ABSTRACT
Lakoff claimed that there were a number of lexical, grammatical and phonological features that characterised women's language. Starting from an informal perception of sex bias in language, linguists were led initially to seek the source of bias in linguistic structure and to argue from there that the process of language development was instrumental in the imposition of a 'man-made' linguistic code. The concept of sexist discourse was identified, described and to some extent explained in intensive work on the topic, mostly carried out in the 1970s. In the case of sexist discourse, the relationship between language and ideology is more complex. One particular practice that has received considerable attention in the literature on language and gender is the use of male pronouns and other male-oriented terms to refer to people in general. The general re-interpretation of the origins of linguistic gender differentiation has gone hand in hand with a re-evaluation of the properties of the female register.
