work from tuesday 12th april

 

 

Labels do not determine your power

Why are all men addressed as ‘Mr’ married or not? [Pause for 3 seconds while making eye contact with many people]Is it because all men are equal no matter what their relationship status? [Quick pause]If it is to do with equality, then why are unmarried women addressed as ‘Miss’ and married ‘Mrs’?  Is sexism still a big part of humanity?

When you are sat in a classroom and you address the teacher as Mr – when male- you do not know whether [say it while using hands as a way of showing opposites] this male is neither married nor single. As a result, this does not affect how you see this person and you [making eye contact while pointing] do not see them beyond their personal power in the classroom. Do you not? But this is not the case when it comes to females [pause to give thinking time]. As soon as you here the teacher being addressed as Miss, you instantly know that she is not married. In some cases, this could be a sign that she is not [using the gesture for an apostrophe] ‘settled down’ –even though she may have been in a stable relationship for many years. This could either make you see this teacher not as powerful as she would be if married where she would be addressed as ‘Mrs’ as it is an official sign that this women is wed.

But marriage does not mean between a man and a women… [Pause for effect]

By stating this alone shows how the title of Miss or Mrs is not determined by a males power. How men do not determine a women’s status in her work place. Does a female not get a job purely on being a ‘Miss’ or Mrs’? NO [say louder, more passionate but not shouting] I know stereotypes will believe you to be married to the opposite sex but there is a stereotype for everything! Why should you [eye contact] when you are older feel ashamed in whom you marry?

If the concrete noun ‘Mr’ is used to address all men, then surely there is a reason, is it because men dominate conversation when it comes to communicating with the opposite sex? Zimmerman and West found that 95% of men interrupted during a conversation with females. The use of the noun ‘Mr’ therefore could be seen as the reason for why men perceive themselves of having a superior status. However, 5% [puts up 5 fingers] of these men did not interrupt in conversation. This implies that not all men are dominant within conversation and maybe it is to do with individual differences. Could men just be ruder? 

When a doctor or a Professor, the person- no matter what sex- is addressed as Dr for Doctor or Pro for Professor. They have [counting on fingers] the same job, personal power and status and [moving both hands outwards in synchrony] still seen as equal. But why is this seen as a surprise? [Pause for 2 seconds] This question I just made may be more of a shock to women as it does to men, because it is suggesting how women finally are seen as equals in the workplace to males. It might just be in these lexical fields but somewhere, someone has made the mend! As a doctor or a professor is [counting on fingers] a high paid, educated well-earned job, this equality may be a bribe. As men might say [Says sarcastically] ‘Some females are actually as good as we are when it comes to work so they can finally be seen as equals’ This is very old-fashioned views and is why I am saying how this inequality of women being picked out as not being married is wrong!

[Starts walking round as it is a bit of topic so can engage with people more with a laid back vibe]After the Second World War-[tilting head forward] before your time- working class mothers had to stay at home and look after the children. They were seen as stay at home wives and had this label of stay at home mothers. Females had neither time nor money to go and get a degree while the men went off to work .This divide with being married stay at home mothers and non-married women who were seen to not have a stable lifestyle has lived on until this day and age and it is now- I believe- outdated. We are not involved in a war in this country like we were in world war two so why live like it?

Berstein and Labov’s research oppose how women are classed as equals only when or if they become a doctor or professor, due to their results showing how a man’s perceived higher status is nothing to do with their intelligence. This just sums up how this labelling is outrageous and should never make you or any female feel less important or less manageable of having a high skilled job than men.

Labels do not determine your power… so don’t let them!

 

My audience is College students as I want to inform them on how having Labels do not determine the power you have and will have after college because these pupils will be going off and getting jobs and applying to university so need to know that nothing will stop them getting what they want if they try.