Women Behaving Badly: Female Speakers Backstage

In this paper I explore women's (and girls') self-presentation in contexts where they seem most relaxed, most off-record, drawing on Goffman's concept of 'backstage'. In particular, I shall focus on those aspects of women's backstage performance of self which do not fit prevailing norms of femininity, in other words, women's performances of 'not-nice' selves, as well as reports of – and fantasies about – behaving 'badly'. The analysis will draw on a corpus of spontaneous conversation involving girl and women friends. It will be argued that the backstage talk possible only with close friends provides women with an arena where norms can be subverted and challenged and alternative selves explored. But it also needs to be acknowledged that in an important sense such talk helps to maintain the heteropatriarchal order, by providing an outlet for the frustrations of frontstage performance.     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed
Jones, Mari C. Language Obsolescence and Revitalization. Linguistic Change in Two Sociolinguistically Contrasting Welsh Communities .
Savage-Rumbaugh, Sue; Shanker, Stuart and Taylor, Talbot. Apes, Language and the Human Mind .
Kurzon, Dennis. 1998. Discourse of Silence .
Blommaert, Jan and Verschueren, Jef. Debating Diversity: Analysing the Discourse of Tolerance .
Robertshaw, Paul. Summary Justice: Judges Address Juries .
Broderick, George. Language Death in the Isle of Man: An Investigation into the Decline and Extinction of Manx Gaelic as a Community Language in the Isle of Man .
Jenkins, Geraint H. (ed.). Language and Community in the Nineteenth Century: A Social History of the Welsh Language .
Czyz˙ewski, Marek; Kowalski, Sergiusz and Piotrowski, Andrzej (eds.). Rytualny chaos: Studium dyskursu publicznego .
Suleiman, Yasir (ed.). Language and Identity in the Middle East and North Africa .     

Book Reviews

Shoshana Blum-Kulka. Dinner Talk: Cultural Patterns of Sociability and Socialization in Family Discourse .
Karin Aijmer. Conversational Routines in English: Convention and Creativity .
Laurel J. Brinton. Pragmatic Markers in English: Grammaticalization and Discourse Functions .
Gunther Kress. Before Writing: Rethinking the Paths to Literacy .
Martha C. Pennington. Phonology in English Language Teaching .     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed in this article: Grenoble, Leonore A. and Whaley, Lindsay J. (eds) Endangered Languages: Current Issues and Future Prospects van Dijk, Theun A (ed.) Discourse Studies: A Multidisciplinary Introduction. Volume 1: Discourse as Structure and Process. Volume 2: Discourse as Social Interaction Flowerdew, John The Final Years of British Hong Kong: The Discourse of Colonial Withdrawal gumperz, john j. and Levinson, Stephen C. (edds) Rethinking Linguistic Relativity Wodak, Ruth The Disorders of Discourse Clyne, Michael Undoing and Redoing Corpus Planning Bakker, Peter A Language of Our Own: The Genesis of Michif, the Mixed Cree-French Language of the Canadian Me´tis Ewers, Traute The Origin of American Black English: Be-Forms in the Hoodoo Texts Stevenson, Patraick The German Speaking World: A Practical Introduction to Sociolinguistic Issues Travers, Max The Reality of Law: Working and Talking in a Firm of Criminal Lawyers Gudykunst, William B., Ting-Toomey, Stella and Nishida, Tsukasa (eds) Communication in Personal Relationships Across Cultures     

Book Reviews

Rampton, Ben, Crossing: Language and Ethnicity among Adolescents
Drechsel, Emanuel J., Mobilian Jargon: Linguistic and Sociohistorical Aspects of a Native American Pidgin
Hensel, Chase, Telling Our Selves: Ethnicity and Discourse in Southwestern Alaska
Silverman, David, Discourses of Counselling: HIV Counselling as Social Interaction
Goebl, Hans; Nelde, Peter H.; Starý, Zdeněk and Wölck, Wolfgang (eds), Kontaktlinguistik, Contact Linguistics, Linguistique de contact
Baxter, Leslie A. and Montgomery, Barbara M., Relating: Dialogues and Dialectics
Lanstyák, István and Szabómihály, Gizella, Magyar nyelvhasználat – iskola – kétnyelvüség [Hungarian language use, schools and bilingualism]
Zentella, Ana Celia, Growing up Bilingual: Puerto Rican Children in New York
Fairclough, Norman, Media Discourse     

How to Do Things with Prayer Utterances

While the social scientific study of prayer is growing, little work has investigated prayer utterances—or statements where social actors say the term “prayer” or various cognates—in everyday talk. Drawing on insights from ordinary language philosophy, I argue that prayer utterances are performative utterances that help social actors accomplish a variety of actions in social interactions. To illustrate the performative nature of prayer utterances, I describe three types of actions that prayer utterances can accomplish: (1) aligning potentially problematic or questionable conduct with cultural expectations, (2) signaling to others an intense yearning for an object or occurrence on the behalf of oneself or others, and (3) signaling to others authentic feelings of care for another person or group of people. I conclude with a discussion of the implications of the analysis.     

Book Notices

Gregory M. Mathoesian. Reproducing Rape: Domination through Talk in the Courtroom (Language and Legal Discourse)
Sidney Greenbaum (ed.). Comparing English Worldwide: The International Corpus of English.
Mari´a José Serrano. La variacio´n sinta´ctica: formas verbales del periodo hipote´tico en espan˜ol
Ian Hutchby. Confrontation Talk: Arguments, Asymmetries, and Power on Talk Radio
Nikolas Coupland and Adam Jaworski (eds.). Sociolinguistics: A Reader and Coursebook     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed
Romaine, Suzanne. Communicating Gender
Chouliaraki, Lilie and Fairclough, Norman. Discourse in Late Modernity: Rethinking Critical Discourse Analysis
Fishman, Joshua A. (ed.). Handbook of Language and Ethnic Identity
Kontra, Miklo´s; Phillipson, Robert; Skutnabb-Kangas, Tove and Va´rady, Tibor (eds.). Language: A Right and a Resource. Approaches to Linguistic Human Rights
Foulkes, Paul and Docherty, Gerard (eds.). Urban Voices. Accent Studies in the British Isles
Baron, Naomi S. Alphabet to Email: How Written English Evolved and Where It's Heading     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed: Monica Heller, Linguistic Minorities and Modernity: A Sociolinguistic Ethnography Philip Baker and John Eversley, (eds.) Multilingual Capital. The Languages of London's Schoolchildren and their Relevance to Economic, Social and Educational Policies Ralph Penny, Variation and Change in Spanish Maria Pilar Navarro Errasti, Rosa Lores Sanz, Silvia Murillo Ornat and Carmina Buesa Gomez, (eds.) Transcultural Communication: Pragmalinguistic Aspects Deborah Cameron, Good to Talk? Living and Working in Communication Culture Susan Ehrlich, Representing Rape: Language and Sexual Consent Mikko Lehtonen, The Cultural Analysis of Texts     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed: Stephen Whitehead and Roy Moodley (eds), Transforming Managers: Gendering Change in the Public Sector Julia O'Connell Davidson, Prostitution, Power and Freedom Su Maddock, Challenging Women Kathleen Weiler and Sue Middleton (eds), Telling Women's Lives Eileen Drew, Ruth Emerek and Evelyn Mahon, Women, Work and the Family in Europe Ian Proctor and Maureen Padfield, Young Adult Women, Work and Family     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed: Ann Brooks and Alison Mackinnon (eds.), Gender and the Restructured University Deborah Cameron, Good to Talk? Living and Working in a Communication Culture Jody Miller, One of the Guys: Girls, Gangs and Gender David D. Hall(ed.), Witch–hunting in Seventeenth–century New England: A Documentary History 1638–1693 Carla Freeman, High Tech and High Heels in the Global Economy: Women, Work, and Pink Collar Identities in the Caribbean     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed: L.A. Reese and K.E. Lindenberg, Implementing Sexual Harassment Policy: Challenges for the Public Sector Workplace Amy Flowers, The Fantasy Factory: An Insider's View of the Phone Sex Industry Helinä Melkas and Richard Anker, Gender Equality and Occupational Segregation in Nordic Labour Markets John Denton, Organisational Learning and Effectiveness Carol Lee Bacchi, Women, Policy and Politics     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed:
Susan Ehrlich, Representing Rape: Language and Sexual Consent
Deborah Cameron, Working with Spoken Discourse
Stefan Titscher, Michael Meyer, Ruth Wodak and Eva Vetter, Methods of Text and Discourse Analysis
Linda A. Wood and Rolf O. Kroger, Doing Discourse Analysis: Methods for Studying Action in Talk and Text
Srikant Sarangi and Celia Roberts (eds.), Talk, Work and Institutional Order: Discourse in Medical, Mediation and Management Settings
Ulrich Ammon (ed.), The Dominance of English as a Language of Science: Effects on Other Languages and Language Communities
Alexandra Jaffe, Ideologies in Action: Language Politics on Corsica
Niloofar Haeri, The Sociolinguistic Market of Cairo: Gender, Class and Education
Anita Y. K. Poon, Medium of Instruction in Hong Kong: Policy and Practice
Tariq Rahman, Language, Education and Culture
Dariusz Galasinski, The Language of Deception: A Discourse Analytical Study
Clifford Hill and Eric Larsen, Children and Reading Tests
Fern L. Johnson, Speaking Culturally: Language Diversity in the United States
Lucy Burke, Tony Crowley and Alan Girvin (eds.), The Routledge Language and Cultural Theory Reader     

Book Reviews

Abstract

Project on Social History Curriculum. Peter N. Stearns and Linda W. Rosenzweig, eds., six volumes. Pittsburgh, Penn.: Carnegie-Mellon University, 1982, 1502 pp., 108 transparencies. Reviewed by Mildred Alpern.

Using Local History in the Classroom. Fay D. Metcalf and Matthew T. Downey. Nashville, Tennessee: The American Association for State and Local History, 1982, 284 pp. Reviewed by Gerald A. Danzer.     

Book Reviews

Indonesia: the making of a culture. James J. Fox (ed.). 286pp, maps, figures, tables, bibliographies. (Vol. 1 in Indonesia: Australian Perspectives. James J. Fox, Ross Garnaut, Peter McCawley, J.A.C. Mackie (eds).) Canberra: Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University. 1980. $10.

Mekeo: inequality and ambivalence in a village society. Epeli Hau’ofa. x, 3 39pp., maps, figures, tables, plates, appendices, glossary, bibliography, index. Canberra: Australian National University Press. 1981. $19.50.

Tribal communities in rural areas. Elspeth Young, xxiii, 230pp., maps, figures, tables, bibliography. (The Aboriginal Component in the Australian Economy, no. 1.) Canberra: Development Studies Centre, Research School of Pacific Studies, The Australian National University. 1981. $9.

Women in India and Nepal. Michael Allen and S.N. Mukerjee (eds). xiii, 286pp., figures, bibliographies, index. Canberra: The Australian National University (Monographs on South Asia no. 8). 1982. $10.     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed:
Gunnel Tottie An Introduction to American English: A Resource Book for Students
Joan Cutting Pragmatics and Discourse
Peter Stockwell Sociolinguistics: A Resource Book for Students
Steven Clayman and John Heritage The News Interview: Journalists and Public Figures on Air     

Book Reviews

No abstract available for this article.     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed in this article:
Penelope Eckert and John R. Rickford (eds.), Style and Sociolinguistic Variation
Richard Watts and Peter Trudgill (eds), Alternative Histories of English
Shana Poplack (ed.), The English History of African American English
Urszula Clark, War Words: Language, History and the Disciplining of English
Beverley A. Lewin, Jonathan Fine and Lynne Young, Expository Discourse: A Genre–based Approach to Social Science Research Texts
Alexandra Georgakopoulou and Marianna Spanaki (eds.), A Reader in Greek Sociolinguistics – Studies in Modern Greek Language, Culture and Communication
Maya Khemlani David, The Sindhis of Malaysia: A Sociolinguistic Study
Gunther Kress and Theo van Leeuwen, Multimodal Discourse: The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed
Auer, P. (ed.) Code-Switching in Conversation: Language, Interaction and Identity
Malone, Martin J. Worlds of Talk: The Presentation of Self in Everyday Conversation
Diamond, Julie. Status and Power in Verbal Interaction: A Study of Discourse in a Close-Knit Social Network
Roca, Ana and Jensen, John B. (eds.). Spanish in Contact: Issues in Bilingualism
Shaul, David L. and Furbee, N. Louanna. Language and Culture
Kotthoff, Helga and Wodak, Ruth (eds.). Communicating Gender in Context
Wodak, Ruth (ed.). Gender and Discourse
Cheshire, Jenny and Stein, Dieter (eds.). Taming the Vernacular: From Dialect to Written Standard Language     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed: Carol Miller and Shahra Razavi (eds), Missionaries and Mandarins: Feminist Engagement with Development Institutions Joel F. Handler and Lucie White (eds), Hard Labor: Women and Work in the Post‐Welfare Era K. Kempadoo and J. Doezema, Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance, and Redefinition Paul Iles, Managing Staff Selection and Assessment Danusia Malina and Sian Maslin‐Protheroe, Surviving the Academy: Feminist Perspectives Jim Stewart, Employee Development Practice