Linguist and author lectures on differences in men's and women's conversational styles

http://www.news.cornell.edu/chronicle/97/7.10.97/conversation.html

This is yet another article attempting to explain the differences between male and female conversation, this time stating that conversation is gendered from childhood and stems form the different ways in which girls and boys play (girls in small groups, boys in larger team games).

Yet again we are bombarded with the ideas that women's talk is less aggressive; that men are all about one-up-man-ship.

This idea of men always needing to get one over the other lads has now been taken so far there is a new TV show about to air called The Hunks in which 10 strapping blokes essentially go for a bit of a lads holiday in Newquay and compete for the love of the locals. They are followed by cameras 24/7and the audience are giving a no-holds-barred insight into their hearts and minds, covering everything from love to marriage, fidelity, sex and fatherhood. Think Baywatch meets Jersey Shore – but with feelings…

Seriously, if this kind of thing is what passes for ‘normal’ male conversation I cannot explain how happy I am to be a woman. Although all this has got me thinking that I’ve never seen my male friends act in this way… Is it because they are not as “butch” as other men, or as a woman am I turning a blind eye to this competitive style of men’s conversation. Or has television once again just managed to grossly contort the truth.

Anyway, that’s my rant over; I will get to what I was actually thinking.

As a group of women chatting we have done really well, but can we really see what we are doing differently from men’s conversation without there being any men there? I can’t help but feel that the only thing the project is missing at the moment is a man, as a control subject.

So, in the spirit of the project I propose some kind of competitive aspect to the performance. Something that hints at the child like game play that the speakers have talked to us about, and the need to constantly be ‘top dog’ in male conversation. Maybe done in that way from the exercise the other week where the words ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘me’, and ‘we’ are replaced by only using ‘she’ or ‘he’.

To Perform or Not to Perform?

Aaargh. Why have I just dreamt about sellotaping craft knives to the underside of various surfaces? At the moment my dreams are far more interesting than my life..this week mostly nightmares around dropped bombs and devastated cities.

I saw my psychiatrist on Friday and it was pretty much standard : Me making no eye contact whatsoever and kind of stroking my hands together while trying to get him to understand that my nightmares were dominating my life and soaking into my days.

Although i can't look at him I am aware of when I say something significant enough for him to scribble something down.He is very gentle with me when i try to explain that I don't see the world as he does,that the past can change, that I re-read books and they have different endings, re-read things i have written and they say something different.

He asks me if i don't think this is a process of my disease and suggests we increase my medication.Lets face it..he is not a dream analyst he is a drug dealer. Well i have been aware all my life that the thing that used to make me dance and still makes me paint,sculpt,draw and write could be diagnosed as crazy in the hands of a psychiatrist!

More role play on Sunday. This time I was playing nagging parent.My son has this amazing pose when he is wanting to escape from a situation ..arms behind chair as if handcuffed and straining forward. He intersperses this with flapping his arms as if batting away an annoying insect (me) and hisses! So I went silent.And he went silent.Usually i can't resist saying something else. But I didn't. Huuuge silence .Then he packed up his lap top and stuff to go to his flat...Huuuge silence.Then he spoke.And he was quite right!

Ok, so here is the thing.I have loved the Art of Conversation meetings.. they have made me start to observe things around me and within me and have made me want to write and create some theatre.But i don't think the time-scale is right for me in terms of being prepared to perform with only two more sessions to go.I need more time working with the process before i would have the confidence to perform...Maybe i could pre-record something as a contribution.

I love the idea of performers and audience being in a circle with centre lit.. though spatial arrangement will have to be part of the creating to make sure everything can be seen...probably need circle of chairs within the circle...kind of all round hot seat...musical chairs...

See you Thursday

Gifts

Last Sunday I went to visit my mum.  I’m a pretty terrible daughter because before then I hadn’t seen my mum since Christmas (but I really am really busy doing things all the time, excuses, excuses).  Whenever I do call my mum (not that often) conversation usually descends into petty arguments, with her telling me off for having not called her and for working too hard.  I know it’s because she cares, as I said I’m a terrible daughter.

Anyway, I think she must have wanted to build bridges because on Saturday morning I received a package in the post… my mum, completely out of the blue, had sent me a SKIRT with a note enclosed saying “Saw this and thought of you. Any chance of a visit soon? Lots of love, Mum xxx”.  As you can imagine I felt immensely guilty and booked a train ticket to visit the next day.

It made me think about gift giving and communication.  When you know someone as well as you know your own mum, you know that a skirt in the post is code for ‘I’m not angry with you, I just miss you’.  I also know that her buying me lunch means ‘are you eating enough?’, ‘do you have enough money?’, ‘I don’t care how old you are, I’m still your mum’.

I think gifts are often a starting point for dialogue - like when you're staying in a hotel & you find an origami towel or a chocolate on your pillow as a reminder that some kind soul changed your sheets earlier and would very much like a tip.  Gifts can also to be insulting (a poorly worded offer of a mint), demeaning or fuelled by guilt (I won’t offer any personal examples).

My favourite gifts are those unexpected gifts which completely charm you.  I used to have a next door neighbour called Norman who would take my bins out every week – it was months before my housemates and I cottoned-on.  I also very much enjoyed arriving at work this morning to see that someone had left a mini chocolate egg on everyone's desk.

I'll take this opportunity to thank Greenroom for the strawberries, cakes and jelly beans.

Happy Easter.

Jen x

Mind your purse

Young female (shouts): "Menstrual dam"
Young male (stirs coffee): "Ha.We should so see that film."(shouts)"Red bat"
Young female: "All the reviews are bad..which can be a good thing"(shouts)"Womb hammock"
Young male (stirs coffee): "Ha.Its supposed to be a mixture of Alice in Wonderland and Kill Bill" (shouts) "Uterus goblin" Youngfemale: "I hate both those films"

Ok..to cut a long story short, i worked it out...they were coming up with different expressions for sanitary towels! I love when people personalise names for personal things. Not because euphemisms are sometimes necessary in ordinary conversation...but because of the sly references you can make to things... with only the ones in the know getting the joke. Yes its childish! I had one lover who referred to my private parts as my "purse" He stole a poster from outside a police station that said "Mind your purse"...it had a very graphic picture of a hand entering someone's handbag to snatch their purse!!

More Bits

Following on from my last post I have been thinking around the issue of feminism and pondering the confusion as to what equality actually means and what it should mean. Does feminism equate with only womens' rights or with fairness and equality between the sexes? I think there is a sense of injustice in a lot of young males in that women seem to get away with things that they don't...that they have the best of all worlds. From the female point of view women have the right to do as men do eg hit on someone if you fancy them.

But there is so much confusion. I was told of an ugly incident that took place in student halls this week where a mixed group were laying into one guy for not fitting in.His girlfriend emerged wrapped in a towel and slapped one of the students who had been baiting him.The student hit her back and was bundled away by his girlfriend who said "You don't hit girls" ....Do you hit girls if they hit you?

In the interests of research I made an attempt to watch " loose women" but was bored stiff after 5 minutes. I felt like I was the only sober person at a hen party.I hate panels at the best of times.

Thinking around our performance and how to turn our musings, anecdotes and stories into more than an aural experience...thinking how often you see something without hearing what is being said...and hear things without being able to STARE...a real advantage to watching a performance is that you can STARE at people...need to provide something inappropriate that is worth staring at...hmm...will ponder this and get back to you!

Bits and Bobs

I've been noticing how much people gesture when they are having a conversation,even when they are on the phone.Just talking isn't enough ...and I was thinking maybe this is why I find listening to the radio so unsatisfying...so much of the expression is absent.

One snippet I witnessed this week:
1st student(approaching fellow student outside uni library)
"How did your night turn out? Did you get rid of that woman in purple?"
2nd student
"Nah..she was all over me.I kept dancing away from her like this (demonstrates backwards shuffle with both elbows raised and pointing forwards) but she kept moving in.She wouldn't take the hint."
1st student
"If that had been the other way round it would have been rape"

The provocations

Your homework, women of the AoC, should you choose to accept it, is to consider an artistic conversational-based response to the following provocations.

This means mulling over the following and then when we next meet up we'll discuss in groups what we think and how to respond performatively. Makes sense?

For example, Kaz talks in an earlier blog about wanting to become one of those living statues you see in tourist-y areas. So, one performative response might be to transcribe and then record a discussion between 2 people on one of the topics, then, come performance time, have two people dress up and perform as living statues with a recording of the conversation being played out of speakers behind the performers.

You can also have a think of your own provocations, and don't forget to keep eavesdropping on the bus!

Title: “The Dirtiest F Word”
Abstract: Young women today don't recognise themselves as feminists. Those we have spoken to recently have suggested a new word would be more appropriate as their views of feminism centre around ideas of the eighties radical feminist and the idea that men are obsolete. If young girls disagree and distance themselves from feminism, are we fighting a losing battle? How do we make feminism relevant to younger women? Should we be doing more to rehabilitate the term "feminism"?

Title: “Harmless Banter - Richard Keys ‘smashes’ it"
Abstract: With regard to the ‘off air’ tv clip where Keys is asking Jamie Redknapp if he 'smashed it' and is really trying hard to engage him in some sexist banter, what does ‘smash it’ even mean? Should we be concerned about the inane (and some might say insane) behaviour and language used by Keys and his colleague Andy Gray, or does the whole episode merely shine further light on how out of step football culture is from the rest of the us?

Title: "Loose Women - not any women I know"
Abstract: Award winning telly programme Loose Women consists of a panel of privileged, reactionary harridans, who say nothing to me about my life, and in fact, set the women's cause back 50 years. Discuss.

Title: "It's My Pejorative"
Abstract: A large number of insults seem to derive from words for female genitalia, including 'cunt'. Does this word (and others) still have the same power to disgust that it has held historically? Should we as women be looking to re-appropriate these words in the same way that "queer" has been re-appropriated? Are we overly sensitive to language and should we learn to let words bother us less?

Don't forget the conversation can always start before the next session, either on this blog or at twitter.

Amanda @ Pigeon Theatre

Serial Liar

I got up, got showered and had some cereal for breakfast. I raced out of the house and jumped on the bus. A man next to me nudged me, and said "you've got cereal by your mouth". And I said "I haven't eaten any cereal this morning, I haven't eaten anything".