Previous studies of the sex variable

Few linguistic studies have dealt systematically with sex differentiation in language use, and none in the context of Creole societies, even though the latter provide ideal terrain for this type of research because of recent changes in gender roles. The following claims have been made in respect to men and women's use of language, and their roles in the diffusion of linguistic change.

(1) Women are more likely to use standard or prestige forms, and to upgrade their speech patterns in formal situations than men of the same age, social class and education level. This appears to hold true for all social classes, and is interpreted as a strategy to compensate for the general subordination to which women are subjected in social structures (see, however, Milroy, this volume).

(2) Men's speech patterns are more directly related to their socioeconomic status. Nonstandard speech has positive connotations of masculinity and signals male solidarity, mostly for working classes, but for others as well. Thus, in formal situations working class men do not deviate from low status variants as much as women do. But lower middle class men are so conscious of the social value of standard speech that they often hypercorrect, a sign of linguistic insecurity, according to Labov (1972).

(3) Women are innovators in linguistic change, but only in the direction of standard speech, whereas men lead in the use of new vernacular forms.