LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 21:2 February 2021
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

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Social Dynamics and Changing Male and Female Speech Differences
in Meiteilon

Dr. Ch. Sarajubala Devi

Abstract

It is widely agreed that in most of the patriarchal societies, women speak more politely without much command than men do. The same pattern is observable in Manipuri society. There are observable differences in male and female speech in this society. However, in due course of time because of various feminist movements, empowerment of women and also the expansion of their representation from their traditional role of housewife to political, economic and other newly emerging sphere brought changes in the speech patterns of the women.

In this study a corpus of 30 dramas of Meiteilon discourse has been utilized. In addition to it some of the speech made by male and females in various discussion sessions telecasted in few local TV channels, as well as its continuum at domestic sphere are also used. While using these sources, an attempt has been made to match the male and female characters, evaluating them from the same social scale and number of males and females are made equal to make the calculation and comparison easy.

Keywords: Meithei society (Manipuri), socialization, subculture, polite forms, social dynamics, male and female speech.

Introduction

Different sociolinguistic studies reveal that there is a regular and systematic pattern of sociolinguistic variation among male and female speakers. According to Robin Lakoff (1975), language gives a concrete expression to implicit social norms, and language both reflects and subtly reinforces social order. In every society, males and females are differently referred and have different allocation of roles and responsibilities. The unequal roles and the unequal status results to or reinforces the existing power relationships in the socio-cultural milieu of the society. It is also well known that in many of the patriarchal societies, women often use minimal responses, tag questions and hedging devices. Therefore, their languages are often regarded non- assertive, polite, and hesitant. As the system already fixes code of conduct for both the sexes, all the female speech has a tendency to use standard form at the same time are counted as friendly, gentle, enthusiastic, grammatically correct and unimportant, whereas, men’s speech is considered assertive, adult and direct, attention seeking (dominating, boastful, loud and forceful), dominating, authoritarian, aggressive and frank. This very fact of speech act is in support of the argument given the ‘Social Dominance Theory’.

On the other hand, according to another theory known as “Social Difference Theory”, a different female speech is attributable to their separate subcultures rather than their subordinate position. Therefore, males and females have different values and norms developed out of social segregation. Jespersen (1922) claims that women’s speech is stereotyped as it is more euphemistic in expression. They tend to use more hyperbolic and terms of circumlocution and phrases. One probable reason why they tend to use circumlocutional forms is their visualization of the speech partners as equal as their talk group is non-hierarchical in organization and smartness in talking put a distance between the talk groups, (Coates J. 1989).

Meitei society is no exception to the aforesaid features. Males and females in Meitei society speaks differently, though the difference is not sex-exclusive but sex-preferential. There is a gradable difference in the usage of polite forms, persuasive, commands, endearment forms and in reduplicated forms. These variations are non-discrete. However, it is interesting to observe a marked difference in the usage of these forms.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Dr. Ch. Sarajubala Devi
NERIE – NCERT, Shillong
sarajubala@yahoo.com
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