First we let 2 women and 2 men have a conversation in front of the class. After this we let the ones who were listening tell us some differences. What we noticed was that women picked different topics and talked about details more. They also used longer sentences. They completed each other's sentences. The women could have talked longer while the men were done in 2 minutes and they had said everything they needed to, according to them.
Our conclusion from this was that men are more direct than women. Women use longer sentences, complete each other sentences and talk about details more (for example, color). They also use more adjectives and adverbs than men do.
The next thing we did was get a man and a woman to have a discussion. We noticed that the male figure was more dominant. He didn't let the woman finish her sentences. The woman asked more questions and listened better. In the end the man showed his happiness because he won the discussion.
Conclusion: Men tend to dominate discussions, they talk more than women. They also are more competetive; they want to win the discussion. Everybody thinks that women talk more than men, but in conversations the opposite is more likely to be true. Women are better listeners and let the other finish his/her sentences, while men don't. Women tend to use more standard forms of English, while men use less standard forms. Women are somehow aware of their lower status and that is why they use standard forms of English. Also when a woman talks in a dialect of some kind it is less attractive and accepted, while when a man does that it is (more) 'normal'.
Because men and women don't understand each other there can be unnescesary disputes. A known misunderstanding is for example the 'uhuh'. When a man says that he agrees, but when a woman says that she wants to encourage him to go on with what he was saying. Another example is that men are very direct in their speech, woman can see this as an insult.
A lot of misunderstandings can be solved if we could just understand each other..................
If you want to see some (funny and not really serious) differences in language check the first links we added. There are also some other links on this subject, for more information.
