This seminar explores how gender is shaped, maintained, and challenged through language. Drawing on sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology, we will examine how linguistic practices reflect and construct gender roles across cultures and contexts. Students will gain critical tools to analyze language use and evaluate claims about gendered communication, going beyond stereotypes and popular assumptions. While we acknowledge contemporary discussions in gender and sexuality studies, the course centers on enduring questions at the intersection of language, identity, and power.
At the end of this seminar students
- have developed a critical understanding of how language both reflects and shapes gender roles across different social and cultural contexts.
- can apply key sociolinguistic and anthropological frameworks to analyze the interaction between language use and gendered identities.
- can evaluate and challenge prevailing assumptions about language and gender by engaging with scholarly research and real-world case studies. |
