In Katherine Wilson’s “Dude Looks Like a Lady,” she begins with a powerful introduction saying “this is about hair, breasts, and identity” (Wilson 21), insinuating it is going to be a gender identity piece. Reading more of the first page, you assume the thesis is about the common misconceptions of how a woman is supposed to look and how not looking that way could take away from a woman being a woman. Wilson gives the example of her hair being buzzed and people looking at her differently. Although she tries to argue the hardships of not looking like the normal female, Wilson’s argument fails to meet the rest of her story. She claims her argument is about “hair, breasts, and identity,” she is really just ranting and raving her being disrespected and her own issues of being black.
Metamessages Men and women often receive messages in an erroneous way due to misunderstandings caused by metamessages. A metamessage is a message concealed in a message that a woman usually has a better understanding of. In Talk in the Intimate Relationship: His and Hers, by Deborah Tannen, demonstrates how women and men have different communication skills than one another. Women are seen to “have a relatively greater need for involvement, and men a greater need for independence,” causing the opposite sex to retrieve a message incorrectly from what was meant to be said (200). The article clarifies how genders react to metamessages as well as how they can retrieve them and apply them to their daily conversations.
She only references woman in her advice on how to overcome the issue, therefore leaving out a major demographic in the workforce. Due to the fact that the male population is completely disregarded from her arguments, it shows a major prejudice in her writing for this
Khadija Taib, 635269 Response to Maura Kelly’s: Op-Ed Column Maura Kelly’s argument is that women’s contribution to Op-eds signifies a deeper gender gap in society, that despite the lack of ‘old boy’s networks’ women are still quiet when it comes to giving their opinions. She asks, with rhetorical cleverness whether women are silent by choice and whether the 15% contribution to Op-eds by women implies that they’re underrepresented in the society’s most important issues and discussions because women choose not to participate. Maura Kelly concludes that women do not have the confidence that their opinions matter or do not push their opinions forward because they feel they are not informed enough. Maura Kelly’s sources the argument that Op-eds
We often find ourselves criticizing the way a message is presented and ignoring its content or value. We don’t like the message being “read” to us, we find the speaker lacking in experience, or we don’t care for the negative tone of the boss. Our listening focuses on delivery and approach.
Lakoff emphasizes that “[t]his uncertainty is reinforced in more subliminal ways, too. There is a peculiar sentence-intonation pattern, used almost exclusively by women, as far as I know, which changes a declarative answer into a question. The effect of using the rising inflection typical of a yes-no question is to imply that the speaker is seeking confirmation.…”(510). By frequently ending statements in questions the speaker loses credibility and in a way asks her audience for confirmation. Not only do women undermine their image by using this - women’s language- but, a woman’s image can be altered by the words that are used to describe her.
Linda occasionally argues her point across until she is yelling at members of the family and this may be because she is frustrated because she is never heard when she tries to give her opinion. Although Willy has an affair with a woman, even in the midst of trying to convince herself that Willy's
The divergent communication styles of men and women, referred to as “genderlects” by Deborah Tannen, are often the impetus behind relationship problems. But before one goes into the blame game of accusing others of not listening, the styles of communication for both men and women must be examined as if one is investigating two diverse cultures. Tannen says that “each partner [in a relationship] is operating within a different
I take her comments to heart as a personal attack that I’m either not feeding them enough or that I’m spoiling them too much. I feel it has a lot to do with my low self esteem on my part when it comes to being a parent or on any other topic that I feel insecure about. For others it can be that they are generally defensive all of the time and perceive negative judgments in anything said to them instead of on separate issues. Responding defensively happens when you have a bad perception of the person’s message; you perceived the person doesn’t like/ respect/ trust you and expresses it in their communication. (4) The downfall of responding defensively all of the time though may discourage others from being so honest with their remarks.
The widespread imbalance in sex’s interests and expectations poses as a communication gap between the two genders. It causes men and women to have different impressions of social interaction with the opposite sex. In “Sex, Lies, and Conversation,” written by Deborah Tannen, She states that lack of conversation is wreaking havoc within marriages. In order to avoid these conflicts we should understand how each other behaves so that we won’t get the wrong idea about our attitudes and judge them unfairly. Deborah Tannen describes how differences in communication start in the childhood socialization.