Merry Christmas 2011 and Happy New Year 2012

Classroom Activity as Social Activity

The idea of classroom as sociocultural setting comes for the first time from Vygotsky’s (1978) idea that cognitive development originates from social interaction. Since learning is one instrument in achieving cognitive development, classroom as the place of learning can also be considered as sociocultural setting. This theory is well-known as sociocultural theory. In this theory Vygotsky proposed that children cultural development occurs in two planes by saying: 

           Any function in the child’s cultural development appears twice, or in two planes: first, it appears on the 

               social plane, and then on the psychological plane; first it appears between people as an interpsychological 

               category, and then within the child as an intrapsychological category. This is equally true with regard to 

               voluntary attention, logical memory, and the formation of concepts and the development of volition  (p.163). 

         Another theory which shares almost the same idea is social learning theory (Arliss, 1991). According to this theory, in the area of children’s learning of sex appropriateness, teacher is stated as second socializer. Meaning that classroom is social setting to learn how to behave based on sex. Erickson (as cited in Schiffrin 2001:505) states that classroom interaction demonstrates a complex social and cognitive relation. Therefore, it can be concluded that in terms of cognitive development and sex appropriateness learning, classroom is a social setting. And what children learn in classroom can be and will be manifested in other social settings. 

       And for sure, if we see conversely, what being implemented in society happens in classroom. For example, teacher as socializer will treat male and female students based on what he /she understands the appropriate one according to society. Students in classroom behave like people do outside. For instance, girls are taught to behave lady likely, no screaming and no sarcasm like in other social setting outside class. They then apply it in their relation in classroom. Many studies have proved that female students tend to be passive and listen more than talk. This situation happens also outside classroom in mixed-sex conversation that women speak less than men. If we see closer and try to understand, we may find that social issue and classroom activity are like a cycle. Meaning that what happens in society is applied in classroom, and what applied in classroom is also applied in social interaction outside classroom. In conclusion, what we see taking place in classroom highly demonstrates what happens outside or in society.

Man, Female and Oral Language

Male and female are two terms used to signal two different kinds of sex and they are also used as terms for gender. As asserted by Coates (1986: 4), sex refers to biological condition whereas gender refers to socially constructed category based on sex. Sharing almost the same idea with Coates, Arliss (1991: 8) states sex as biologically determined category, and narrows gender as a behaviorally determined category. Indirectly those statements note that society distinguishes male and female by creating such categories. The distinctions between them do not take place only on one or two area but in several and almost all areas of human life. Society through culture drives human to behave things according to category where she or he belongs. These behaviors are learned and then constitute maleness and femaleness, named sex-typed behaviors or gender-specific behaviors (Arliss, 1991: 9). 

In a simple way it can be said that men and women behave according to what is constructed by society. Those factors are still working in daily life, including in the scope of oral language where gender-specific behaviors are also influenced by language. Noted by Weatherall (2002: 97) that through language gender is produced and has its important or meaning as a social category. 

Here are facts about language, men and women. In oral communication with their same sex friends, women tend to talk more but that does not happen when they are talking to men. When they are conversing with men, women tend to listen actively and men dominate the conversation. Based on research conducted by Zimmerman and West (in Coates 1986: 100), conversation is dominated by men looking at the number of interruption and overlap. Women seldom produce overlap because they are concerned not to violate men’s turn. Since men dominate, women have the tendency to fall silent. Zimmerman and West found that the number of silence in same sex conversation is far fewer than in mixed-sex conversation. In same sex conversation both men and women share equal topic control. But in mixed sex conversation, men tend to control the topic by interrupting and delay minimal responses. 

The myth among society that claims women as ones who talk more is countered by several study, for instance according to Swacker (in Coates 1986: 103) it is men who talk more. Based on her research findings, when asked to describe three picture men took on average 13.00 minutes per picture and women took only 3.17 minutes. Not only Swacker, but other researches also present the idea that in mixed-sex conversation men talk more than women. (Eakins & Eakins 1978, Bernard 1972, Soskin & John 1963 and Argyle et. al 1968) 

Besides the facts above, there is another fact that women use more facilitative tag question, and Lakoff’s assumed that. Holmes (in Coates 1986: 105) shows that male speaker use modal tag question 61 per cent to express uncertainty. At the meantime, 59 per cent tag questions used by female speaker are facilitative (express speaker solidarity to the addressee). Linguists also assert that women use more polite language that men. Brown (in Coates 1986: 112) studied Mayan community and found that women use many positive and negative politeness, whereas men’s speech is matter-of-fact. Lakoff (in Arliss 1991: 57) proposed that men are more straightforward than women. 

In case of using expletive (an exclamation, a rude word used when one is angry), men use stronger expletives (Lakoff in Arliss 1991: 53). Lakoff also proposed that women have a big number of color vocabulary and use them in expressing their emotions verbally. In case of using intensifier (in this case means syntactic construction using adverb that heavily emphasized, e.g.: I am sooooo tired), one study reports that during group discussion women use more intensifiers than men (six times more). Men, women and oral language are not separated. Men and women use oral language according to their own way when communicating one another. Their characteristics are constructed by the society yet manifested in social activity as well as in classroom activity.