Includes bibliographical references (p. 243-264) and index.

List of figures and tables. Acknowledgements. Transcription Conventions. Part I Preliminaries: Airing Stereotypes and Early Models. 1 Language and gender. About this book. Linguistic sex differentiation. Sex versus gender. Sex and gender as troublesome dichotomies. Why is language study important for feminism? Further reading. 2 Talking proper. Women, men and Standard' English. Sex, gender and voice quality. Further reading. 3 Women's language' and 'man made language'. Early interest. 'Women's language'. 'Man made language'. Conclusion and lead-in to part II. Further reading. Part II Interaction among Women and Men. 4 Telling stories. Studying stories. Story content. A couple tell a story. At the family dinner-table. Generalizing from research findings. Further reading. 5 Conversation. Conversation as a genre. The conversational division of labour. Miscommunication. Politeness. Men's and women's interactional styles. Equal but different? Further reading. 6 Difference-and-dominance and beyond. Deficit, dominance and difference. The trouble with 'dominance'. The trouble with 'difference'. Beyond difference: the influence of poststructuralism. Further reading. Part III Discourse and Gender: Construction and Performance. 7 Critical perspectives on gender identity. Why critical? Discourse and discourses. Gender identity and subject positioning. The discursive construction of maternity. Examining constructions of gender identity. Further reading. 8 Consumerism. Femininity. Women and consumerism. Multiple voices in magazines. The voice of a friend. Men as consumers. Further reading. 9 New men and old boys. Masculinities. Dominance and control. The importance of being hetero. Change and resistance. Further reading. 10 Public talk. Women and the public sphere. Politics. Broadcast interviews. Women in charge: dealing with the doublebind. Media representations of working women. Further reading. 11 Language, gender and sexuality. Queering gender. Heteronorms. Homosociality among male university students. The sexual politics of consent. Resisting heteronormative identities. Further reading. 12 Reclaiming the language. Modes of struggle. Resistance and Contestation. Struggles over access. Interventions. Counter-resistance. The media. Academia. What is 'political correctness'? Further reading.