A Study Of Sexism In English And Chinese Names

Personal names are cultural universals and a part of language. In nearly every society, personal names do two things. First, they provide messages to the members of the society at large about who an individual is. Second, they provide messages to the named individual about who he or she is or is expected to be. The messages they provide and expectations they reveal aroused my interest in the research into sexism in naming practice.In the early study of language and sex, linguists were most interested in sex-related linguistic features as a purely linguistic phenomenon. Since the mid-1970s, research on language and sex has concentrated on the role language plays in the location and maintenance of women in a disadvantageous position in society. We find research into language and gender may generally be said to fall into two major categories. The first, the dominance approach, sees women as an oppressed group and interprets linguistic differences in women's and men's speech in terms of men's dominance and women's subordination. The second and newer approach, the difference model, emphasizes the idea that women and men belong to different subcultures, and the differences in women's and men's speech are interpreted as reflecting and maintaining gender-specific subcultures. In the essay, dominance approach is adopted to demonstrate sex discrimination in names and naming practices.In chapter three, I have a study of sexism in naming practices and names in both Chinese and English. In two cultures, many English and Chinese surnames are patronymic; Children usually follow their fathers' surname instead of mothers' surname; Women's surnames will change after marriage. These prove that there exists sexism in surnames. After analyses of a large collection of given names in both languages, we find male dominance is strikingly apparent in the content of given names. Male name words often convey notions of power, prestige or leadership. In contrast, female name words often convey weakness, inferiority, or a sense of the trivial. The name words show obviously, women's political and economic contributions to society are minimized, women become valuable only as sex objects. Their importance lies in their ability to please man and arouse their tender feeling. We can see serious sex discrimination against women in naming.The thesis, from a sociolinguistic angle, studies the general naming practices and the biased meanings of the name words in Chinese and English, and explores sexism in naming practice. It proves that sexism in naming practice is a universal phenomenon and is a reflection of social sexism of male superiority and female inferiority. And sexism in naming practice in turn reinforces and perpetuates people's biased attitude and stereotyping towards women. The thesis emphasizes that the sexist attitude leads females toward dependency and to the development of negative self-image which can be a major barrier to improvement in their status. In order to improve women's status, not only must the negative self-image be overcome, but also changes in biased attitudes of both sexes are required. With men and women gaining more equal status, sexism is gradually dying out.Research into sexism in language definitely benefits both language teaching and learning. It is especially of great value in cross-cultural communication.