GENDER DIFFERENCES AND THE USE OF METADISCOURSE MARKERS IN WRITING ESSAYS

Abstract

This study aims at investigating metadiscourse markers in academic essays written by male and female students. With the goal in mind, 20 essays written by EFL female students and 20 essays written by EFL male students were chosen. These data were analyzed based on the metadiscourse framework proposed by Hyland (2005). The findings revealed that both male and female writers employed more interactive markers than interactional markers due to the fact that both genders inserted transition markers frequently to guide readers through the texts. However, a cultural factor may influence the writers' tendency not to use transition markers showing arguments. Furthermore, although male students employed more interactional markers, female students used more markers in interactional sub-categories except self-mentions. Although it is assumed that women prefer to use a more personalized style, male writers in this study also personalized their essays by using self-mentions. One possible reason was that the use of these features tended to be more field-specific than gender-specific. The findings and discussion indicated that gender is not the only factor influencing the use of metadiscourse markers. Other possible variables discussed in this study should be taken into account. Introduction Studies have suggested that men and women tend to favor distinct language features in expressing themselves (Lakoff 1975, Waskita, 2008, Matei, 2011, Subon, 2013, and Shirzad & Jamali, 2013). Lakoff (1975) revealed that women used linguistic features that reinforced their subordination. She further revealed that they were inclined to use some specific language features, such as lexical hedges, tag questions, empty adjectives, intensifiers, and emphatic stress. These differences between men and women in communication have attracted ongoing scholarly discussion. Some studies have extensively explored how gender differences influence both spoken (Subon, 2013 & Matei, 2011) and written language (Shirzad & Jamali, 2013 and Waskita, 2008). Besides claiming that women's language tended to be more polite (Subon 2013) and more complex