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Shaping fictional characters is an important part of story-telling and the forces which shape identity are worth examining as they add to pragmatic theorizing on identity construction. The paper suggests that translation practice offers multiple contexts where the various workings of identity formation through discourse may be explored. The study uses Bucholtz and Halls's (2005) identity formation principles in two Greek versions (1947, 2017) of the same playtext to heighten awareness of alternative identity representation patterns, which employ various identity formation principles. Results show a significant shift in the translators' shaping the identity of the father figure, through target discursive options assuming a shifting gender position in the target societal environment and a different perception of societal values. Questionnaire respondents favoured certain target options probably for the intensity they created. The paper concludes that an integral part of a character's identity is conveyed through the non-/offensive value of items which regulate the translators' renegotiation of the character's identity. The paper advances understanding of pragmatic aspects in fictional identity formation and im/politeness through translation. It shifts attention to cross-cultural pragmatics, highlights the relational dynamic in the characters' communication, and the translator evaluation intention manifesting how intra-cultural variation affects the translator's task. • Identity formation principles are potentially anchored in interaction. • Translated versions of a playtext may favour different identity formation processes. • Translation practice may reveal further aspects of identity formation processes. • Translation practice may anchor identity in the relational dynamics of discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores sellers' addressing behaviours in Chinese e-commerce live streaming discourse by focusing on the impact of gender. Data were drawn from a self-built corpus comprising 120 h of transcribed texts from live streaming on Taobao. By conducting a corpus-based analysis, we compared males' and females' keywords for addressing customers and their performative functions of suggestive selling. The findings show that: (1) both males and females use a small percentage of kinship terms; (2) males' ratio of address pronouns to nouns greatly surpasses females', but their frequency of ' nín ' (deferential you) is much lower than females'; (3) females are more likely to consistently use nouns with the meaning of baby, whereas males prefer utilising diverse friendship terms; and (4) females frequently use a pattern of 'thank/greet + baby' to conduct ritual interactions more often than males. We argue that both males' and females' addressing behaviours function to promote successful selling; however, gender distinctions do exist in terms of their lexical choices and pragmatic uses of addressing words. The current study contributes to both pragmatics and the sociolinguistic study of gender and language. • Provides research data on Chinese addressing behaviors in e-commerce live streaming context. • Explores how sellers manage rapport via address pronouns and nouns for suggestive selling. • Focuses on gender's impact on addressing forms by conducting a corpus-based analysis. • Finds both similarities and differences in males' and females' use of addressing forms. • Contributes to both pragmatics and the sociolinguistic study of gender and language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The issue of gender-fair language remains rather controversial in France. Although some recent changes have taken place at institutional level, forms associated with inclusive writing are still discouraged in numerous legal settings. Inspired by the broader research framework of the Eurolect Observatory Project, 1 which focuses on the cross-language contact that derives from the multilingual drafting and translation of EU legislation, this paper investigates the possible dialogue between supranational and national legal varieties and the way(s) in which the topical issue of gender is addressed in French legal provisions. Based on qualitative and quantitative analysis of a corpus consisting of (i) EU directives, (ii) their implementing measures in the French national legal system, and (iii) French national laws, the study investigates different linguistic strategies for expressing gender, which can be categorised under the tripartite division of masculine, binary, or neutral forms. This contribution joins an existing body of recent literature on the discursive articulation of gender in legislative languages (Cavagnoli and Mori, 2019) and narrows down the focus to gender-related provisions in the French language. The analysis is guided by the following research questions: Can a potential intralinguistic dialogue be observed between supranational and national varieties in French legal discourse? And if so, can such a potential dialogue be said to be moving towards (more) gender-fair representation in the law? • Masculine forms in the law are a case of pragmatic indeterminacy. • The strategies used to represent gender in French legal discourse still lack convergence. • The inconsistent use of gender-fair strategies may result in male-biased inferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we analyze the discourse-pragmatic use of the adverbs there/here , e.g., " So, our grandson there is a real mixture ", in four small northern Ontario towns. 1200 examples contrasted by type of reference, ambiguous locative or non-locative, were coded for social and linguistic factors and analysed using statistical modelling. The results reveal that the strongest predictor of discourse-pragmatic use is date of birth: middle-aged speakers use it most in each town, but no other social factors (e.g. perceived gender, education, job type) are significant. Importantly, the higher the proportion of Francophone populations in the community, the greater the use of there but not here. We argue that alignment between Francophones and Anglophones is a likely explanation. More generally this study highlights the value of discourse-pragmatic features for understanding styles of interaction and underscores the research potential for comparing these phenomena across communities. • Discourse-pragmatic there/here is a vernacular feature of northern Ontario. • Strongest predictor of use is date of birth: middle-aged speakers use it most. • More French heritage individuals in a community correlates with greater usage. • Heightened use is emblematic of alignment between Francophones and Anglophones as defined and reported in the discourse-pragmatic and sociolinguistic literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is twofold: First, to critically examine the evaluative implications of the conversation analytic (hereafter CA) methodology for studying interruptions, and second, to offer an outline of an intertextual approach to interruption that situates a US presidential debate by taking seriously its interrelatedness to 'ongoing debates in the media' (i.e., its intertextual constitution). First, the analysis identifies the 'interruptions' that occur in the debate using four CA notions of 'clashes'. These four notions presume that interruptions involve uncooperative or incoherent actions, and interruptions are identified on the basis of the participants' mutual orientations. Next, the 'interruptions' thus identified are subjected to intertextual analysis. Here, interruption is conceived of in terms of a very different notion of 'clash', namely as participants drawing on different, conflicting 'prior discourses'. This part of the analysis draws on Jacobsen's (2016) notion of the position–contradiction pair type and Tannen's (2007/1989) Bakhtin-inspired approach to verbal interaction. The analysis not only reveals several things about interruption in the First 2016 US presidential debate, but likewise demonstrates that the picture of 'clash' that one is left with using the present intertextual approach is very different from the one left by a CA-oriented approach. • The study critically examines the evaluative implications of the CA methodology for studying interruptions. • The study offers an outline of an intertextual approach to interruption. • The First 2016 debate is situated/contextualized by way of the participants' references to 'ongoing debates in the media'. • Two basic notions of 'clash' are examined: one relating to 'simultaneous' talk and one to 'conflicting prior discourses'. • Interruptions are found to serve two primary functions: an attacking one and a defensive one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Laughter is employed in social interaction to construct meaning, identities, and relationships. Although studies have begun to examine humour within the medical workplace, none have employed observational methods to study laughables/laughter within the learning triad of the bedside teaching encounter (BTE). This paper focuses on this gap by exploring the novel question: How do students, patients, and doctors construct and co-construct power, identity and gender through laughter within BTEs? In this paper, we focus on the disaffiliative function of laughables/laughter across BTEs. Most of the laughables presented can be construed as teases: fallibility, frustration, cynicism and/or sexual teasing; and this teasing was accompanied by a competitive rather than collaborative play frame. Teasing and laughter was employed by participants to maintain or subvert existing power asymmetries, to construct identities, for example, as individuals who are intelligent, witty and powerful, and to construct gender by performing masculinity or femininity. Further research with a larger and more diverse sample of participants (including more female doctors, male students and female patients) is now essential to explore more fully the co-construction of power, identities and gender through laughter within medical workplace learning encounters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper explores the construction of collective identity by students in an academic learning environment, and shows how such collective identity may hinder or slow down individual learning or what may be referred to as independent learning. To demonstrate this I draw on language as a tool used for the construction of identity, and for showcasing and defending identity. The goal of this paper is to draw the attention of students and educators to the role of non-linguistic variables such as identity in student learning, and particularly in learning in a second language. 1 [1] South Africa today is mounting a series of academic intervention programmes to bridge the skills shortage in the country. If these schemes are to succeed, thorough investigation and understanding of society, and in particular of the target group, will be required. The data presented in this article is extracted from my PhD study, and was collected through one group''s focus group discussions, out of many used in the study. The participants were students of the then University of Natal, now the University of KwaZulu-Natal. The participants in this focus group were Zulu-speaking male students, and the data show that they strongly prefer a collective, rather than an individual identity, and this is indicated in their choice and style of language, and specifically in their choice of pronouns. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The recent legislation enforcing male and female equality in the Indonesian workplace and the gradual increase of Indonesian women in leadership positions has generated religious debates treating gender equality as a Western hegemonic influence and a contradiction to Indonesia's cultural values. These sociopolitical changes have created new discourse practices which male and female leaders now need to negotiate. To address these novel gender and linguistic practices and extend the limited research on leadership discourse, this research investigated the manager's use of humour as a politeness strategy in Indonesian business meetings. Previous research identified the formal nature of business exchanges, the importance of hierarchy and respect for authority in the workplace. Using the discursive approach to politeness, the concept of relational practice and communities of practice, this paper examined male and female managers' deployment of humour in Indonesian meetings. The study revealed that both male and female managers widely adopted humour mainly to promote group solidarity and cohesiveness. Female managers also utilized humour as a device for mitigating their criticism of male staff, and asserting power and authority. The deployment of humour by both male and female managers to enhance collegiality reflects changes in workplace discourse and may be characteristic of Indonesia's modernization and the influence exerted by global forces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper showcases work in ‘categorial systematics’ ( Stokoe, 2012 ) and the sequential analysis of categories in interaction, in the context of current developments in membership categorization analysis. It shows how, in a corpus of sales calls, categorial matters are initiated and managed as salespeople elicit information about prospective customers. In particular, our interest is in the turn design of sellers’ requests for names, and how men and women customers are asked for their titles (e.g., “is it miss, missus or ms?”). We show that these activities precipitate talk about the customers’ domestic domain regarding who comprises ‘the buyer’ within the membership categorization device ‘parties to a sale’. While such requests are apparently mandated by the company, they can produce turbulence as salespeople imply, or attempt to avoid implying, the nature of customers’ domestic relationships. The analysis also shows that and how such requests sustain the gendered nature of forms of address. We discuss the implications of the research findings for training salespeople to communicate more effectively with their customers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This study aims to gain in-depth understanding on whether and how asynchronous computer mediated communication (CMC), exemplified by advice giving in web-based discussion forums, is instrumental in the construction of gender identities and can thus be taken to reflect gendered discursive practices. While there is a growing body of literature on this topic, this paper extends the discussion into a less explored issue in the area of gender and advice, namely, the potential effect that the sex of the recipient may have on the linguistic structure of the message. Unlike advice-givers, advice-seekers unambiguously reveal their sex in their posts, while typically omitting other personal information or identifying features. Sex is thus the only identifiable variable. This study therefore examined how men and women are given advice – not just on how they produce advice – in terms of directness, politeness considerations and affect display. The picture that emerges is complex and points to potential changing discursive practices and gender role expectations. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In this paper I examine the position of women as news reporters and editors – as journalistic authors and animators – in relation to their male counterparts, and consider changes in news coverage as their numbers increased in the newsroom over the past 50 years. I compare profession-internal guidelines which encapsulate gender ideologies pervasive in the larger culture – starting with a popular 1959 career guide – alongside journalistic genre forms, using as specific examples ‘women''s pages’ and ‘page one’ in the New York Times. The change from a backgrounded position on the ‘women''s pages’ to greater visibility in more prestigeful news contexts is indexed through macropragmatic factors such as byline (who is entitled to be recognized by name) and story topic (what counts as salient in the journalist''s world), both of which can be viewed in terms of their nonreferential index value within the community of journalists. Profession-internal critiques suggest that despite increased opportunities for women over time, the place of women at the Fourth Estate is still limited – and the discourse-level evidence supports that, affording a potential explanation for more global gender disparities in news media coverage. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper investigates how two British newspapers, the Guardian and the Telegraph, construed the French Socialist Presidential candidate, Ségolène Royal. It explores how both newspapers employed lexicogrammatical choices to realize texts, which represented Royal as an inhabitant of worlds normally dissociated from politics. It shows that both newspapers through their choices of material and relational processes consistently represented her not only as an actor in a political world but also simultaneously represented her as an actor in a celebrity world and to a lesser extent as an actor in the private sphere of the family. By depicting her as a celebrity, the newspapers distanced her not only from ordinary life but also denigrated her gravitas as a politician. The article also examines the newspapers’ use of over-lexicalization in depicting Royal as subject in nominal groups and shows that both newspapers had difficulty in situating Royal, a 53-year-old unmarried mother of four, as a political figure. Finally, by examining intrusions into the texts, it shows how a metaphor ‘old is bad’ was evoked and used to deflect serious discussion of Royal''s policies and views. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper argues that ideological metaphors can be special cases of conceptual interaction between metaphor and metonymy, along with synecdoche. We focus on a specific type of ideological metaphor, advertising gender metaphors. Within a cognitive semantic–pragmatic framework we have described and analysed the strategies and complex conceptual metaphoric–metonymic/synecdochic patterns in a case study of 292 advertising gender metaphors taken from a corpus of 1610 advertising metaphors present in 1142 commercial ads published in British Cosmopolitan. Metonymy, along with synecdoche, has been shown, as far as the above analysis of advertising gender metaphors is concerned, to precede in all but one of the various types and subtypes of this concrete type of ideological metaphor. The existence of underlying patterns of metonymic (and synecdochic) motivation used for gender assignment is, therefore, proven and evidence is given for that all (ideological) metaphors may necessarily need underlying metonymisations. It also supports , , , , and idea of a metaphor–metonymy continuum with the intermediate notion of metonymy-based metaphors. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: In academic writing the construction of an authorial identity is constrained by different social, biographical and academic factors as writers bring their diverse personal experiences to a text. One of these factors is that of gender, although this has been far less studied in published academic writing than in other forms of social interaction. In this paper, we explore the issue of gender in academic interactions by analyzing a corpus of academic book reviews and interviews with academics from Philosophy and Biology. Focusing on metadiscourse features, we examine the similarities and differences in the rhetorical practices of male and female academics in their construction of a disciplinarily appropriate identity. Our findings show while there is no one-to-one relation between gender and language, gender and discipline identities cross-cut each other in significant ways in the context of professional self-conception and personal preferences. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper investigates the methodological convenience of a critical cognitive–pragmatic approach to gender metaphors in Advertising English. We begin by reviewing recent research in cognitive linguistics, pragmatics and critical discourse analysis (CDA) with regard to advertising metaphors and gender, then proceed to characterize advertising gender metaphors as indirect cognitive–pragmatic devices used in Advertising English to give rise to often covertly sexist communicated interpretations. Next, we present a description of advertising gender metaphors, subtypes (cases of metaphorical gender, universal gender metaphors and cultural gender metaphors) and cross-categorization in a case study of 1142 advertisements published in British Cosmopolitan (years 1999 and 2000). Finally, we argue that a critical cognitive–pragmatic approach to advertising gender metaphors is of most salience since it permits to (1) help the audience''s search for cognitive efficiency, (2) unmask the advertiser''s rhetorical intentions to make certain non-neutral assumptions more manifest to the target audience without making public its intention to do so and (3) call for action on the part of the addressee to overcome negative social consequences of its use in Advertising English. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The skillful use of joking to achieve characterization, within the essentially male world of the recent American film, Sling Blade, is the focus of this paper. The elusive yet socially highly significant notion of ‘sense of humor’ is assumed to reveal itself in social practice through joking interaction. For an appropriate analysis of situated discursive practice, I take a broad interpretation of ‘joking’, within an interactional sociolinguistic framework, to indicate any shift of footing from ‘serious’ to ‘non-serious’, whether signalled proactively or retroactively in the interaction, whether taken up or not by other interlocutors. Characterization is achieved through different styles of joking, representing typifications of gender role behavior within the rural American Southern world of the film. Good ol’ boy Bill, the fix-it shop owner, uses typical solidarity joking, including ritualized joking associated with conversational routines, narrative jokes, and teasing or ‘ritual insult’ joking. Bigoted and abusive ‘redneck’ Doyle uses joking to express his own hostility, either in the form of sarcasm, or as a retroactive ‘cover’ for his intentionally insulting remarks. Vaughn, a gay man, uses irony as his main style, symbolic of his veiled gender identity. Karl and Frank, who have the most important emotional bond in the movie in the form of a friendship across generations, engage in the only joking which constitutes a true empathic connection. The main female character, Frank''s mother Linda, existing in an essentially male world in the screenplay, operates in a mode of seriousness, participating in joking only by responding as socially required. Her one ambiguous attempt at joking, as a social control move on Doyle, is ineffectual. A narrative dirty joke, first occurring among men at the fix-it shop, is used effectively for characterization when Karl later tries to tell it to Linda in the mistaken belief that it constitutes an appropriate way to be sociable. Billy Bob Thornton, a native of rural Arkansas in the American South, not only wrote and adapted the screenplay for the film (for which he won an Academy Award in 1996), but also directed the film, and portrayed the starring character. The joking styles are analyzed as aesthetic typifications which can be used in the service of characterization. The treatment of joking within pragmatic framework is critiqued, and a more comprehensive analysis is offered, one which combines the pragmalinguistic and the sociopragmatic. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper examines how playful language functions in the friendship talk of preadolescent girls. The corpus on which the investigation is based is audio-taped interactions between peer girlfriends. The analytical focus is on speaker''s negotiation of talk in and out of play and non-play. It is argued that these playful forms of speaking are particularly salient at this life stage and that the talk of preadolescent girls mirrors their shifting allegiances. These interactional practices show remnants of earlier childhood discourse whilst also presaging future practices resulting in a marked oscillating key. The methodology is synthesised from interactional sociolinguistics, cultural feminist ethnography and Conversational Analysis approaches. Findings demonstrate that alliance building is accomplished in a diversity of forms that contribute to the overall game-like key of preadolescent girls’ talk. Some of the selected resources foreshadow documented cooperative interactive practices associated with women. However, one of the chief findings is that alliance building is not confined to supportive behaviours. Episodes of playful confrontation, name-calling and insulting sequences are highly prominent in these data and contribute to locating the talk as distinct from that of earlier childhood and adult discourse. Results are discussed in terms of their contribution to the literature on older children''s language use. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Humor serves a wide range of functions at work, one of which is to foster collegiality. An analysis of interactions in New Zealand workplaces showed that one of the most important functions of humor was the construction and maintenance of good relations with fellow workers. Such workplace collegiality is often constructed and maintained through extended sequences of humor. This paper examines some of the ways in which humor is used to construct collegial relations at work, with particular attention to the dimension of gender in the workplace. The analysis identifies three factors, which may contribute to the construction of gender identity in extended jointly constructed humor sequences. Firstly, the pragmatic force of contributions is relevant: a distinction between supportive as opposed to contestive humor sequences proved useful. Secondly, the discursive effect of contributions to such sequences must be considered: a distinction is made between a maximally and minimally collaborative contribution (i.e. a cohesive contribution to a single shared floor vs. an independent often more competitive contribution to the floor). Finally, the content of three examples of specifically ‘gendered’ sequences is examined in some detail, illustrating how, on occasion, gender may become the explicit focus of workplace humor. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper explores the way people ‘do mentoring’ in the workplace. Using examples from our extensive database of interactions, recorded in a number of New Zealand workplaces, the analysis identifies a variety of discourse strategies used by those in positions of responsibility in mentoring colleagues. The mentors in our corpus draw from a wide repertoire of strategies, ranging from those which focus on procedural aspects of career advising, through corrective and appreciative comments, to supportive advising, and indirect coaching. Although mentoring has traditionally been associated with men, the examples demonstrate that women leaders do mentoring too, and the analysis suggests that some do it very well. Moreover, this exploratory look at how mentoring is accomplished indicates that ‘feminine’ strategies are well represented among those available, and appear to be very effective. Finally, it is suggested that successful women leaders contest or ‘trouble’ established gender boundaries and thereby expand the very concept of what it means to be a leader. Through their discursive practices, they give the legitimacy of power to a range of discursive strategies, including some conventionally regarded as feminine. Thus, it is argued, the process of constructing one''s identity as an effective leader becomes increasingly compatible for women with that of constructing a socially coherent gender identity. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Machine searches of transcribed speech can assist in the quantitative study of sociolinguistic variation in the use of discourse markers. This approach makes possible the analysis of extended samples of speech from a stratified population from which frequency counts can be calculated. The present paper deals with the use of you know as a discourse marker in two data-sets from Scotland. The first is a set of interviews recorded in Ayr and the second a set of same-sex conversations recorded in Glasgow. The analysis shows age, gender, and social class differences in the use of you know that do not appear to be based on any notion of ‘shared information.'' [Copyright &y& Elsevier]