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Journal - Volume 7, Issue 2, December 2021

 
Understanding Women’s Dialect
Mina Dan
Abstract In the domain of linguistics one of the earliest writings as well as the most influential study on women’s dialect is Jesperson (1922). Since then numerous studies in this domain are meticulously unveiling various aspects of women’s dialect and in turn enriching the field of knowledge. The present paper, on the one hand, provides a glimpse of a few major issues and arguments of this domain in its three parts, viz. variation between men’s and women’s speech, understanding sex and gender and dialects vs. variation. On the other, it points to the differences between three categories of studies dealing with women’s dialect, viz. those dealing with (i) unsubstantiated stereotypes, (ii) observed trends in language and (iii) encoded traits in language, along with examples and justifications, chiefly based on the existing literature of linguistics and gender studies.
Keywords woman’s dialect, sexist language, gender based variation, folk linguistics, feminism, linguistic activism, sex, gender, norm, marginal.
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Women’s Dialect: Some Observations
Udaya Kumar Chakraborty
Abstract In this electronic media dependent age, when we are thinking that we are mechanically using this world, when we are thinking that our attitude towards our neighbours and relatives are gradually becoming artificial, today’s discussion again reveals a human face of our attitude.

The knowledge of such sex language exists in our mind. If we follow the terminology of generative linguistics, it is our language competence and our communicative competence. We do posses such inherent knowledge. Actually, the sex language is expressed through our behavioural attitude in a social context. Finally, let us assume that conception of sex language is related with our language cognition.
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Women’s Dialect: A Social Phenomena
Dr. Debtusi Misra Chowdhury
Abstract An attempt has been made here to study women’s dialect in sociolinguistic aspect. Language is the tool to express our thought. People use language for communicate with each other. Here comes the difference between male and female. Language differs in phonological, grammatical or in vocabulary, conversational topics and style when we judge it by gender. A deep social impact is behind this. Here women`s dialect is discussed through social context.
Keywords socio-linguistics, physiology, phonology, repetition, storytelling, metaphor, onomatopoeia, symbolism, code language.
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Gender and Work: Reconsidering Women Legal Professional’s Identity and Space
Rupanjana Sinha & Asmita Bhattacharyya
Abstract This study problematizes existentialism of Indian women legal professionals. Prior empirical works suggest that women lawyers face myriad challenges in creating and sustaining their own legal identities within their own professional ambit which, so far, has remained men’s strong hold, since its inception. Within this profession different social associations are to be maintained in order to progress. These associations are conjoined to the male lawyers, excluding the female lawyers and keeping them away from the internal culture of the profession, thus also showcasing the unacceptability of women within the profession. Women are already at the back foot when it comes to acquiring these associations, the achievement of which requires after work hours socialization to which women may not always engage. Within the workplace female legal professionals are often less recognized as lawyers and more as ‘home managers’. Thus different terminologies are associated with women which further hinder their path of progress. The internship under the senior lawyer becomes challenging as they are often not accepted within these chambers on the basis of their expected incompetency. Even if accepted the female lawyers are bestowed with mundane work. The professional interaction that takes place within the workspace involving the stakeholders often project the women under a discriminatory light, focusing on their care giving and nurturing roles more than their professional expertise. As a result women legal professionals are marginalized within the profession. The situation is further aggravated due to covid-19 pandemic, due to which face to face interaction has reduced and virtual courts and the work-from home are the ‘new normal’. The present study delves into the dilemma faced by women legal professionals as they strive to survive within the profession whose interaction and association patterns tries to eliminate them.
Keywords Legal profession, Women legal professionals, interaction patterns, professional associations, work space, covid-19
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Gender Discrimination in Marxian Context
Sampa Biswas
Abstract No doubt women have been exploited from the ancient period to this very day based on social rules. Everyone has to follow social norms in order to live in society. But who controls these social norms? Marx has shown that man has used religion as a tool to exploit women. Custom or religion is used in social discrimination, wrong doing and oppression of a woman, which continue as a person`s destiny. In Manusaṃhitā Manu had refuted the rights of women. Dependence on males in every aspect of life was imposed on women. In the late middle Ages, Sabitri Bai Phule was the first woman in India, who opposed social discrimination. Attempts are still being made to resist this discrimination in society. Discriminatory practices have prevailed in the minds of people for a long time. It is not easy to eliminate. In reality women are working hard to earn money outside of the home, but they are still forced to work at home. It is a masculine mindset that, domestic work is compulsory for women and is identified with women. Women's domestic work has no value. In this way, the use of their labor force is not considered as productive labor and men enjoy the result of this surplus. In this context, Marxists show that the oppressed class is exploited by the ruling class, embodying the capitalist. The ruling class uses the oppressed class as a way to make a surplus. The main focus of this paper is to explain the social problem of patriarchy in exploitation of women by the social rules in the context of Marxian point of view.
Keywords Patriarchy, discrimination, women, ethics, Marxian
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Passivity of Expression and Patriarchal Portrait of Female: A Study on Ukil Munshi’s Selected Baul Songs
Safi Ullah
Abstract Male dominance over women is very common in Bangladeshi society. Dominance exposed through expression is considered as hegemony of language. In patriarchal society, females are portrayed by males and therefore they meet the demand of male. Women from their birth learn to think themselves as weak, passive and dominatable. They express physical and intellectual passiveness through language. In folk literature of Bangladesh, baul songs occupy a very strong position. A Baul song is an oral form of folk literature, though collected and written in later times. This type of songs exposes women’s real subordinate position in the society and therefore describes hegemony of language and inequality of gender. Subordination expressed in female language exposes intellectual passivity of women which is accurately depicted in baul songs of Ukil Munshi. He sang many of his songs from female point of view where almost all female characters are controlled by male both directly and indirectly. It can be said that these women are described and depicted from patriarchal perspectives. In Munshi’s baul songs, the pitiful longing of women’s heart is described such as, women staring at boats for the arrival of lovers and best friend, crying for no return of lover, dying of youth and beauty as well as begging for love. Even women, in Munshi’s songs, wait for someone coming from parents’ house to take them to their parental houses. This sense of passivity and powerlessness and experience of limited self-esteem and self-confidence contribute to subordination of women. These women, portrayed from patriarchal perspectives which are quite true in case of Bangladesh, represent passivity in their thinking and expression. This paper examines selected baul songs of Ukil Munshi to discuss hegemony of language in terms of gender role; passivity of female’s expression and women’s depiction in patriarchal society by patriarchy.
Keywords baul, hegemony, patriarchy, feminism, passivity and gender
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Politics of Women's Dialect: A deeper look into Bengali idioms and proverbs
Ritaja Mukherjee
Abstract Patriarchy has it's deep tentacles into society and living with it is a reality. Controlling of women however has never been easy for society. That may be a reason why there have been such elaborate and well-planned measures to do so. Controlling the way women speak has been a major part of it by taking control of the thought process of the collective. This paper attempts to throw light upon the old Bengali proverbs and idioms that was and is a major part of the women's dialect in Bengal. Through statements like "Sak die mach dhaka jaena", or short but piercing rhymes like "Poorle narir, urle chai, tobe Narir kolonko nai", even everyday statements like, "bachte dilona bhat kapor, Morley korche daan sagor" are an integral part of the women's dialect in Bengal. It will be incorrect to claim these phrases are obsolete nowadays because the entire Bengali women's dialect cannot be judged through the language of a handful of the educated urban class of women. These and many more such statements are part of the popular culture and language and are often repeatedly used to represent situations mostly by women. On the other hand, these statements unravel the horrific stories of atrocities women have been subjected to through ages. The few mentioned here alone state loads of information about tortures on widows, sexual abuse and domestic violence on women and also traumatic social injustice that took place on the so-called 'weaker vessels' through the ages. This paper tries to look into such oral histories that remained captured in the Bengali women's dialect. The dominance of patriarchy shaped up the way beneficial for them and shrewdly guided women to speak and think in a manner that made it easy for them to take them. However, through this paper, some light can be thrown on untold social injustices and stories of resistance in Bengal which remains an important chapter in the history of women's empowerment.
Keywords Bengali Women's dialect, popular language, social injustices, patriarchy
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Silenced Voices: Articulating the Role of 'Invisible' Women Farmers in the Conservation of Agrobiodiversity in Rural and Tribal India
Shreyashi Chaudhuri and Kuntal Narayan Chaudhuri
Abstract Agrobiodiversity that ensures our food security is increasingly threatened by rapid globalization of modern agriculture. This has led to the realization of the need for conserving local genetic resources of domesticated organisms and their wild relatives. In the developing world, indigenous agriculture involves sustainably using, managing and conserving the biodiversity of local agroecosystems. Intangible cultural heritage is considered as an integral part of this biodiversity since it is nurtured and protected by human activities in relation to traditional agricultural practices. Across the globe women, who are more affected by poverty, hunger and malnutrition compared to men, are key stakeholders in a range of agricultural activities that provide them food, nutrition and even additional income. Although they constitute, often as unpaid workers in subsistence farming, the majority of the agrarian labour force, their voices remain mostly unheard in farming-related decision making and their vital contribution to agricultural production remain largely 'invisible' in the academic literature and official statistics. Women are also the best custodians of oral traditions, cultural practices and traditional knowledge. Women in traditional farming, using their inherent prudence as diligent homemakers, are the unsung heroes of agro biodiversity conservation. Their gender dialect includes names with which they can narrate this complex variety and variability growing in their fields, gardens or homesteads, as well as ideas of taboos, totems and magic that are vital elements of this conservation effort. This paper provides an overview of the often overlooked contributions by rural and tribal women farmers of India in the in situ conservation of the genetic resources of crops and livestock, and discusses the significance of this in the context of household food and nutritional security.
Keywords Agrobiodiversity Conservation, Gender Dialect, Genetic Resources, India, Women
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Bengali Dialect with Advanced Technology: Empowering Women Artists in Kumartuli, Kolkata
Sayantani Mallick, Dr. M. Alankara Masillamania, Sayan Das
Abstract Empowerment, particularly in controlling one's life and claiming one's rights, is described as becoming stronger, more confident which depends on the backgrounds, situations, aspirations, dreams and has several distinct meanings for different people. For women, self-esteem, and also for communities, empowerment is necessary. Women can be entitled to equal involvement in education, culture, economy, and politics to choose their faith, language, job and many other things to participate in society. But language, especially local dialect can hinder women's empowerment. A language is typically written as well as spoken, while a dialect is only spoken before it is usually promoted for political purposes to elite status. The term dialect refers to a variety of languages that are typical of a specific community of speakers of the language. In the paper, we mainly focus on how the language and dialect hinder the work of artisans (mainly woman artisans) of Kumartuli, a famous potter's quarter in Kolkata. Since the place of potters is patriarchal, there are many problems for female artists, one of which is language. The potters of Kumartuli have their own language of communication, which is described in the paper. The paper also highlights the difficulties women artisans face in running the business as they do not have any traditional education in this profession, no one is highly educated or came to this business due to the dire needs of the family. There are many problems in selling their idols especially for not knowing any language other than Bengali. Thus, when someone from another state or abroad is coming/requisition to buy idols, they face problems selling and promoting the product, which affects globalization and the marketization of this industry. Advance technology (e-commerce, cloud computing) helps promote products worldwide, but most artisans are not familiar with modern technology or require inter mediators that increase business costs.
Keywords Empowerment; Bengali dialect; Kumartuli woman artisan; Advance technology; Globalization.
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Women and hegemony of language: A case study of 21st century Bollywood action films promoting rape culture
Dishari Sarkar
Abstract Language as a system and has the power to produce discursive knowledge leading to the formation of cultural identity of human beings. Systemic oppression of women and male domination in different fields has been the core subject to the critical thinking of feminist studies. Understanding the social structure of gender calls for thorough analysis of how a woman perceives her sexuality from within a socio-cultural establishment. Language is the primary and dominant medium of interaction in the communicative process of human beings in a society. Sexuation of discourse within patriarchal structure tends to eliminate women and their accounts as the source of empirical knowledge. Thus, it is felt that the signification of language system should be taken under the purview of feminist critique. Language being predominantly male centric, encodes the patriarchal notions of the society and culture and reproduces it through its use sup lifting only male perspectives. The linguistic representation of women in a framework of sexist discourse should be held accountable for projecting women sexuality through the male gaze, eliminating and making the first-hand experiences of women invisible as the source. This can be identified as the hegemonic role of language which appears to be universally valid even after speaking from and for one dimension.

In order to understand the power dynamics and dialectics of gender through language, proper analysis of the popular culture being produced and created by Bollywood films can be really effective to have a clear perspective to challenge the basic foundation of the androcentric language. Bollywood action movies are famous for the heroic portrayal of the leading male actors. The communicative factor of the films as a popular culture often promotes rape culture leaving a significant audience affected among the viewers. The linguistic discrimination and the normalization of slut shaming, women objectification including different myths related to women sexuality are often perpetrated by the contents of the films. A study of those films and analysis of the linguistic representation would provide the insight of a woman’s place in the linguistic hegemony that contributes to rape culture.
Keywords Sexist discourse, Interaction, communicative process, empirical knowledge, signification of language system, androcentric language, hegemony, gender dialectics, popular culture, linguistic representation, rape culture.
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Gender, Dialect and Society in Japan
Dr. Purabi Gangopadhyay
Abstract In this paper I attempt to discuss about various linguistic pattern that are gender specified for the speaker among the Japanese nationals. -This gender specified language pattern in Japanese Society have had their variations in different historical periods and also in the system of social hirerarchy. -The gender specified language in Japanese society might start on and from the Heian Period (C. 794 to 1185 A.D.).- During the Kamakura Period (C.1185-1333 A.D.), along with the classification of different social castes, based on social ranks, women’s social roles were also ascertained by gender specified pattern.-“Court Ladies Language” was introduced during the Muromachi period (C. 1333- 1573 A.D.) and it made women’s speech distinctive from the men’s language and henceforth started a new dimension of women dialect in Japan.- A radical change of Japanese Society after the Meiji Restoration and then after World War II, the pattern of women dialect also took a new dimension. -In modern times there is little difference between men’s and women’s speech in the work situation and public speaking. -In personal conversation, however, there are some differences. In polite conversation, women, especially older women tend to speak more politely and use some feminine sentence endings.
Keywords Language and society, Gender specified linguistic pattern in Japan, Women’s status in Japanese society, Present scenario in Japan and women’s dialect.
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