The Use of Gender-Marked and Gender-Neutral Forms

The Importance of Linguistic Corpora in Increasing the Linguistic Awareness of L2 Learners of English

Bibliographic Data

ID21390476
AuthorsBożena Cetnarowska (0000-0001-8642-6827, University of Silesia in Katowice, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume71
Issue10sp
Pages61-77
Publication date2023-11-24
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueRoczniki Humanistyczne (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0035-7707 • E-ISSN: 2544-5200
PublisherTowarzystwo Naukowe KUL (PUBLISHER • PL)
DOI10.18290/rh237110sp-3
OpenAlexW4388974127
LanguageEN
References cited3

This paper discusses some corpus-based activities which can be used to increase the sensitivity of advanced L2 learners of English to the constraints on the occurrence of gender-marked forms in English. Guidelines for gender-inclusive language recommend replacing gender-specific job titles, such as fireman/firewoman, with gender-neutral nouns, i.e. firefighter. By investigating examples gleaned from the Corpus of Contemporary American English and the British National Corpus, learners of English can identify the conditions under which gender-specific forms may be employed. They can also see which type of gender-marked forms occurs more commonly in each of those corpora (e.g., woman driver or female driver). A further online corpus known as Global Web-Based English can be used with advanced L2 learners of English as a source of data indicating different attitudes towards gender-marked forms in native and non-native varieties of English, as can be shown for occupational terms with the modifier lady

American English · British National Corpus · Corpus linguistics · English language · Grammatical Gender · Language and gender · Linguistics · Noun · Varieties of English · Gender Studies in Language · Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity · Psychology · Translation Studies and Practices

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