Language and Gender in English Language Teaching

Murni Mahmud

([email protected])

Universitas Negeri Makassar, Indonesia

The data collected in 2008 from 20 males and 20 females’ English students of the State
University of Makassar. These different styles of female and male students in learning English
were affected by the notions of women’s lan-guage. It explores students’ learning styles as
affected by the notions about men and women differences in communication.

It is to reveal their attitudes towards speaking to different sex, strategy to express opinion, group
work preferences, activeness/passiveness, and their perception to increase Eng-lish skills dealing
with sex difference. It is revealed that female than male students were reluctant to speak to
different sex; females preferred the direct way to express opinions (writing), work with the same
sex, and tended to be passive in class. This paper highlights the impact of gender differences in
English Lan-guage Teaching.

Their impacts can not only be seen in political life, where women fight their political rights, or in
households, in which women fight to reduce household harassment. Discourse on gender
differences, in fact, also exists in the use of language for communi-cation, highlighting that men
and women are different in their ways of commu-nication, and therefore they should be treated
differently.

This discourse had been hotly and creatively debated since Lakoff (1976) and Tannen (1990), in
their study on English speaking countries, illuminated the concept of women’s language which
highlights the existence of men and women differences in communication.

One study by Griffin et al (1999) looked at the use of nonverbal communication: eye contact,
gestures, smiles, personal space, touch, and interpretation of nonverbal cues, and found that 67.5
per cent of females establish more eye contact than men do; 75.5 per cent use more ges-tures
than males and 83.7 per cent typically smile more often than a male does. You know, sort of,
well, you see), tag questions (she’s very nice, isn’t she? One characteristic of women’s language
as stated by Lakoff (1976) is the great tendency of women in using lexical hedges or fillers (e.g.
This result shows that women are more comfortable using sensitive communi-cators than verbal
communication.

Other research on language and gender also reveals the differences be-tween men and women in
using language for communication. Tymson (1998:8) classifies differences on men and women
in communica-tion as seen in Table 1: Table 1. This article will also look at how gender dif-
ferences in language and communication affect students’ strategies in learning English. Because
of those differences, men and women are treated differently. Male and Female Style of
Communication Male Style Female Style Focus on information Focus on relationship Report
style of speaking Rapport style of speaking Goal driven Process oriented Single-task approach
Multi-task approach Succinct language Storytelling style of speech Working towards a
destination On a journey Need to know the answers Want to ask the right questions These
differences on men and women communication may affect expecta-tions for men and women in
various fields of life. In the area of English Language Teaching, in which female and male stu-
dents interact to each other by using English for their communication, pro-blems caused by men
and women’s differences in using language may be affecting. Eckert (1998:64) states that
‘gender practices differ considerably from culture to culture, from place to place, from group to
group, living at the intersection of all the other aspects of social iden-tity’.

There were 85% of female students who felt reluctant to speak English to male students whereas
only 50% male students who felt reluctant to speak English to female students. Students’
Reluctance to Speak English with Different Sex The first observed aspect was whether the
students feel reluctant to speak English with different sex. From the whole population, there were
more female students than male students who felt reluctant to speak English to different sex. In
fact, the rest of the male re-spondents (20%) felt more enjoyable to speak English with their
female coun-terparts. Their reasons can be seen in the following table: Table 2: Students’
Reasons to Feel Reluctant to Speak English with Differ-ent Sex Females’ Reasons Males’
Reasons Males are arrogant, like to show up Females get offended easily Not good in English
Only if females are smarter Ashamed to make mistakes Feeling shy to females Afraid to
communicate to male at all Nervous Males sometimes speak rough Not convenient Males are
difficult to understand Not free to express. It is different from female students in which only 15%
of them who were not reluctant to speak English with their male counterparts. Most of the female
respondents preferred working with single sex group (85% students) whereas there were only
15% of female students preferred working with the single sex group.

Students’ Preferences in Expressing Opinions Of the two important productive skills in English,
writing and speaking, as the way to express their opinions in English, each female and male
respondent had different preferences. The reasons for their decisions to choose either sin-gle sex
group or mixed sex group can be seen in Table 5. There were more male students (60%) than
female students (10%) who preferred expressing opinions in English. On the other hand, there
were more female students (90%) than male students (25%) who preferred expressing opinions
by writing than by speaking. Female Students’ Reasons for Expressing Opinions Females’
reasons to choose writing Females’ reasons to choose speaking Indirect way as less English
capability Willing to share ideas No confidence to speak More skilled in speaking Shame,
hesitation, afraid Easy, direct, and faster to transfer ideas Not very sure by speaking Need to be
more creative Table 4. Table 5: Students’ Reasons for Working in Groups Working with Males
Females Males Easy to control emotion; To get more freedom; Easier to under-stand; More
cooperative; No limit More responsible; more dili-gent; more talkative; more ex-cited
discussion; if women are smarter; women are more like-ly to agree and share; to show ability as
men; to get new ex-periences; to be more active; women are more careful; more enjoyable
Females.

They need to improve knowledge; more creative; good cooperation; difficult to interact; the need
to overcome problems Similar way of thinking; more concerns on feelings; more freedom; easy
to share ideas; more serious; more open; more enjoyable; less emotion; more comfortable; more
un-derstanding; easy to manage things Students’ Preferences to be Active or Silent in English
Classes In English classes, female and male students also had different prefer-ences, whether to
be active or passive. It is revealed that more women liked to keep silent, which encountered 80%
of the respondents, compared to only 15% of male students. The majority of male students
preferred to be active (60% students), and the rest could choose either of them.
The reasons for being active or silent in English classes can be seen Table 6.
Table 6: Students’ Reasons for being Active or Silent Males Females Active Influenced by
status; to know more; talk less do more as men; to show ambition and aspiration as men; to show
off; a nature to be active; to increase knowledge. There were 85% of female students who felt
likely to improve their English if they were working or speaking with the same sex whereas for
males, different sex was the best way to choose to increase English (75%).

Table Continued Silent Less vocabulary; not interested in the topic; not moody More
comfortable; ashamed; not confident; nervous; the topic is not interesting; not free to express as
women; not sure; felt; not understand and not moody Students’ Perceptions on Strategies to
Improve English Dealing with Sex To improve their English, male and female students also had
different per-ceptions. Females speaking English to the same sex was more effective than
speaking to different sex. Female students (85%) preferred working with the single sex group
whereas male students (65%) preferred working with the mixed sex group. Conversely, male
students felt reluctant to speak English to female students due to the reason that females get
offended easily. Female students, for example, felt reluctant to speak to male students because
they thought that males were arrogant. The study indicated that female students outnumbered
male students who liked to be si-lent (80% compared to 15%).

Conversely, male students were 60% who liked to be active. Another fact differentiating female
and male students in English learning is their tendency whether to be active or to be silent in
English classroom. Males’ preferences in working with different sex show their tendency to
challenge the differences in more dynamic situation whereas fe-males tended to be more
monotonous showing their less confidence and less certainty. In Bugis society, ‘gender is not the
sole factor influ-encing men and women’s communication. This is very important in English
classroom as their strong activity in the class will contribute much to their English proficiency,
especially in speaking.