Conclusions

Summary

This analysis of the complex relation between gender and politeness has implications for future research, not simply in the rather narrow field of politeness research but also within linguistics in general, and feminist linguistics in particular. I have also been arguing throughout this book for a rapprochement between Conversational Analysis and Critical Discourse Analysis, so that analysis of conversation can incorporate both openly political analysis, which focuses on negotiations with power relations at a structural and a local level, and also close textual analysis, which considers the way that individuals orient to those power relations.

Language and gender research

Second-Wave feminist linguistics drew on essentialist models of gender, and in many ways this is a very seductive form of analysis because experimental data can be made to fit this binary model of gender difference. Analysing gender as a simple factor which influences or determines language production for all women makes research and experimental work simpler. However, it is clear that if we simply assume a homogeneous male and female population, we cannot make accurate assessments of the role that gender plays. If we assume that stereotypes exist in a reified form which people simply accept or reject, we cannot account for the force of those stereotypes in people's language production and reception, and in their negotiation of particular linguistic styles and subject positions. We also cannot account for change and difference in perceptions of stereotyping.