(Re)presenting identities: the discursive construction of gender in conversation
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Abstract
In the last few decades considerable academic research has been undertaken from a psychological, sociological, anthropological, historical or linguistic point of view into the creation of identity based on a context-dependent, linguistically mediated process of which the subject may be more or less aware. The present paper focuses on this process of gender identity (re)construction, while distancing itself from essentialism in the light of the historical transformations in current feminist thought. The corpus used is a two-hour recording of three heterosexual couples who were initially divided into two same-gender groups and subsequently brought together in a single mixed group. The suggested topics, “things that are important to you” and “dating”, aimed to bring out gender construction and illustrate how the creation of identities may be achieved through structuring and thematic development in the course of ordinary conversation. Taking our lead from queer theory and the latest studies on language and gender, care was taken not to apply stable gender categories to notions of femininity and masculinity; hence attention was paid to vacillations and intermediate positions occurring in the conversations. We argue that language should not only be seen a means of reflecting identities but also of creating them. This work shows that people create gender identities in the course of conversation through thematic management and do not always conform to established social roles.
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