-wing newspapers is statistically significant
(c2 = 54.3582; p < 0.0000). Given this results, it seems that right-wing newspapers tend to
overuse Markle’s first name as a way of showing a subtle rejection towards the figure of the
Duchess of Sussex and her role within the royal family.
In this section I also present an analysis of the most frequently used epithets for both
duchesses. It might be reiterated that an automatic analysis for the study of these epithets was
impossible to carry out. Therefore, all examples have been checked manually. The most
common ones in reference to Middleton are listed in Table 3. Epithets such as Kate, Kate
Middleton, duchess or Duchess of Cambridge were eliminated from this list since not only have
they been already discussed in Table 2, but also they are the most straightforward when
representing the duchess. Consequently, the first example with the highest frequency is
Catherine (Middleton’s full first name). Even though she has always been referred to as Kate,
Kate Middleton and/or Duchess of Cambridge by the public, some columnists still refer to her
as such.

However, as shown in (1), Catherine is followed by a peripheral dependent (e.g.

Duchess of Cambridge) in order to emphasise the role she plays within the royal family. Surely,
there is a certain tendency of columnists to use this epithet accompanied with other names. See
(2), where Catherine is used as part of a binomial phrase together with William.

(1) IT seems that Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, won’t be able to return the favour
as bridesmaid when it comes to sister Pippa Middleton’s nuptials. (The Sun, 2016-
November-03)

11
 (2) William and Catherine surprised many with their choice of Thomas’s Battersea for
George over more traditional royal schools. (The Daily Mail, 2018-December-27)

Although the epithet found in (3), Prince William’s fiancée, is not as frequent compared
to binomials expressions, it is intriguing to note that left-wing columnists tend to make
reference to Middleton in relation to her husband. Nevertheless, a closer analysis to binomial
structures and how these women are related to their respective husbands can be found in section
4.2.

(3) Prince William's fiancée represents a level of social climbing. (The Guardian, 2010-
November-21)

Additionally, when columnists refer to Middleton solely, the vast majority of examples
make reference to the attire she is wearing either to formal events or public places. This is
clearly illustrated in (4) and (5) respectively.

(4) 30 photographs from a selection of 200 which show Catherine arriving on the terrace
in a red robe, before applying sun cream and sunbathing. (The Guardian, 2012-
September-16)

(5) The mum-of-three coupled the gown with dazzling Jimmy Choo heels. (The Mirror,
2019-February-10)

In turn, the most frequently used epithets for Markle are shown in Table 4. In this case,
epithets such as Meghan, Meghan Markle, duchess or Duchess of Sussex have been disregarded
from the list as well.

12
 The name with the highest frequency is Meg, a hypocoristic form of Meghan (Markle’s first
name). Interestingly, the recurrence of this diminutive form in right-wing tabloids is very high.
Although Meg is used to refer to the duchess as the subject of a clause (see [6] below), it is
more commonly used to construct sensational and attractive headlines (see [7], [8] and [9]
below).

(6) Meg will be flying home refreshed and relaxed - and with a lot of new baby clothes.'
(The Daily Mail, 2019-February-27)

(7) MEGGING AMENDS. It’s up to ‘senior’ Kate Middleton to end ‘feud’ with royal
newcomer Meghan Markle, relationship expert insists.’ (The Sun, 2019-February-
20)

(8) BIG MEG-STAKE. The Queen fears Meghan Markle’s lavish £300K baby shower
is ‘rubbing people’s noses in her wealth’, says Piers Morgan.’ (The Sun, 2019-
February-22)

(9) MEG-A CLOSE. How does Meghan Markle know Serena Williams and how long
have they been friends? (The Sun, 2019-February-21)

The second most commonly used epithet for Markle, particularly in right-wing
newspapers, is mother-to-be. This appellation generally presents a fairly neutral connotation as
it can be seen in (10) and (11).

(10) The mother-to-be dipped incredibly low after shaking hands with King Mohammed
VI in Rabat on Monday evening. (The Daily Mail, 2019-February-2019)

(11) Other reports claim the mother-to-be has tried to reach out to her father to no avail.
(The Daily Express, 2019-March-2)

According to The New York Times Manual of Style and Usage edited by Lewis Jordan
in 1976 (quoted in Fasold 1987, 189) discloses that “besides avoiding designations that are
obviously disparaging—such as doll, weaker sex or the little woman— we should be aware of
undesirable subtleties of meaning that can be conveyed in some contexts by otherwise

13
innocuous terms like housewife, comely brunette, girl, grandmother, divorcee, sculptress and
numerous others”. Nonetheless, The Guardian makes use of the word divorcee several times.
A term naturally classified as innocuous once it is given a context its connotation is none other
than a pejorative and detracting one (see [12] and [13]). Example (12), in particular, shows a
clear hierarchical dominance. Harry, a white British prince is married to a foreign female who
has already been married before. On top of this, this epithet is preceded by the adjective
American in both cases. Nonetheless, American as an adjective will be further analysed in
section 4.3.

(12) Harry, a prince, is married to an American divorcee. (The Guardian, 2018-

November-28)

(13) Just over 80 years later, another American divorcee, Meghan Markle, is set to
give the British monarchy a new lease of life. (The Guardian, 2018-April-20)

4.2. Binomial Expressions

Following the same manual analysis used to compile both names and epithets, these binomial
expressions have been gathered, first, reading the whole corpus and writing them down, and
secondly, using AntConc to examine the frequency of the results from that first reading. Thus,
a list of more than thirty gendered binomials has been compiled. However, for the purpose of
this paper, I have studied the fifteen most frequently used ones (see Table 5).
According Kopaczyk and Sauer, binomials are defined as “a coordinated pair of
linguistic units of the same word class which show some semantic relation” (Kopaczyk and
Sauer 2017, 3). The binomials explored in this paper fall into the semantic category of
“relational expressions”, which mainly relate a male and a female (e.g. mum and dad, men and
women) (Biber et al. 1999, 1033). However, the examples presented above are more specific
since they make use of either the first name, the full name or the official royal title of both
duchesses and their respective husbands. As seen in Table 5, out of the fifteen examples, eight
follow the male-female pattern, four follow a female-male pattern, and just three follow a
female-female pattern.

14
 Lakoff defined the “sexual definition of a woman”, which refers to the fact that “a
woman is identified in terms of the men she relates to” (Lakoff 1973, 65). In turn, in Freebody
and Baker’s The Construction and Operation of Gender in Children’s First School Books’ in
Women, Language and Society in Australia and New Zealand published in 1987 (quoted in
Baker 2014, 92) they refer to “male firstness”, which explains that in cases where both sexes
are being mentioned the male is more likely to occupy the first position. A part from the three
cases in which both duchesses are paired together, following a female-female pattern (e.g.
Meghan and Kate, Kate and Meghan and Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton), the rest of
binomials relate Middleton and/or Markle with their respective partners. Thus, it is interesting
to see that four out of the five most frequently used binomial phrases in the corpus follow a
male-female pattern. Taking this into account, I would argue that there is still a deeply
engrained custom in our culture to unceasingly identify a woman in relation to a man. For this
reason, the tendency that the vast majority of columnists have to follow this male-female pattern
is not groundbreaking. After comparing the frequency levels in Table 5, there is just about the
same number of hits in both left-wing and right-wing newspapers, which shows general
tendency towards male firstness in the current British press.
In order to present a closer analysis, I have examined whether the end-weight principle
is applicable in the twelve examples that follow either a male-female structure or a female-male
structure. The principle of end-weight is defined as “the tendency for long and complex
elements to be placed towards the end of a clause” (Biber et.al 1999, 898). Even though I am

15
studying binomial phrases and not clauses, by counting the number of words of each part
comprised in the structure in question, the weight can be calculated. Furthermore, I have
counted the syllables in each of the parts as well to see if any discrepancies could be found in
comparison to the word count (see Table 6).

Interestingly, in both Prince Harry and Meghan and Prince William and Kate the
principle of end-weight is not applicable. The longer part of the binomial phrase is placed at
the beginning in both cases, likewise the weighty part makes reference to the duchesses’
husbands. Therefore, these two examples illustrate the male firstness feature. Moreover, in
cases such as William and Kate, Meghan Markle and Prince Harry and Kate Middleton and
Prince William, the word count analysis states that the end-weight principle stays neutral, since
both parts present the same weight. Contrarily, the syllable count analysis reveals that the end-
weight principle does not apply in these gendered binomials. Thus, in cases like Meghan Markle
and Prince Harry and Kate Middleton and Prince William where the male is not given
precedence and the female is placed at the beginning, I would question whether it may be due
to whom the columnist wants to focus on in that part of the article. Nonetheless, further research
is needed in this respect. A thorough analysis on the context given in each of these cases should
be carried out in order to present a more conclusive answer.

16
4.3. Adjectives
This section presents the analysis of the most commonly used adjectives regarding both
Middleton and Markle. In order to so, I have followed Biber et al.’s semantic grouping of
adjectives (Biber et al. 1999, 508). Within the two main semantic domains (descriptors and
classifiers), the latter includes the following types of adjectives: (i) color, (ii)
size/quantity/extent, (iii) time, (iv) evaluative/emotive and (v) miscellaneous descriptive (508-
9). I have namely focused on the evaluative and/or emotive adjectives in particular, which are
used to denote judgements, affect and emphasis (509). For the purpose of this paper, the list of
adjectives has been reduced to the five most frequently used adjectives for Middleton and
Markle. Methodologically, after a first reading of the corpus making note of the most striking
adjectives, I proceeded to use AntConc to carry out a more detailed search. Thus, by inserting
the most commonly used names regarding both duchesses (see Table 2) in the search bar, I was
able to study each example individually. Adjectives such as royal, private, black and pregnant
have been dismissed from these lists for several reasons. For instance, royal presents a total of
1257 hits in the corpus, and knowing that this word can function as a noun and as an adjective
a manual analysis to distinguish its function in each of the examples was impossible to carry
out. Likewise, adjectives such as private and pregnant presented a similar problem. With a total
of 174 and 156 hits respectively, a detailed analysis was unattainable. However, at the end of
this section I will briefly present several thought-provoking examples that make use the colour
adjective black, with the aim of exploring the “negative stereotyping of minority cultural
groups” (Tannen 1996, 9) in reference to Markle.
The most frequently used adjectives for Middleton are presented in Table 7. The number
of adjectives that collocated with either Kate or the Duchess of Cambridge in the attributive
position was very scarce, since the vast majority of examples collocated with William (e.g.
William and Kate) or with the definite article the (e.g. the Duchess of Cambridge). Thus, I have
found a larger number of examples of adjectives in the predicative position.

17
 The adjective with the highest frequency presents a negative connotation. In 2017,
several topless photographs of Middleton sunbathing, which had been taken before she got
married with Prince William, were leaked by a French magazine. Thus, the British press made
sure to provide an extensive coverage of such scandal. Interestingly, left-wing newspapers
present a total of 21 hits for topless, which compared to the total number of 7 hits in right-wing
newspapers is reasonably higher. This result was fairly surprising, since the data analysis
presented until this point has indicated that right-wing newspapers were more likely to follow
a tendency towards sensationalism. Examples (14) and (15) illustrate the use of this adjective
in both the attributive and the predicative position respectively.

(14) Trial of topless Kate Middleton photographers is delayed five months. (The
Independent, 2017-January-4)

(15) DUCHESS NUDE CASE Trial begins for six accused of profiting from pictures of
Kate Middleton sunbathing topless. (The Sun, 2017-January-4)

The second most commonly used adjective to refer to Middleton presents a positive
connotation. Stylish is generally found in the attributive position (see [16]), providing a direct
judgment of the duchess. However, if it is used in the predicative position, it makes special
reference to her attire (see [17]). Therefore, the emphasis is given to the sophisticated clothes
and/or complements she is wearing, which in many cases accents who the designer is, or even
the cost of the piece of clothing.

(16) An ever-stylish Kate cut a classic figure in a red custom made Catherine Walker
dress coat with a burgundy collar and matching hat. (The Daily Mail, 2018-
December-27)
(17) Kate Middleton indulges her need for tweed in a chic and stylish Chanel suit. (The
Mirror, 2019-February-13)

Another positive adjective, mainly found in the predicative position, is determined. This
adjective is mostly used to highlight the duchess’ attitude towards social concerns and
environmental issues as seen in examples (18) and (19). Overall, this adjective presents
Middleton as a very caring and resolutive duchess.

18
 (18) As a mother of three, the Duchess is determined to raise the profile of children's
mental health as one of her key roles in the Royal Family. (The Mirror, 2019-
February-5)
(19) The 36-year-old duchess [of Cambridge] is determined to push ahead because she
sees it as potentially as big an issue as climate change. (The Daily Mail, 2019-
February-6)

The fourth adjective in this list is thin. Even though thin is a neutral adjective used to
describe a person’s physical condition, in both (20) and (21), it is used negatively. After her
wedding with Prince William back in 2011, columnists (left-wing in particular) started
questioning Middleton’s physical state and contemplating the possibility of this being caused
by her new life style as new member of the royal family (see [21]). Interestingly, both examples
are preceded either by a noun (e.g. pencil) or a adverb (e.g. too) to further intensify the negative
connotation in which this adjective is presented.

(20) Her [Kate’s] pencil-thin appearance has led to speculation. (The Guardian, 2012-
March-20)

(21) ‘Duchess of Cambridge is too thin and has a “bastard of a job”, Germaine Greer
says.’ (The Guardian, 2014-September-29)

The last adjective in regard to Middleton is hands-on, a positive adjective which mainly
collocates with the mum (see [22]). Despite having a very busy lifestyle, Middleton is portrayed
as a very caring mum by the media. She definitely shows her mothering side to the public,
which results in a positive representation of her being involved in the daily life of her three
children.
(22) Kate is a hands-on mum. She takes four-year-old Prince George to school as much
as possible and helps Princess Charlotte up when she stumbles. (The Daily Mirror,
2018-August-15)

Table 8 presents the five most frequently used adjectives for Markle. Former and
American are the highest in frequency with a total number of 102 and 98 hits respectively. At
a glance, the difference between left-wing and right-wing use of these two adjectives seems
fairly equal.

19
 Both left-wing and right-wing newspapers make use of former quite recurrently to make
reference to Markle’s past career unbiasedly (see [23] and [24]).

(23) The former actress married into the Royal Family. (The Daily Express, 2019-
February-22)

(24) The former Suits actress who married Prince Harry in May. (The Daily Mail, 2018-
December-27)

However, there is a clear tendency for left-wing newspapers to make use of the affiliate
adjective American, use to define “the national or religious group to which a referent belongs
to” (Biber et al. 1999, 509). Examples (25) and (26) illustrate the constant use of this adjective
to make reference to Markle, which distinctly accentuates the idea that Meghan is not British.
Therefore, I would maintain that this presents a relentless hint of disapproval in having a foreign
duchess in the royal family.

(25) A mixed race American divorcee actress. (The Guardian, 2018-May-20)

(26) We have our first African-American princess. (The Guardian, 2018-May-19)

The third and fourth adjectives in Table 8 present a negative meaning as well. Even
though Lavish does not make direct reference to Markle, it is repeatedly used to point out how
expensive-looking and luxurious Markle’s events are, in particular her baby shower celebrated
in New York last February (see [27] and [28]). Interestingly, right-wing newspapers have a
total number of 51 hits for lavish, compared to a total of 14 hits in left-wing newspapers. This
emphasises the constant tendency of right-wing newspapers towards rumours and scandals,
which results on continued exasperation from their readership towards Markle.

20
 (27) The eye-watering cost and extraordinarily lavish nature of Meghan's trip to New
York has caused some disquiet in Britain (The Daily Mail, 2019-February-26)

(28) I think Prince William will be angered by all of Meghan's lavish extravagance this
week and the fact her baby shower looked so 'celebrity' rather than 'royal'." (The
Mirror, 2019-February-23)

In turn, difficult is mainly used in collocation with Duchess (see [29] and [30]). In (29),
in particular, the right-wing columnist is making a play on words in which the use of alliteration
can be spotted (e.g. Duchess Dazzling to Duchess Difficult). Once again, this stresses the
recurring tendency towards sensationalistic phrases when making special reference to Markle.
Particularly in (30), where “the UK press negativity” is discussed by Markle’s close circle of
friends. This reasserts this unfavorable and pejorative portrayal of Meghan Markle in the British
press.

(29) Meghan has quickly morphed from Duchess Dazzling to Duchess Difficult. (The
Sun, 2019-February-16)

(30) Meghan's friends have seen her depicted in the UK press negativity, labelled as
Duchess Difficult. (The Mirror, 2019-February-6)

The last adjective from Markle’s list is successful which is predominantly used by both
left-wing and right-wing newspapers to illustrate her past career as an actress in a positive
manner (see [31] and [32]).

(31) Meghan's life now is nothing to scoff at: she's a successful actor and has an
impressive career. (The Independent, 2017-November-27)

(32) Meghan is clearly a smart, independent woman with a successful career. (The Daily
Express, 2019-March-2)

In the last part of this section, I briefly present several striking and thought-provoking
examples of the use of the adjective black in reference to Markle, particularly in left-wing
newspapers. This colour adjective presents a total number of 221 hits, thus a systematic analysis

21
was unattainable since the vast majority of examples were followed by nouns such as
accessories, boots, clutch, dress, handbag, heels, leather, outfit, skirt and tights, among others.
However, when used in regard to Markle, it presents a pejorative and disapproving discourse
towards the duchess (see [33], [34] and [35]).

(33) Meghan’s casting as a Disney villain a black female divorcee. (The Guardian,
2018-December-3)

(34) The excitement about a black princess simply underlines how anachronistic the
royal family really is. (The Guardian, 2018-May-20)

(35) The rumour itself is enough – the angry black woman [Markle] making a
Defenseless white woman [Middleton] cry is exactly the kind of thing the press
has prepped for since Meghan entered the royal family. (The Guardian, 2018-
December-17)

The examples listed above illustrate what Tannen calls the “negative stereotyping of
minority cultural groups (Tannen 1996, 9). The rejection towards Markle is unquestionable: not
merely is she a woman, but she is also biracial. Additionally, the use of the colour adjective
black underlines the idea that she is a foreigner and reasserts once again the rejection towards
her role within the royal British family. Likewise, following Tannen’s words, “roles are not
given but created in interaction” (10). Due to the constant interaction between British
columnists and their readership these two females are prejudged and criticised by the engrained
prejudiced fixed in our culture. In example (33), Markle was assigned the role of the villain
from the first moment she entered the British national scene. Thus, this “joint production”
created in both left-wing and right-wing newspapers is accentuated by the constant “talk and
action” (10) of their readers. In truth, the more sensationalist and scandalous headlines are, the
more appealing they are for general public. Consequently, these contributions enforce the
buildup of these negative stereotypes, which at the same time influence the representation of
these two women.

22
5. Conclusion
The findings of this investigation confirm Lakoff’s words in regard to the linguistic
discrimination exerted on women by the way language is used to represent them (Lakoff 1973,
46). Although what has been presented in this paper is a fairly preliminary analysis, I have come
to some conclusions worthy of mentioning. As it has been demonstrated in the analysed data
above, right-wing newspapers show a clear tendency towards sensationalism. Evidence of this
can be found not merely in the use of catchy and to some extent scandalous headlines, but also
in the constant use of hypocoristic forms and first names (e.g. Meg and Megan) in order to refer
to Markle. By doing this, a certain rejection towards the figure of Markle and her role within
the British royal family can be grasped when reading the articles from which the examples
presented above have been taken from. Left-wing newspapers are not far behind in presenting
a similar representation of Markle. Although they do present a more muted discourse towards
both women, they still make use of troublesome adjectives: topless and/or thin, in relation to
Middleton, and American, divorcee and/or black to refer to Markle. At a first glance, these
adjectives seem innocuous, but once they are analysed within the context presented in the
articles, they portray a negative description towards its antecedent. Thus, it must be
acknowledged that both left-wing and right-wing newspapers contribute to the linguistic
discrimination towards these two females.
Notwithstanding Middleton’s overall representation is comparatively more positive
than Markle’s, it still presents some negative stereotyping as well. However, I would like to
emphasise that this negative stereotyping is found in concrete articles concerning her past
behaviour before entering the royal family. However, Markle’s overall representation and the
numerous examples presented throughout the analysis hints this relentless disapproval from the
columnists in having a foreign duchess in the royal family. In light of this, I argue that this
study does reveal that there is an unambiguously objectionable and pejorative discourse towards
Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex. As Butler claims there is always “a ‘doer’ behind the
deed” (Butler 1990, 25). By stating these, I do not intent to place the blame on the columnists
and their readership. Nonetheless, their interaction does portray the deep-seated prejudices
engrained in our society that contribute to the negative stereotyping of Markle, because not only
is she a woman, but she is also biracial. Thus, I would affirm that we, as in our culture, are the
“doers” behind this indisputable linguistic discrimination towards Meghan Markle.
Nonetheless, this explanation must remain speculative, since this paper represents a rather small

23
part of the British press’ articles in regard to both duchesses. Therefore, further research on this
topic is needed and encouraged.

24
6. Works Cited
Anthony, Laurence. 2019. "AntConc (Version 3.5.8)". Tokyo: Waseda University.
http//www.laurenceanthony.net/software.
Baker, Paul. 2014. Using Corpora to Analyze Gender. London: Bloomsbury.
Biber, Douglas, Stig Johansson, Geoffrey Leech, Susan Conrad & Edward Finegan. 1999.
Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English. Harlow, England: Pearson
Education Limited.
Butler, J. 1990. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York:
Routledge.
Fasold, Ralph. 1987. “Language Policy and Change: Sexist language in the periodical news
media.” In Language Spread and Language Policy: Issues, Implications, and Case
Studies, edited by Peter H Lowenberg, 187–206. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown
University Press.
Kendall, Shari and Deborah Tannen. 2001. ‘Discourse and Gender.’ In The Handbook of
Dicourse Analysis, edited by Deborah Schiffrin, Deborah Tannen, and Heidi E.
Hamilton, 548-567. UK: Blackwell.
Kopaczyk, Joanna, and Hans Sauer. 2017. Binomials in the History of English: Fixed and
Flexible. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lakoff, Robin. 1973. “Language and Woman’s Place.” In Language in Society 2 (1): 45-80.
Norberg, Cathrine. “Naughty Boys and Sexy Girls: The Representation of Young Individuals
in a Web-Based Corpus of English.” Journal of English Linguistics 44, no. 4 (December
2016): 291–317.
Tannen, Deborah. 1994. Gender and Discourse. Oxford and New York: Oxford University
Press.
You Gov. 2017. “How left or right-wing are UK’s newspapers?” Media, Politics & current
affairs. Accessed February 22, 2019. https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/articles-
reports/2017/03/07/how-left-or-right-wing-are-uks-newspapers

25