ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 documents, primary socialization bombards children with mountains of information and learning they must absorb. This process includes learning both the verbal and nonverbal rules and complexities of their language. Language reflects culture and is shaped by it; therefore, it is fundamental to our understanding of gender. A child’s emerging gender identity is strongly connected to the way words are perceived. Language tells us about how culture defines and categorizes the genders. Symbolic interactionists affirm that language shapes our perceptions and thus our understanding of “reality.” In learning language, children are taught that the genders are valued differently. However, as the end point fallacy suggests, because language socialization is lifelong, we continually modify it in response to social change. It is the taken-for-granted part of language socialization that makes language such a powerful element in determining gender role continuity and change. For speakers of English, unless stated otherwise, everyone begins as a male. Decades of research on American English suggest that people are male until proven female.
