Analysis Of Sexism In The English Language From Socio-psychological Perspective

Since 1960s, with the rise of Second Wave of Feminist Movement, the highly progressed consciousness of social equality, and sufficient development of sociolinguistics, sociology and women's studies, linguistic sexism has drawn great attention in western academia. The study of sexism in the English language is one of the most significant subjects in linguistic research, especially in sociolinguistics. Traditionally, feminist linguists argue that linguistic sexism only refers to women; the term"sexism"was even understood as bias or discrimination against women. However, in the modern society, there is also linguistic sexism against men.This thesis makes analysis not only on prejudices and discrimination against women in the English language but also on prejudices and discrimination against men. Analysis of sexism against women are made in the following eight aspects: the generic use of"man/he"and their variants; sexism in word-formation; sexism in collocation; sexism in metaphor; sexism in social connotation; sexism in semantic change; sexism in addressing form and naming convention and sexism in English proverbs. The analysis of sexism against men in language use is made in the following six respects: terms challenging men's masculinity; men being the origin of evil and law-breaking; animal metaphors; the bad habits of men in routine life; men and sexualities; terms of men's professions. By applying gender role theory, gender schema theory, social identity theory and the theory of stereotype, the author analyzes and interprets the formation of sexism in the English language in socio-psychological perspective.