ABSTRACT
Language and gender scholars have long recognised the hegemonic relationships or ‘orders’ that impact society, whether represented as the ‘gender order’ with its inherent hierarchies relating to the societal gender roles, or the more recently proposed concept of the ‘culture order’ with which the gender order intersects. These unmarked ideologies manifest as sets of taken-for-granted societal norms influencing behaviour, including linguistic behaviour. While gender discrimination is well recognised in terms of hiring and other organisational practices, the impact of gender bias is also experienced in more invidious and subtle ways through the way language is used in everyday talk. This paper exposes assumptions about relative power in workplace settings by focusing on the influence of these orders and biases in mundane interactions between colleagues.
Drawing on New Zealand data from corporate workplaces where normatively masculine behaviours are still evident, especially in leadership practices, as well as interactions recorded in gender-segregated occupations such as nursing and aged care, our analysis contributes to an understanding of the role of biases on interaction at a more theoretical level, challenges gendered stereotyping in a global context and suggests means of identifying unconscious biases which continue to impact on workplace practices.
