1 - Introduction

Summary

This chapter starts by giving a theoretical definition of gender and its relation to language. It gives the rationale for the focus of the book on women politicians and a critical overview of work in the field of gender and language research investigating language and gender in the professional workplace. It also critically reviews linguistic research into political discourse and the much smaller body of work relating to gender, language and politics. In doing so it highlights the originality of the book’s focus on gender and the interactional details of political discourse in political institutions. The chapter also explains relevant theories and empirical research on women’s representation in politics from the discipline of political science. It describes research into the descriptive and substantive representation; examines current re-evaluations of the ‘critical mass’ theory; and examines the ‘different voice’ ideology relating to expectations about gender and communicative styles. It concludes by citing calls from political scientists for additional methods from a wider range of disciplines with which to measure women’s substantive representation and describes the overall structure of the book.