An exploration of female leadership language:case studies of senior women in Bahrain

This is a multiple case study of the leadership language of three senior women working in a large corporation in Bahrain. The study’s main aim is to explore the linguistic practices the women leaders use with their colleagues and subordinates in corporate meetings. Adopting a Foucauldian (1972) notion of ‘discourses’ as social practices and a view of gender as socially constructed and discursively performed (Butler 1990), this research aims to unveil the competing discourses which may shape the leadership language of senior women in their communities of practice. The research is situated within the broader field of Sociolinguistics and the specific field of Language and Gender. To address the research aim, a case study approach incorporating multiple methods of qualitative data collection (observation, interviews, and shadowing) was utilised to gather information about the three women leaders and produce a rich description of their use of language in and out of meeting contexts. For analysis, principles of Qualitative Data Analysis (QDA) were used to organise and sort the large amount of data. Also, Feminist Post- Structuralist Discourse Analysis (FPDA) was adopted to produce a multi-faceted analysis of the subjects, their language leadership, power relations, and competing discourses in the context. It was found that the three senior women enact leadership differently making variable use of a repertoire of conventionally masculine and feminine linguistic practices. However, they all appear to have limited language resources and even more limiting subject positions; and they all have to exercise considerable linguistic expertise to police and modify their language in order to avoid the ‘double bind’. Yet, the extent of this limitation and constraints depends on the community of practice with its prevailing discourses, which appear to have their roots in Islamic and cultural practices as well as some Western influences acquired throughout the company’s history. It is concluded that it may be particularly challenging for Middle Eastern women to achieve any degree of equality with men in the workplace because discourses of Gender difference lie at the core of Islamic teaching and ideology.

“I thought I’d be safe there”:pre-empting blame in the talk of women reporting rape

One routine “common sense” means of explaining sexual violence is the ideologically facilitated tendency to blame the victim, and previous research has identified patterns of victim-blaming in the talk of perpetrators of rape, and also in that of the professionals who deal with rape in their day-to-day work. This article focuses on the discursive resources drawn on in police interviews by rape victims themselves as they attempt to account for their own behaviour in relation to the attack. It identifies and describes points within interviewees’ talk where they produce “accounts” (Potter and Wetherell, 1987), and considers what these tell us about the participants’ shared understanding of what is relevant to the on-going talk. Occasions when there is evidence of a mis-match in the understanding of the participants will also be discussed. The analyses illustrate that for the accounts of interviewees to be heard as relevant, a number of prevalent and problematic themes of victim-blaming must be assumed. Interviewees anticipate and pre-empt implications that various aspects of their own behaviour contributed to their attack, and interviewers vary in the level of skill they display at negotiating these shared understandings.

Ellen Fleischer, First Woman Public Relations Commissioner of the New York Police Department

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Police destroy papier-mâché statue of Susan B. Anthony at NOW conference

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Artist Alida Walsh at Women's March down 5th Avenue

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Lt. Mary Keefe, from the Sex Crimes Analysis Unit, talks to women on how to prevent rape

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Demonstration at Police Headquarters against rape

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Demonstration supporting Iranian Women

Inscription: Verso: New York.

Portrait of a police officer

Inscription: Verso: New York.

Auxiliary Police

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Only police woman on a horse in NYC in 1974

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Las Cruces, New Mexico police-highway patrol

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

NY police woman with other officers in front of the United Nations

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Chinese Americans demonstrate against police brutality

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.

Ed Jennings and Ray Marino, fire and police spokespersons against gay civil rights, speaking at Intro 2 at City Hall

General note: Title and date provided by Bettye Lane.