Prof. Kristen Syrett shared her expertise on the linguistics of gendered speech in the workplace in an article on British news website The Independent.
The article, “Is it sexist to call a female employee a b****? That depends, says De Niro judge and jury” was written by Bevan Hurley and published on Nov. 16. The article gets into the language issues in actor Robert Deniro’s gender discrimination trial.
Prof. Syrett was asked about appropriate language between bosses and their employees, explaining that while expletives often have different uses depending on the social situation, it seems that women get held to a different standard, even when they are at the receiving end of a potential slur. Powerful men often get away with using language that would otherwise be deemed inappropriate, she says.
Prof. Syrett is one of the experts listed on the Linguistic Society of America’s Media Resource List.