Re: Are Beliefs Like Clothes? & gender
Sunah Caroline Cherwin (slippery@pobox.com)
Sat, 16 Aug 1997 23:42:02 -0700 (PDT)
>In a message dated 8/16/97 10:20:30 PM, slippery@pobox.com (Sunah Caroline
>Cherwin) wrote:
>
>>Some linguists see a male tendency toward argument not as part of
>>present-day sexual selection, but as legacy code in which
>>(to put it broadly and generally)
>>
>>*men* communicate to seek status
>>(originally for sexual purposes)
>>
>>and *women* communicate to form connections
>>(originally a habit that led to fathers and other community members helping
>>support them and their kids).
>
>These both seem very plausible. In what sense, however, are they "legacy"?
> Persuasiveness and skill at argument remain an excellent road to status
>(sales, law, management) and I believe it's been shown that a strong social
>network continues to provide good insurance for personal crises, whether
>social or financial.
They are "legacy" in the sense that they are gender-specific and no longer
need to be, which is a way of saying they are "legacy" in the sense that
these styles are highly correlated with hardware. I guess the metaphor with
legacy code does break down there.
--
Sunah Caroline Cherwin + + http://pobox.com/~sunah
Member: HTML Writer's Guild + Member: San Francisco Webgrrls