scholarly journals Evidence of Variable Gender Role in Defining Language Change Leadership in Syrian Arabic

This study aims to present evidence of gender variability among leaders of language change across different sociolinguistic variables, five phonological variables (a consonant and four vowels) and a discourse variable in Syrian Arabic, within the same speech community. Employing a sociolinguistic variationist approach and comparing children to adults yielded different gendered linguistic behavior. Children show the same dramatic gendered linguistic difference as adults regarding the variable (q), with males using much more rural [q] than urban [ʔ] than females. Regarding the vowel variables, children dramatize their gendered linguistic difference much more than adults; boys show much higher use of the rural vowels than girls compared to the difference between men and women. This pattern is reversed in the discourse variable (yaʕni) ‘that is/I mean’; the gendered linguistic difference is more dramatic among adults than it is among children, and gender effect diminishes in the linguistic distribution of the variable. This multidirectionality in gender effects bears implications for sociolinguistic variationist research. Variables indexed to urban refinement/prestige and social meanings such as femininity/masculinity are more likely to be led by females than males. Conversely, variables that lack these types of social/gender identification indexicality, regardless of whether they are phonological or discursive, do not follow the same pattern of leadership.

2016 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-67
Author(s):  
Rania Habib

Through ethnographic investigation, this study shows that the different linguistic behavior of girls and boys in the village of Oyoun Al-Wadi in Syria is due to gendered linguistic ideologies and attitudes that are utilized in different ways to project gendered (feminine or masculine) and spatial (local or supralocal) identities. Social meanings are gleaned from the naturally occurring speech of 72 speakers aged 6–18 and 29–57 to illuminate the ideologies and attitudes that result in inter- and intra-speaker variation between and among boys and girls and highlight the importance of both the community of practice and the speech community in investigating linguistic variation. The study also highlights the growth of the children’s sociolinguistic competence and their awareness from a very young age of the ideologies and attitudes that exist in their community and their capability to build on them. The results of this awareness are highly observed in preadolescents, particularly boys.


2020 ◽  
pp. 1-69
Author(s):  
Michael J. Fox

The social mechanisms that influence the direction of language change operate along the demarcations of networks of communication (Bloomfield 1933; Milroy and Milroy 1985). Within geographic regions, the focused organizations that individuals participate in structure the lines of communication (Feld 1981) and the socio-demographic composition (social ecology) therein limits the options of peers to associate with (McPherson, Smith-Lovin, and Cook 2001). Schools have their own social ecology (McFarland et al. 2014) and attendance at schools can explain language change at a level above social interaction but below the level of community (Dodsworth and Benton 2017, 2019). This study uses acoustic vowel measurements from 132 speakers in three geographically contiguous cities located in northwestern Wisconsin. Modeling results indicate (1) similar socio-geographic contexts lead to linguistic similarity; (2) dissimilarity in social ecology leads to greater linguistic dissimilarity as the difference between a dyads’ years of birth increases; (3) net of local socio-geographic context and social ecology, similarity in sex and age leads to linguistic similarity and vice versa. These patterns indicate that local social ecologies further demarcate the lines of communication thereby structuring the form of language at a level between the micro interactional and the macro level of the speech community.


1995 ◽  
Vol 79 (5) ◽  
pp. 1787-1795 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. S. Brown ◽  
T. R. Gerrity ◽  
W. D. Bennett ◽  
C. S. Kim ◽  
D. E. House

The dispersion of aerosol boluses in the human lungs has been studied in health and disease, usually as a means of investigating convective mixing. However, there are limited data on the roles of critical factors, such as the volume of inhaled boluses, lung inflation, and gender on dispersion. To examine these factors, we measured the difference in volume variance between exhaled and inhaled boluses (sigma 2V) of a 0.5-micron aerosol in 11 healthy male and 12 healthy female subjects as a function of tidal volume (VT = 1,000 and 1,500 ml in females and 1,000 and 2,000 ml in males), bolus penetration volume (Vi at 250-ml increments over each VT), and bolus volume (target VBol = 75, 150, and 300 ml). Analysis of variance showed marginally significant gender effects (P = 0.073) on sigma 2V, with sigma 2V greater in males than in females. There was also a significant effect of VBol on sigma 2V (P < 0.001). A Vi-dependent mean volume shift between inhaled and exhaled boluses (delta V) was observed at all Vi except 500 ml. The observation of gender and VBol effects and the existence of a nonzero delta V suggest that convective mixing mechanisms other than longitudinal dispersion alone occur in the healthy lung. The lack of VT dependence suggests a minimal role of lung inflation above functional residual capacity on dispersion. The dependence of sigma 2V on Vi2 up to 1,750 ml and minimal VBol effects demonstrates that convective mixing processes continue far into the gas exchange regions of the lung and support a significant role for axial streaming.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-37
Author(s):  
Almas Binnal ◽  
Anu S Jacob

ABSTRACT Aim The aim of our study was to measure the frontal sinus morphology that could aid us in gender determination and also to assess the difference in measurements between the right and left frontal sinus. Materials and methods A retrospective study was done using 100 cone beam computed tomography (CBCT) images (50 males and 50 females) matched with age and gender with full field of view (FOV). The examinations were carried out using Promax 3DMid (Planmeca Oy., Helsinki, Finland) CBCT unit. The frontal sinus was assessed in coronal, sagittal, and axial planes, and the maximum measurements in each section were recorded. The results to compare the right and left frontal sinus were analyzed using paired t-tests, and independent Student's t-test was used to compare the difference in measurements of frontal sinus between males and females. Results We found that the left side of the frontal sinus was bigger than the right side, and while comparing between the genders, it was found that the measurements were greater in males. Statistically significant results were obtained on comparing between the sides and gender. Conclusion As mentioned in previous studies, frontal sinus measurements are significantly higher in males compared with females which can, therefore, be used in gender identification in cases of mass disasters. Clinical significance Frontal sinus measurements can be used as an adjunct in gender identification in mass disasters and with advances in technology. Cone beam computed tomography, in addition to providing accurate measurements, has overcome all the disadvantages with two-dimensional imaging. How to cite this article Denny C, Jacob AS, Ahmed J, Natarajan S, Binnal A, Sujir N. Frontal Sinus as an aid in Gender Identification in Forensic Dentistry: A Retrospective Study using Cone Beam Computed Tomography. World J Dent 2018;9(1):34-37.


2013 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 361-383 ◽  
Author(s):  
Suzanne Evans Wagner

AbstractHow is ethnicity indexed linguistically in a speech community in which immigrant L2s have typically not been spoken for three or more generations? Drawing on recordings and ethnographic observations of eighteen white high school girls in south Philadelphia, speakers of Irish descent are shown to differentiate themselves from speakers of Italian descent through their use of (ay0), that is, Canadian Raising. (ay0) is an ongoing sound change in Philadelphia and is remarkable for being a rare example of a male-led change. Irish girls exploit more male-like, backed, and raised variants as a resource for indexing their ethnic identity, which is associated locally with stereotypically masculine characteristics such as toughness. The symbolic reflection of ethnic affiliation through this subtle linguistic device makes use of both local and supralocal social meanings. (Ethnicity, adolescence, Philadelphia, Irish, Canadian Raising, gender, sound change, language, and identity)*


2019 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 19-22
Author(s):  
Shyam Prasad Sedai

The study aimed to compare health status and lifestyle i n university students. The participants were college students from health and physical Ed. majors (N = 195, Mean = 20.9, SD = 1.87) and population Ed. majors (N = 195, Mean = 2 1.73, SD = 0.93) in Chitwan. The Diagnostic Inventory of Health and Life habit (DIHAL.2) scale (Tokunaga, 2003) was administered to all participants. A one-way sample t-test was used to analyze the difference in both interdepartmental and gender effects. Results of t-test indicated that there were significantly difference in physical health, social health and life habit. Moreover, students majoring in health and physical education were scored lower on the mental health domain compared to the physical and social health domains. The practical implication of this study focused on finding the difference between the students who regularly exercised and those who did not, and considered the characteristics of gender.


2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (7) ◽  
pp. 2054-2069
Author(s):  
Brandon Merritt ◽  
Tessa Bent

Purpose The purpose of this study was to investigate how speech naturalness relates to masculinity–femininity and gender identification (accuracy and reaction time) for cisgender male and female speakers as well as transmasculine and transfeminine speakers. Method Stimuli included spontaneous speech samples from 20 speakers who are transgender (10 transmasculine and 10 transfeminine) and 20 speakers who are cisgender (10 male and 10 female). Fifty-two listeners completed three tasks: a two-alternative forced-choice gender identification task, a speech naturalness rating task, and a masculinity/femininity rating task. Results Transfeminine and transmasculine speakers were rated as significantly less natural sounding than cisgender speakers. Speakers rated as less natural took longer to identify and were identified less accurately in the gender identification task; furthermore, they were rated as less prototypically masculine/feminine. Conclusions Perceptual speech naturalness for both transfeminine and transmasculine speakers is strongly associated with gender cues in spontaneous speech. Training to align a speaker's voice with their gender identity may concurrently improve perceptual speech naturalness. Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.12543158


2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Susannah Paletz ◽  
Judith Orasanu ◽  
Yuri Tada ◽  
Roberta Bernhard ◽  
Ute Fischer ◽  
...  

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