Faculteit Letteren & Wijsbegeerte

Lieve Abbas

Gender Differences in Expressing

Wishes in Quotations from Dutch and

English Sports News Articles:

A Corpus-Based Study

Masterproef voorgedragen tot het behalen van de graad van

Master in de Meertalige Communicatie

2014

Promotor Prof. Dr. Sonia Vandepitte

Vakgroep Vertalen Tolken Communicatie

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Acknowledgements

This master paper is the final chapter of my life as a student. It marks the end of an era and

the beginning of the rest of my life. As I reflect upon this time, I can say that it has been a

wonderful and awful seven years all together. But most importantly, it was filled with new

experiences, knowledge, self-reflection and fantastic new friends. I would like to take a

moment to thank all the people who stood by me during this time.

A special word of thanks goes to Prof. Dr. Vandepitte, who has been my promoter and

source of inspiration this academic year. She helped me through several writer’s blocks and

was always prepared to give me advice and feedback. At times when I could not see the wood

for the trees, she was able to give me the confidence I needed to push through.

I can never thank my parents enough for who they are and for everything they have done

for me. They are the ones who made all of this possible. They have given me the opportunity

to receive the best education possible and have always encouraged me to realize my full

potential. My lovely sister and those beautiful baby girls inside your belly, thank you so, so

much for being the greatest motivation I could have ever imagined. “You are my sun, my

moon and all my stars” (E.E. Cummings).

Thanks to my classmates from English-Spanish and English-Italian for all the great

moments we shared. Not only for keeping me company in class, but also for the great parties,

coffee breaks and thesis hours in the library. My life as a student would not have been the

same without you and I want to wish you all the best for the future. I am already looking

forward to some great reunions. In particular I also want to thank my roommate and a friend

for life, Charlotte. I will miss walking to school with you...

My best friends Marlies and Hannah and everyone who endured my tantrums about

examinations, my master paper and school in general, thank you for always being there when

I needed you the most.

Finally, I want to thank the love of my life. For believing in us even when we were worlds

apart and for standing by me every step of the way. Thanks to you and everything we went

through, I was able to become the person I am proud of to be and I cannot wait to spend the

rest of my life with you.

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Table of Contents

List of Tables ........................................................................................................................................... 5

Abstract ................................................................................................................................................... 6

2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK .............................................................................................. 8

2.1 Gender differences in language use ............................................................................................... 8

2.1.1 Previous research ......................................................................................................... 8

2.1.2 Study by Newman et al. (2008) ................................................................................. 10

2.1.3.1 Goals and expectations ............................................................................................. 11

2.1.3.2 Results ...................................................................................................................... 12

2.2 Stereotypes about gender differences .......................................................................................... 12

2.3 Expressing Wishes ...................................................................................................................... 13

2.4 Quotations in Journalism ............................................................................................................. 20

2.5 Hypotheses .................................................................................................................................. 22

3 METHODOLOGY ................................................................................................................... 24

4 CORPUS FINDINGS ............................................................................................................... 26

4.1 English Corpus Findings ............................................................................................................. 26

4.2 Dutch Corpus Findings ................................................................................................................ 32

5 DISCUSSION ........................................................................................................................... 36

6 CONCLUSIONS ...................................................................................................................... 39

Bibliography .......................................................................................................................................... 41

List of Appendices................................................................................................................................. 43

Appendix I: English Corpus (Enclosed with this dissertation via Minerva) ..................................... 43

Appendix II: Dutch Corpus (Enclosed with this dissertation via Minerva) ...................................... 43

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List of Tables

Table 1: Illustration of the distinction between ‘deontic’ and ‘epistemic’

modality.

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Table 2:

Hypotheses for women and men based on previous research on

gender differences in language.

Table 2 (continued)

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Table 3: Hypotheses for women, men and both genders based on the study by

Newman et al. (2008).

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Table 4: Overview of the different ways to express wishes in English,

indicating the number of occurrences in both male and female

quotations (also in percentages).

Table 4 (continued)

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Table 5: Overview of intensifiers or down toners used in expressing wishes in

English.

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Table 6: Overview of the different ways to express wishes in Dutch, indicating

the number of occurrences in both male and female quotations (also

in percentages).

Table 6 (continued)

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Table 7: Overview of intensifiers or down toners used in expressing wishes in

Dutch.

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Abstract

A study by Newman et al. (2008) analysed 14,000 written and oral texts in order to explore

gender differences in language use. This dissertation discusses gender differences in

expressing wishes in quotations from Dutch and English sports news articles. The main focus

was to discover if sportsmen and sportswomen express wishes differently and if wishes are

expressed by using similar or different constructions in Dutch and in English. A bilingual

corpus was created, consisting of 150 Dutch and 150 English quotations retrieved from sports

news articles. The different constructions expressing wishes were categorised in both corpora

in 18 different categories. Then the frequency of the use of each construction was established

for both genders. The results of this corpus-based study showed many similarities instead of

differences between the Dutch and English constructions to express wishes. Between men and

women, however, there are indeed differences in the expression of wishes in both languages.

In the English corpus the clearest differences can be found in the use of adverbs (M: 17.07%

vs. F: 26.47%), the modal auxiliary verb would in combination with an adjective (M: 0.00%

vs. F: 7.35%), the phrasal verb to look forward to (M: 7.32% vs. F: 0.00%) and the use of the

verb to want (M: 39.02% vs. 29.41%). In the Dutch corpus differences occur in the use of the

modal auxiliary verb hebben in combination with a past participle (M: 0.95% vs. F: 4.44%),

the verbs proberen and zich voornemen (M: 0.00% vs. 4.44%, in both cases), and hopen (M:

38.10% vs. 22.22%). The results from this corpus-based study confirm previous findings on

gender differences in languages.

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1 INTRODUCTION

“There are two abiding truths on which the general public and research scholars find

themselves in uneasy agreement: (a) Men and women speak the same language, and (b) men

and women speak that language differently”

(Mulac, 1998: 127).

Gender differences have long been of interest in a variety of fields such as sociology,

psychology and physiology. The last several decades, however, the question to which extent

men and women use language differently has gained in popularity. According to Newman et

al. (2008) “[t]his popularity stems, in part, from the fact that language is an inherently social

phenomenon and can provide insight into how men and women approach their social worlds”.

The actual aim of this dissertation is to explore gender differences in the specific context

of expressing wishes in interviews from sports news articles. To achieve this, a corpus-based

study will be conducted. In order to contextualise our study, a theoretical framework was set

up, starting with an overview of the most frequent gender differences in language use,

focusing on a study by Newman et al. (2008). Second, certain stereotypes about gender

differences in emotional communication or expression will be presented before the

elaboration on the expression of wishes in English as well as in Dutch is touched upon. This

study will analyse quotations retrieved from interviews with journalists, hence, it was

considered important to know how journalists deal with quotations when transforming a

(spoken) interview into a written news article. A study by Killenberg and Anderson (1993)

will be focused on to answer this question. This theoretical framework will then form the

basis for the corpus-based study for this dissertation.

For this study, a bilingual corpus containing English and Dutch quotations from sportsmen

and sportswomen will be created. With this corpus, this dissertation first intends to analyse

whether there are differences between men and women in how they express wishes, whereas

the second goal of this study concerns the question whether there are differences between the

English and Dutch constructions to express wishes.

In the Discussion, our corpus findings will be compared with the hypotheses formulated at

the end of chapter 2. These will also be related to the present findings on the topic in the

literature. To conclude this dissertation, suggestions for further research on the subject will be

presented.

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2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

This chapter will give an overview of a number of studies that are significant for this

dissrtation. First, the most frequent gender differences in language use will be discussed,

focussing on a study by Newman et al. (2008). Second, certain stereotypes about gender

differences will be presented, followed by an elaboration on the expression of wishes. To

conclude this theoretical framework, it will also be discussed how journalists deal with

quotations when transforming them into written news articles.

Taking into consideration the information of all of these studies, it will then be possible to

formulate the hypotheses that will form the basis for our own study on gender differences in

expressing wishes in the context of sports texts.

2.1 Gender differences in language use

“Men are from Mars, women are from Venus”

(John Gray, 1992)

To give an overview of the most frequent gender differences in language use, we will

focus on the study by Newman et al. (2008): Gender differences in Language Use: An

Analysis of 14,000 Text Samples. In what follows, we will first give a brief overview of

previous research on men’s and women’s language use, discussed by Newman et al. (2008),

and secondly, we will discuss the goals, expectations and final results of their own analysis of

14,000 written and oral texts in order to explore gender differences in language use.

2.1.1 Previous research

Previous research found that gender differences in expressing language can occur in two

main goals: message goals and semantic goals. The different message goals used by men and

women were found within the social sciences, in studies by Brownlow et al. (2003) and

Colley et al. (2004). They state that women tend to use language more for social purposes

with verbal communication serving as an end in itself, while men are more likely to use verbal

interaction for the instrumental purpose of conveying information. In addition to these

message goals, men and women may also have different semantic goals in mind when they

construct sentences. We will elaborate on these semantic differences below.

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A study by Mulac et al. (2000), comparing 36 female and 50 male managers giving

professional criticism in a role play, found that men refer to emotion more often than do

women. Mehl & Pennebaker (2003) elaborate on these findings. Confirming the gender

stereotypes, they state that women use more references to positive emotion, while men refer

more often to anger.

Another difference in language use between men and women, observed by several

researchers, states that men use longer words, swear more, and use more articles and

references to location (Gleser et al., 1959, Mulac & Lundell, 1986, Mehl & Pennebaker,

2003), whereas women are believed to use more intensive adverbs, more conjunctions (e.g.

“but”), and more modal auxiliary verbs (e.g. “could”) (McMillan et al., 1977, Biber et al.

1998, Mulac et al., 2001, Mehl & Pennebaker, 2003).

Mulac & Lundell (1986) state that uncertainty verb phrases, especially the combination of

first-person singular pronouns with perceptual or cognitive verbs, such as “I wonder if”, occur

more often in women’s than in men’s writing. Studies by Hartman (1976) and Poole (1979)

had already found that this was also the case in women’s speech. In accordance with these

findings, Mehl & Pennebaker (2003) found that women use first-person singular more than

men. Stereotypically, however, the word “I” corresponds better with men than with women,

as it can be linked intuitively to selfishness and individualism.

Calculating mean sentence length, studies by Warshay (1972), Poole (1979) and Mulac &

Lundell (1994) found that women are the wordier gender in writing as well as in speaking.

Men, on the other hand, generally take more turns in conversation (Dovidio et al., 1988).

Research by Mulac et al. (1988) found that women more commonly ask questions in dyadic

interactions (e.g., “Does anyone want to get some food?”), whereas men are more likely to

use directives that tell the recipients to do something (e.g., “Let’s go get some food”). More

recent studies, however, tend to contradict some of these findings. Although Mulac et al.’s

(2000) study of managers (cf. supra) confirms that men use more words and women use

longer sentences, it found that the men from their study used significantly more negations and

asked more questions, whereas the women used more directives. A study of e-mail

communication by Thomson and Murachver (2001), on the other hand, denied any language

differences between men and women, saying that both genders reacted equally in different

types of contexts. In their e-mail communication, men and women were, for example, equally

likely to apologise, offer compliments and opinions, ask questions and insult their “net pal”.

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Robin Lakoff (1975) investigated gender differences at the level of specific phrases,

identifying two specific types of phrases more used in women’s language than in men’s

language: hedges (e.g., “it seems like”) and tag questions (e.g., “...aren’t you?”). Studies by

McMillan et al. (1977) and Mulac & Lundell (1986) confirm this more frequent female use of

tag questions. It is assumed that women use more hedge phrases because they are more

hesitant to force their views on another person. According to Lakoff (1975) this is consistent

with the idea that women use more extra-polite forms (e.g., “Would you mind...”) than men in

the same situation.

Dubois & Crouch (1975), however, observed exactly the opposite in their study of

male/female participation in academic conferences. According to their study, men are more

likely to use question tags than women. It is important to mention here that Lakoff (1975) and

Dubois & Crouch (1975) based their results on two different types of data. Whereas Lakoff’s

(1975) evidence was largely anecdotal, Dubois and Crouch (1975) based their research on

empirical data from academic conferences.

Newman et al. (2008: 213) elaborate on why research can be contradictory, stating that

“the different contexts in which the language samples were generated influenced the size and

direction of the gender differences”. A study by David et al. (2006) about the function and

role of laughter in Malaysian women’s and men’s talk, for example, examines gender

differences in the context of humour. This study found that, by using humour to defend and

equalise, men wanted to emphasise status and competition, whereas women used humour to

emphasise solidarity, interaction and a sense of community. In her Language and Gender: An

Advanced Research Book, Jane Sunderland (2006) also points to the relevance of context to

linguistics by quoting the anthropologist Malinowski (1923), who referred to the “context of

situation” in which “speech events” took place. He wrote:

Utterance and situation are bound up inextricably with each other and the context of

situation is indispensable for the understanding of the words. Exactly as in the reality

of spoken or written languages, a word without linguistic context is a mere figment

and stands for nothing by itself, so in the reality of a spoken living tongue, the

utterance has no meaning except in the context of situation. (Malinowski, 1923: 307

quoted by Sunderland, 2006: 42)

2.1.2 Study by Newman et al. (2008)

Despite the large number of previous investigations, there is still no coherent picture of

gender differences in language use. According to Newman et al. (2008), previous research

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encountered several limitations, the most important of which are, first, the lack of agreement

over the best way to analyse language and, second, the use of small samples with low

statistical power. In their Gender Differences in Language Use: An Analysis of 14,000 Text

Samples, Newman et al. (2008: 212) “explored gender differences in language use in a very

large data set of written and spoken text samples using a computerized text analysis tool”.

2.1.3.1 Goals and expectations

On the basis of this large data set of samples, the researchers wanted to ask a rather simple

question: “Do men and women use language differently?” Newman et al. expected the answer

to be overall consistent with the previous research by Brownlow et al. (2003) and Colley et al.

(2004), namely that “men’s language should focus relatively more on conveying information,

and women’s language should focus relatively more on social connections” (2008: 218).

Newman et al. (2008) expected that men and women would show the most differences in the

use of function words, which include pronouns, articles, prepositions, conjunctions and

auxiliary verbs. These are distinct from content words such as nouns, verbs and adjectives.

The use of function words reflects the ways in which individuals think about and relate to the

world, which explains the possible gender difference. However, in order to better understand

the differences in language use between men and women, the researchers also examined a

range of social and psychological process words, including references to friends, family and

emotions.

In this study by Newman et al. (2008), the relevance of context was also a point of

interest. The researchers expected a significant difference in language use across different

contexts. The corpus for this study thus contained text samples from seven totally different

context categories: “emotion, time management, stream of consciousness, fiction, Thematic

Apperception Test (TAT)-inkblot, exams, and conversation” 1

.

1 The emotion category contained language samples in which participants addressed emotional (usually

traumatic) life events. These included writing studies conducted in a traditional laboratory setting and interviews

in which participants discussed such topics as their family histories or their thoughts and feelings about traumatic

events. The time management category contained language samples from the control conditions in writing

studies in which participants wrote or spoke about time management. The stream of consciousness category

contained language samples from college student participants who were asked simply to track their thoughts and

feelings as they occurred as part of class assignments in at least 10 Introductory Psychology classes. The fiction

category contained the full text of fictional novels, mostly consisting of the top-selling fiction books from the

year 1996 (e.g., The Alienist by Caleb Carr, and K is for Killer by Sue Grafton). The TAT-inkblot category

consisted of participant’s free responses to describing drawings of specific scenes (TAT) or standard inkblots

typically used in the Rorschach test. The exam category consisted of essays written for class exams in

psychology courses. Finally, the conversation category contained spoken natural language samples, talk-show

transcripts, and other nontraumatic face-to-face interviews. (Newman et al., 2008: 222)

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2.1.3.2 Results

With their analysis of 14,000 written and oral text samples, Newman et al. (2008) found

several differences in the language use of men and women. They found that women include

more pronouns and social words in their speech, as well as a wider variety of other

psychological process references, verbs, negations and references to the home. Men, on the

other hand, exceeded women in the use of numbers, articles, and prepositions. They also used

longer words, discussed various current concerns more frequently, and swore more often.

Men and women were equally likely to use question marks, exclusion words (e.g. but,

although) and the first-person plural. The first-person singular, however, was found to be used

more in women’s language. Men and women were also indistinguishable in the number of

words employed, and in their references to anger, gender, time, and space. The study could

not find any gender differences in language use when age was controlled for. As mentioned

before, Newman et al. (2008: 225) hypothesized that the most significant differences in

language use between men and women would be found with function words as they are linked

to the emotional state, social connections with others and, most importantly, how individuals

think about the world. This hypothesis was confirmed by the study. It was, however, added

that men and women differed not only in their use of function words, but also in the use of

content words. The study also confirmed that there were, indeed, gender differences in

language use across different contexts. The most significant differences occurred in the

contexts of fiction writing, natural conversations, and examination essays.

Newman et al. (2008) concluded their study by offering five dimensions which appear to

be the most meaningful differences: long words, articles and swear words in men’s language

use and social words and pronouns in women’s language use.

2.2 Stereotypes about gender differences

The previous section elaborated on gender differences in language. The findings discussed

above were derived from investigations based on specific data. In this section, we will discuss

certain stereotypes about gender differences and their contribution to the construction of

reality.

In her research Gender and emotion: Beyond Stereotypes, Brody (1997) focuses on

stereotypes about gender differences in emotional communication or expression. She starts

her analysis by mentioning some of the more well-known stereotypes about men and women,

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such as women are more emotionally expressive and less aggressive than men. More

specifically, she says, women are expected to smile more and to express more warmth and

affection than are men. They are also believed to express more fear, vulnerability, and sadness

than men do, whereas men are believed to be more aggressive and to express more anger than

women. Based on a study by Birnbaum (1983), Brody (1997) states that, as early as preschool

age, both males and females associate anger with men, whereas sadness and fear are believed

to be associated with women. Another stereotype about men, according to Brody (1997) is

that they tend to use more direct behaviours or “acting out” to express their feelings.

Brody (1997: 370) believes that these stereotypes about men and women mirror as well as

construct the reality of gender differences in emotion. As people who do not conform to

stereotypic behaviour may be punished through social rejection, and people who do conform

may be encouraged or rewarded for such behaviour in the form of social approval, one could

say that stereotypes partially help to shape reality. Brody (1997) therefore agrees with the

assumption that stereotypes may generally reflect reality. She also argues that “stereotypes are

self-fulfilling prophecies, pressuring males and females to express emotions in ways that are

constraining, and ultimately limiting for both psychological and physical adaptation” (1997:

388). Research found, however, that actual gender differences do not occur as frequently as

the stereotyped expectations (Swim, 1994).

In comparison with the importance of context mentioned in section 2.1.1, Brody (1997)

warns that stereotypes ignore individual differences in personality, cultural and social

processes related to gender.

2.3 Expressing Wishes

In order to be able to formulate hypotheses regarding gender differences in expressing

wishes, we need to fully understand this notion of expressing wishes, also referred to as

desideratives, desires or hopes.

We will first elaborate on the concept of mood and modality, giving a clear overview of

the distinctions within modality. For this overview we will mainly focus on the research by

Palmer (1979) and Huddleston (1984). Second, we will also briefly discuss an alternative

distinction within modality offered by Narrog (2005) and touch upon the subject of

hypothetical verbs, explained by Magnera (1984). To conclude our discussion about the

concept of expressing wishes, we will present a number of example sentences in English as

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well as in Dutch. For this overview we will keep our main focus on the expression of wishes,

desires and hopes as these are the most important aspects of our study.

Well-known scholars such as Palmer (1979) and Huddleston (1984) agree that there is a

clear distinction between the two concepts of mood and modality. Mood is used as a category

of grammar, also referred to as form, whereas modality is used as a category of meaning.

These meanings are usually associated with mood. Modality is expressed by a considerable

range of syntactically quite diverse items such as modal auxiliaries, certain catenatives (cf.

infra), adverbs and adjectives. In his Introduction to theoretical linguistics (1968: 308), Lyons

had suggested three ‘scales’ of modality, those of (1) wish and intention, (2) of necessity and

obligation, and (3) of certainty and possibility. The latter two pairs, necessity and possibility,

are later considered to be the two most central notions in modal logic dealing with modality.

More recent works, including Lyons in his later book Semantics (1977), distinguish two kinds

of these notions of possibility and necessity: deontic and epistemic modality. In contrast with

his earlier publication in 1968, Lyons (1977) here only deals with wish and intention in a

discussion of ‘non-factives’ and continues to focus only on deontic and epistemic modality.

Huddleston (1984: 166) illustrates the distinction between these two types of modality by

means of the following ambiguous sentences, which can be interpreted either deontically or

epistemically:

You may have a bottle You must be very tolerant

Deontic

“You are permitted to

have/take a bottle”

“You are required to be very

tolerant”

Epistemic

“Perhaps you have a bottle” “I am forced to conclude that

you are very tolerant”

Table 1: Illustration of the distinction between ‘deontic’ and ‘epistemic’ modality.

In what follows, we will briefly discuss the four main differences between epistemic and

deontic modality, offered by Huddleston (1984: 167-168). In presenting these differences, he

uses the informal term ‘residue’ for “what is left of the meaning expressed in an utterance of

the clause when the modality is abstracted away”.

The first difference discussed by Huddleston (1984) refers to the character of the residue.

In epistemic modality the residue can be considered a proposition, something that is either

true or false in the light of what the speaker knows. With epistemic possibility the speaker

implies that he does not know whether the proposition is false. For example, if one says ‘It

may be Kim’s’, he cannot, without contradiction, add ‘but I know it’s not’. With epistemic

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necessity the speaker implies that, on the basis of his knowledge, he cannot accept that there

is any possibility of the proposition not being true. It would again be contradictory to say ‘It

must be Kim’s though I concede it’s just possible that it isn’t’. According to Huddleston

(1984: 167), we can say that ‘It must be Kim’s’ (interpreted epistemically) entails ‘It is

Kim’s’ because ‘It must be Kim’s but it isn’t’ is contradictory.

In deontic modality the residue has the character of an action. Here, it is not important

whether something is true but whether something is going to be done. With deontic possibility

the speaker gives permission for the action to be performed: ‘You may/can come in now’,

whereas with deontic necessity the speaker requires that the action be performed: ‘You must

come in now’.

A second difference between epistemic and deontic modality is the time involved in the

residue. With deontic modality, the time of the residue is generally future: the speaker

requires or permits something to be done after the obligation is imposed or the permission

granted. With epistemic modality, on the other hand, the time involved in the residue is

generally present or past.

The differences relating to tense only concern the modals of possibility (may and can,

having the past tense forms might and could) since the modals of necessity (must and need)

lack past tense forms. As the utterance is expressed by the speaker at the time of speaking,

which implies the present time, there are no past tense modals with the past tense having its

primary, temporal meaning. Might indeed is rarely used to indicate past time, whereas could

sometimes is. The use of the present tense, for example with epistemic may, shows a contrast

with the past tense form might, with the latter indicating a more remote possibility than the

former. Compare ‘You may/might be right’. Although the meaning is not quite identical, also

‘You could be right’ is possible here. Can could not be substituted for may as it is not used

epistemically in kernel clauses.

The last difference between epistemic and deontic modality offered by Huddleston (1984)

concerns negation. This may apply either to the residue or to the modality, which is also

referred to as internal and external negation respectively. With internal negation, the negation

is within the residue that is modalised, for example: ‘She may not have known him’ can then

be interpreted as ‘It may be the case that she did not know him’. In ‘She can’t have known

him’, by contrast, the possibility of it being the case that she knew him is negated, the

negation hence applies to the modality.

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As an extra, third category of modality, Huddleston (1984: 170) also briefly discusses

‘dynamic’ modality which is concerned with ability and disposition as in ‘Sue can speak ten

languages’. This category, however, is not as standard as the other two. Initially, Palmer

(1979), too, recognized the category of dynamic modality besides the deontic and epistemic

modalities. According to Palmer (1979), this third type of modality, then, would encompass

notions such as volition and ability, (neutral) possibility and necessity. In his later work,

however, Palmer (1986: 103) turned to the two-term system. Volition and ability, he

corrected, would not strictly fall into the scope of modality, and (neutral) possibility and

necessity would now belong to deontic modality. Consequently, Palmer’s Modality and the

English Modals (1979: 162) only includes one reference to wishes with the use of may in:

(1) May God bless you all through the coming year.

In the overview of the different types of modality by Huddleston (1984), not any reference

to wishes, hopes or desires could be found either. As mentioned before, also Lyons (1968)

only briefly discussed the notion of wish and intention, focussing mainly on deontic and

epistemic modality later.

Narrog (2005: 679) criticizes this approach of distinguishing modality in terms of the

expression of possibility and necessity. He states that these notions “fail to include modal

categories such as evidentials and volition/desire that in some languages may be much more

salient”. Narrog (2005) therefore suggests among other things a new distinction: volitive vs.

non volitive modality. Referring to Jesperen, Narrog (2005) explains that an “element of will”

is also at the base of the difference between deontic and epistemic modality and, therefore, he

feels that the two types of modality should be named by the very factor that characterizes their

difference. Epistemic (and dynamic) modality are then re-conceptualized as non-volitive,

whereas deontic modality is volitive. Although SIL International (2004) defines volitive

modality as “a deontic modality that expresses the speaker’s attitude of hope, wish or fear

concerning the proposition expressed by the utterance”, Narrog (2005) does not elaborate on

the concept of wishes. For this reason we will now focus on the work by Magnera (1984: 71)

who considers “future, predictions, desires, wishes, hopes, obligations, permission, and

prohibition” as categories of hypothetical information.

According to Magnera (1984: 72-73) hypothetical information refers to events that are

only potential and not actually occurring. The prediction of future events could be considered

as the most obvious category. Also desires and intentions are types of hypothetical

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information because they express attitudes towards events which may or may not actually

occur. Besides predictive and desiderative types of hypothetical information, also obligation,

permission and prohibition are included in the category of hypothetical information. These

three types all involve trying to get someone to do something, but as granting permission or

putting someone under obligation is no guarantee that the desired consequences will result,

this information is also considered to be hypothetical.

Magnera (1984) states that the English language has different ways to express events that

may not necessarily occur. Usually this is accomplished by certain kinds of verbs (in

particular modals), by catenatives, adverbs or by syntactic constructions such as the ‘if-

conditional’. Magnera (1984), too, offers the distinction between deontic and epistemic

modality. However, she points out that many authors disagree on the distinction as it is not

always clear whether a modal is being used as an epistemic or a deontic modal. Magnera

(1984) adds that the context should be taken into account in order to decide what meaning

was intended for a particular modal in an utterance.

According to Magnera (1984), will and would are the only two modal verbs to express,

among other things, volition. The volitional use of would, however, seems to require emphatic

stress.

(2) I will have it done properly.

(3) He would be naughty.

Modals can also have semantically related catenative counterparts which also convey

hypothetical information. The set of modals is then extended with catenative verbs such as,

among others, need, ought, dare, used to, have to, get to and be going to. These catenatives

mostly suggest a greater speaker commitment to the actuality of events than their modal

counterparts. But most importantly in the light of our study, catenatives can also be used to

express meanings that are not available from the set of modals, such as desideratives:

(4) I wish/want to travel.

(5) I like to bake cookies.

Desiderative verbs reflect psychological states or attitudes and can be considered

hypothetical because they make no commitment to the actuality of events. Examples of

catenative verbs expressing hypothetical information are ‘wishes to’, ‘tries to’, ‘likes to’ and

‘wants to’. Magnera (1984: 88) concludes that verbs expressing desires, wishes and hopes

18

usually indicate psychological states and are slightly less hypothetical than predictive verbs.

As mentioned before, they are considered hypothetical because desired events do not

necessarily happen.

Taking into account the research by Palmer (1979), Huddleston (1984), Narrog (2005) and

Magnera (1984), all discussed above, we can conclude that the expression of wishes is not

included in the distinction between deontic and epistemic modality. We learned that even with

the re-conceptualization of these categories into volitive and non-volitive modality, Narrog

(2005) also failed to elaborate on the expression of wishes. The only scholar who includes

work on wishes is Magnera (1984), who states that desideratives cannot be expressed by a set

of modals (except for the volitional use of will and would) but instead they can be expressed

by certain catenatives, such as ‘wishes to’, ‘tries to’, ‘likes to’ and ‘wants to’. Although she

did not elaborate on the subjects, Magnera (1984) mentioned that hypothetical information

can also be expressed by adverbs or syntactic constructions such as the ‘if-conditional’.

Sperber and Wilson (1988), referred to by Clark (1989) in his A Relevance-based

Approach to “Pseudo-Imperatives”, too, mention adverbs and the if-conditional in their

research on wishes. They touch upon the subject of wishes by analysing imperatives as

descriptions of states of affairs in potential and desirable worlds. The following sentence

contains the adverb “desirable” and can be considered to be an example of a potential event:

(6) It is desirable that John leave.

The counterfactual if-conditional in the example below (7) suggests then that a world in

which John did attend the party is not a potential world, but merely a possible or desirable

one.

(7) If John had been at the party, it would have been a success.

According to Sperber and Wilson (1988), the notion of a desirable world is subjective in

that desirability is a matter of degree: all worlds are desirable to a greater or lesser extent,

depending on the speaker’s point of view. They further point out the distinction between

wishing and wanting, stating that while you can wish for things which you know cannot

actually happen, you can only want things you believe can actually happen. “In other words,

wishing involves regarding a certain state of affairs as desirable (whether or not it is potential)

while wanting involves regarding a certain state of affairs as both desirable and potential”

(Clark, 1989: 56). Other than the conditional sentences with if-clauses or the more literal

19

formulations with adverbs such as “It is desirable that” or catenatives as “I

wish/like/want/hope that”, imperatives, too, can express wishes as the speaker can order

someone to do something the speaker wants:

(8) Open the door!

(9) Pass the salt.

(10) Go on! Try it!

We have now deduced from previous research that wishes or desideratives can be

expressed by the volitional use of the modals will and would, by certain catenatives, adverbs,

if-constructions and imperatives. There are, however, other ways to formulate wishes, which

we will deduce from our corpus.

In their research on the different types of modality in Dutch, Nuyts et al. (2007), too,

discuss deontic and epistemic modality. They add, however, four (sub)categories: dynamic

modality, “boulomaic” modality, “evidentiality” and volition. Volition, according to Nuyts et

al. (2007: 154), is an indication of a wish or a desire, such as:

(11) Ik wil je niet meer zien. (I don’t want to see you anymore)

According to the research by Zwart (2002: 84), the verb moeten (must/need to/has to) can

be interpreted volitionally and then refers to willen (want):

(12) Jan moet (zo nodig) hoogleraar worden. (John (just) has to become a

professor.)

This sentence can be interpreted as: “John really wants to become a professor”. The use of

moeten instead of willen emphasizes the volitional aspect of the sentence. In the English

translation with “has to”, the down toner “just” is used, because, as in Dutch, the emphasis is

expressed by the verb itself. When the more neutral verb “want” is used, the intensifier

“really” can be added to maintain the same emphasizing effect.

The section De Wensende Zin in the book Grammatica van de Nederlandse Zin by

Vandeweghe (2007: 229), too, offers several examples of sentences expressing wishes:

(13) Had je me maar tijdig gewaarschuwd!

(14) Was ik maar niet in slaap gevallen!

(15) Was hij hier maar!

(16) Kon ik je maar overtuigen!

(17) Mocht ik je maar kunnen overtuigen!

20

Characteristic for these sentences is that the verb is always in the past tense and the

particle maar acts as a wens-indicator (“wish-indicator”). These sentences can be interpreted

as regrets because the situations did not turn out the way the speaker had wished them to turn

out.

In Dutch too, wishes can be expressed by als-zinnen or if-conditionals in English.

Vandeweghe (2007: 229) offers the following example:

(18) Als ik hem maar niet uit het oog verlies!

Other examples for sentences expressing wishes, according to Vandeweghe (2007: 229),

can be formed by using the subjunctive:

(19) Het ga je goed.

(20) Lang leve de koning.

In comparison with the English use of the adverb “hopefully”, Vandeweghe (2007: 149),

too, mentions the Dutch adverb hopelijk (hopefully) which can be found in his subcategory

gevoelsmodaliteit (“modality of feelings”):

(21) Hopelijk komt ze niet. (Hopefully she doesn’t come.)

Similar to the expression of wishes in English, there are many other ways to formulate

wishes in Dutch too. We will deduce these from our corpus.

2.4 Quotations in Journalism

As this study analyses quotations by sportsmen and sportswomen expressing wishes

retrieved from interviews with journalists, it is necessary to elaborate on how journalists deal

with quotations when transforming them into written news articles.

Referring to Lehrer (1989), a study by Killenberg and Anderson (1993) says that when

words appear in print bracketed by quotation marks, the public generally assumes that they

represent unadulterated speech as heard and faithfully recorded by journalists. The implicit

but common understanding is that a quotation is an account of what is said, as it is said. This

is, however, rarely the case. According to Killenberg and Anderson (1993: 38), “the definition

of quotation itself is debatable and not a shared assumption among interviewers, interviewees,

editors, and readers”. Furthermore, the journalism profession offers no uniform code that

applies to the use of quotes. Therefore, some journalists believe that they are free to alter the

21

words of the interviewee, while others strongly feel otherwise. Killenberg and Anderson

(1993) offer a brief overview of these journalists’ different opinions.

Janet Malcolm, an American journalist and the author of Psychoanalysis: The Impossible

Profession (1981), In the Freud Archives (1984) and The Journalist and the Murderer (1990),

believes that journalists owe it to the interviewee, no less than to the reader, to edit and

rewrite his or her words. According to Malcolm (1990: 20), journalists need to perform this

sort of editing and rewriting because, in conversation, the listening process adjusts and

translates spontaneously. Malcolm is in favour of sacrificing the “what is said, as it is said”

standard so that the journalist can create “prose sense”. She wants journalists to take the

responsibility to be interpretive listeners instead of mere stenographic ones.

Rene Cappon (1982), a veteran editor of the Associated Press, strongly disagrees with

Malcolm. He feels that words enclosed by quotation marks must state exactly what the source

said. Reshuffling or even changing words to improve a quote are, according to Cappon

(1982), “high crimes and misdemeanours”. Since quotes are facts, he says, they are not

subject to revision, except for fixing minor grammatical errors or omitting pure padding or

meaningless repetition.

James Kilpatrick (1990: 4), an American newspaper columnist and grammarian, echoed

Cappon, stating that “except for the most minor editing, we ought to put in quotation marks

only those words that actually have been spoken”. He believed that if journalists did

otherwise, at a substantive level, they would be writing fiction instead of reporting facts.

According to William Zinsser, a journalist, teacher, and author of the widely used book

On Writing Well, the journalist’s job is to “distill the essence” of quotations. This view seems

to more accurately represent what actually happens in practice. Journalists can alter quotes in

any way they want, he says, as long as they make sure that they do not let the cutting of a

sentence or the changing of words distort the proper context of what remains.

As people simply do not speak in, with, or by quotes, journalists need to “create” the

quotes. When a news organization lacks precise, clear-cut rules on quoting, according to

McManus (1990: 54-56), the writers face several options. He listed four:

Paraphrase the direct quote and therefore avoid using quotation marks

Clean up the “ums”, grammatical errors and fractured syntax

Add a word or two to compete a speaker’s thought or to make it clearer

Shape quotes for stylistic purposes or narrative flow

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The lack of uniformity in the use of quotes causes ambiguities to arise. When journalists alter

the words of the interviewee, the reader can never know whether a quote came directly from

the interviewee or from an interviewer’s subjective alterations.

2.5 Hypotheses

Taking into consideration the previous research on gender differences in language, the

more recent study by Newman et al. (2008), certain stereotypes about gender differences, our

research on expressing wishes and the research on how journalists deal with quotations, we

can now formulate the hypotheses that will form the basis for our study on gender differences

in expressing wishes in the context of sports news articles.

As mentioned before, this dissertation analyses quotations expressing wishes by sportsmen

and women retrieved from interviews with journalists. As it would, therefore, be irrelevant to

formulate hypotheses about the kind of words used in contexts other than sports news articles,

turn-taking in conversations, asking questions and using directives that tell people to do

something, these have not been taken into account for our study.

Table 2 below presents the hypotheses that are expected to occur based on the previous

research on gender differences in language discussed in section 2.1.1.

Women Men

Use more hedges Use longer words

Use more uncertainty verb

phrases

Use more articles

Use more extra-polite forms Use more numbers

Use more intensive adverbs Use more prepositions

Use more conjunctions Use more negations

Use more modal auxiliary verbs Swear more

Table 2: Hypotheses for women and men based on previous research on gender differences in language.

23

Use more pronouns Refer more to negative

emotions (anger)

Use more social words Refer more to current concerns

Use more verbs

Use more first-person singular

Refer more to positive

emotions

Refer more to psychological

processes

Refer more to the home

Table 2 (continued): Hypotheses for women and men based on previous research on gender differences in

language.

Lakoff (1975) and Dubois & Crouch (1975) disagreed on whether men used more

question tags than women or vice versa. The study by Newman et al. (2008), however, found

that men as well as women were likely to use question tags, we will thus hypothesize that

both genders do (see table 3). Table 3 below presents the hypotheses based on the study by

Newman et al. (2008). As this study found some similarities in language use between men and

women, an extra column was added representing hypotheses for both genders.

Women Men Both genders

Use more pronouns Use more numbers Use question tags

Use more social words Use more articles Use exclusion words (but,

although etc.)

Use more psychological

process references

Use more prepositions Use first-person plural

Use more verbs Use longer words

Use more negations Use swear words

Use more references to the

home

Use more first-person

singular

Table 3: Hypotheses for women, men and both genders based on the study by Newman et al. (2008).

24

Based on the analysis by Brody (1997) on certain stereotypes about men and women, it

can, on the one hand, be hypothesized that women are emotionally more expressive and

therefore say how they feel or what they want more frequently than men do. On the other

hand, however, it is expected that, once they open up, men express their feelings or wishes in

a more direct manner than women.

To express these wishes in English, we can hypothesize that men as well as women can

use constructions consisting of the volitional use of the modals will and would, certain

catenatives, adverbs, if-constructions or imperatives.

In Dutch, based on the examples we found, we can expect the use of the verb willen (want

to) and the volitional use of the verb moeten (must/need to/has to). Based on the book by

Vandeweghe (2007), we can also hypothesize that wishes will be expressed as regrets in the

past and by using the subjunctive, the adverb hopelijk or by als-zinnen (if-conditionals in

English).

Lastly, but most importantly, we need to emphasise the relevance of context. As

mentioned in the studies by Brody (1997) and Newman et al. (2008), the differences in

language use between men and women can differ across contexts. As we confined our study

to a specific context, namely wishes in sports news articles, we need to take into account that

the results of our study could completely differ from the hypotheses mentioned above.

Furthermore, the study by Killenberg and Anderson (1993) says that journalists tend to

change the exact words of an interviewee when transforming an interview from a spoken to a

written context. Consequentially, the reader can never know whether a quote was literally

expressed by the interviewee or if it was altered by the journalist. This raises a very important

question with regard to our study: is it possible that the gender of the journalist influences the

way in which the wishes are expressed in the written versions of the interviews?

3 METHODOLOGY

In this study, we conduct a survey of gender differences in language, and more specifically

of gender differences in expressing wishes in the context of sports news articles. This survey

is brought within reach by the creation of two corpora containing English and Dutch

quotations from sportsmen and sportswomen retrieved from written sports news contexts only

25

(see Appendix I: English Corpus and Appendix II: Dutch Corpus, enclosed with this

dissertation via Minerva).

Both corpora consist of six different columns: in the first column, the sentences are ranked

from 1 to 150, this is the number of analysed quotations. As the expression of wishes is a very

specific context, it was difficult to find a larger amount of sentences to analyse in the time

span we set out: from 1st August 2013 until 20th May 2014. The second column consists of

these quotations, whereas the third column represents the gender of the speaker. In the Dutch

corpus are quotations from 105 men and 45 women, whereas in the English corpus, there are

82 quotations from men and 68 from women. In both corpora, there are considerably less

quotations from women than from men. This can be explained by the fact that the media

generally pay more attention to men’s sports than to women’s sports. The fourth column,

then, explains which construction is used to express the wish. The analysis of how wishes can

be expressed is an onomasiological study. According to Štekauer and Lieber (2005: 208),

“onomasiology studies the ways of languages and their dialects in expressing a particular

concept. The point of departure for an onomasiological approach is always a concept”.

Onomasiological research can be divided in the opposition between synchrony vs. diachrony

and empirical vs. theoretical research. A combination of the individual approaches is also

possible. This dissertation is concerned with empirical onomasiology, studying the different

ways of expressing a given concept (empirical aspect), thus wishes, in various languages

(synchronic aspect), English and Dutch. Next, the fifth column mentions whether or not an

intensifier or down toner is used to emphasize or decrease the effect of a modified item. The

source from where the quotations were retrieved can be found in the sixth and last column.

For the Dutch corpus, the sentences were retrieved from sporza.be, which is the online sports

platform from the VRT (Vlaamse Radio- en Televisieomroeporganisatie or “Flemish Radio

and Television Broadcasting Organization”), complemented with quotations from the online

sports sections of the Belgian quality papers De Standaard and De Morgen. The English

quotations were retrieved from the online sports sections of The Guardian, The London

Evening Standard Online, The Independent, The Telegraph and from BBC Sport.

We intended to create another bilingual corpus containing tweets from sportsmen and

sportswomen expressing their wishes, hopes and desires, which would then have been

compared to the Dutch and English corpora containing quotations from written articles. The

goal was to investigate whether a certain sportsman or sportswoman used the same

constructions to express wishes in both corpora or if a journalist could have altered the

26

quotations. Nonetheless, it was not possible to find a sufficient amount of tweets expressing

wishes to analyse. Due to the research by Killenberg and Anderson (1993) on how journalists

deal with quotations, however, it can be hypothesized that the results from the comparison

between the Twitter-corpora and the quotations-corpora indeed might have shown different

constructions.

The first goal in this study is to find whether there are differences between men and

women in how they express wishes. Based on the literature discussed in the Theoretical

Framework, it can indeed be expected that there are gender differences in language and

consequently also in the expression of wishes. This hypothesis will be confirmed or refuted by

comparing the different constructions used to express wishes and by calculating if one gender

uses certain constructions more or less than the other gender. The second goal concerns the

question whether there are differences between Dutch and English in the expression of

wishes. Based on the examples offered in section 2.3 on how wishes can be expressed in

Dutch as well as in English, not a great number of differences is expected between these

languages.

4 CORPUS FINDINGS

This chapter presents an onomasiological overview of the different ways to express

wishes, deduced from the English and Dutch corpora. The findings for both genders will be

compared as well. Section 4.1 elaborates on the findings in the English corpus (Appendix I),

whereas section 4.2 will present the findings from the Dutch corpus (Appendix II). In the

Discussion, the findings from both languages will be compared and related to the present

findings on the topic in the literature.

4.1 English Corpus Findings

In the English corpus, 18 different ways to express wishes were found. Each of these

forms will be explained here alphabetically, accompanied by examples from the corpus. It is

important to mention that not all wishes have positive connotations. Sentences that expressed

regrets about wishes that did not come true and sentences expressing the wish that something

would not happen, too, were found in this corpus.

27

The first way to express a wish found in this corpus is with the adverb hopefully.

According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (2011), hopefully is used as a

way of saying what you hope will happen.

(1) Hopefully I can get some more goals between now and the end of the season and

show everyone what I can do.

(2) This core group of players have had some big moments and hopefully that will

help us as we carry on.

14 of the total number of 82 men expressed their wish by using the adverb hopefully,

which represents 17.07% of the quotations from men. From the 68 quotations from women in

the corpus, 18 sentences with this adverb were found, representing 26.74%. Based on these

findings, it can be concluded that women use the adverb “hopefully” more frequently than

men to express wishes.

Only one conditional sentence with the use of if only was found, expressed by a woman.

According to the Longman Dictionary, if only can be used in combination with a verb in the

simple past to express that you want something to be true although you know it is either

impossible or unlikely.

(3) You don’t want to wish your life away but you think ‘if only it was next year’.

Another way to express wishes deduced from our corpus is with the linking verb to be in

combination with an adjective. Each gender uses this form to express a wish one time and

each with a different adjective:

(4) It is killing me not to be involved in the matches and I am desperate to get back.

(5) I am very determined to keep my focus on doing my best at the Olympics and get

my tactics right (…).

The adjective desperate, expressed by a sportsman, can be catalogued as a word with a

negative connotation, whereas determined, expressed by a sportswoman, is a strong, positive

word.

As we could expect from our research, men as well as women also expressed wishes with

the help of certain modal (auxiliary) verbs. In our English corpus, we found two. According to

Magnera (1984), will and would are the only two modal verbs to express, among other things,

volition. However, in our corpus, will was only used to talk about the future. Instead of will,

28

we found the modal auxiliary verb need to express volition. We found this use of need once in

the following quotation retrieved from a sportswoman:

(6) (…) the game is moving on all the time and, with us being professional now, we

need to focus on it more.

The modal verb would was found in a number of different combinations. To express a

wish, it can be combined with the verb to be in combination with an adjective (7), to be with a

noun phrase (8) and other verbs like hope (9), like (10), love (11) and prefer (12).

(7) It would be great to have a calendar with the Grand Tours and the historic men's

races combined with women's races.

(8) It would be a fantastic development if my gold medal could lead a permanent ice

track in the UK.

(9) (…) but we'd hope his presence, with his expertise, will encourage the players and

that he is a tool they can benefit from.

(10) (…) I would like to continue to make my mark in speed skating.

(11) I would love to come back and run a marathon or even a half-marathon and

just be able to finish my racing career on my terms.

(12) I'd actually prefer not to win this Golden Boot and for Liverpool to qualify for

the Champions League this season.

The combination of would and an adjective occurs five times in the corpus and only in

quotations from sportswomen, which equals 7.35%. The adjectives that are used are amazing,

great and awesome. The modal verb would in combination with a noun phrase only occurred

once in a quotation from a sportswoman, whereas the combination of would and the verb hope

only occurred once in a quotation from a sportsman. Both men and women expressed wishes

using the modal auxiliary verb would in combination with the verbs like and love four times.

However, as we analysed more quotations from men than from women, we can state that

women more frequently use the combination of would and like or love than men: these

combinations occur in 5.88% of the quotations from women, whereas in 4.88% of the

quotations from men. The combination of would and prefer, then, only occurs once in a

quotation from a sportsman.

A wish can also be expressed by a noun. In this English corpus, one sportsman used a

noun to express his wish, whereas two sportswomen did. The noun ambition was used by the

29

sportsman as well as by one of the two sportswomen. The other sportswoman expressed her

wish with the noun dream:

(13) It was always an ambition [to pass 4,000] to be honest, because you have to

set yourself goals in life.

(14) (…) That was my ambition when I was a kid.

(15) Besides racing, it's my dream to help push women's cycling further.

The phrasal verb to look forward to was found six times in this corpus, all expressed by

sportsmen. There was only one negative use of this phrasal verb (17):

(16) I’m looking forward to the 2016 Olympics in Rio, but I just take every year as

it comes.

(17) God knows, I’m not looking forward to it.

Wishes can also be expressed by certain verbs, such as to dream, to hope, to want and to

wish. The verb to want is used most frequently by men as well as women: 39.02% of the

quotations from men and 29.41% of the quotations from women contain this verb to express a

wish (18). The verb to hope can be found in 10.98% and 10.29% of the quotations from men

and women respectively (19). The verb to wish was only found in 6.10% and 2.94% of the

quotations (20), whereas to dream occurred only once in a quotation from a sportswoman

(21). 4.88% of the men and 7.35% of the women also expressed that they wished something

would not happen, using the negation of to want (22).

(18) I want to challenge myself again and try to make the best of myself in the

coming years.

(19) I hope I will raise the profile so in the future the scouts go there, then our

players can show their skills.

(20) I do wish I were a little taller.

(21) It is still very surreal and it will be for a while. It is something you always

dream about.

(22) But it's important to remember how I felt because I don't want to feel like that

again.

The verb to regret, finally, expresses the regret about a wish that did not come true. The

use of this verb was found only twice in the quotations from sportsmen. Sportswomen did not

use this verb.

30

(23) I regret things and there’s loads I could have done differently.

(24) Of all the clubs I didn’t go to that I could regret, that’d be the one.

Table 4 below presents an overview of the different ways to express wishes in English,

indicating the number of occurrences in both male and female quotations. As we analysed

more quotations from men than from women, this table also shows the occurrences in

percentages for each gender.

Expression of

wishes in English

Men (82) Percentage Women (68) Percentage

Adverb –

HOPEFULLY

14 17.07% 18 26.47%

Conditional sentence

– IF ONLY

0 0.00% 1 1.47%

Linking verb - TO

BE + Adjective

1 1.22% 1 1.47%

Modal auxiliary verb

- NEED + Verb 0 0.00% 1 1.47%

Modal auxiliary verb

- WOULD + to be +

Adjective

0 0.00% 5 7.35%

Modal auxiliary verb

- WOULD + to be +

noun phrase

0 0.00% 1 1.47%

Modal auxiliary verb

WOULD + Verb –

TO HOPE

1 1.22% 0 0.00%

Modal auxiliary verb

WOULD + Verb –

TO LIKE

4 4.88% 4 5.88%

Modal auxiliary verb

WOULD + Verb –

TO LOVE

4 4.88% 4 5.88%

Modal auxiliary verb

WOULD + Verb –

TO PREFER

1 1.22% 0 0.00%

Noun 1 1.22% 2 2.94%

Phrasal verb – TO

LOOK FORWARD

TO

6 7.32% 0 0.00%

Table 4: Overview of the different ways to express wishes in English, indicating the number of

occurrences in both male and female quotations (also in percentages).

31

Verb – TO DREAM 0 0.00% 1 1.47%

Verb – TO HOPE 9 10.98% 7 10.29%

Verb – TO REGRET 2 2.44% 0 0.00%

Verb – TO WANT 32 39.02% 20 29.41%

Verb – TO WANT

(negation)

4 4.88% 5 7.35%

Verb – TO WISH 5 6.10% 2 2.94%

Table 4 (continued): Overview of the different ways to express wishes in English, indicating the number of

occurrences in both male and female quotations (also in percentages).

This study also focused on the use of intensifiers and down toners because their use can

indicate whether someone places emphasis on his or her utterances. In total, there are seven

different intensifiers or down toners found in the 150 English quotations from sportsmen and

sportswomen, which were used 16 times. Two intensifiers and five down toners were found in

the quotations from men, whereas six intensifiers and three down toners in the quotations

from women. This equals 8.54% in men’s quotations and 13.24% in women’s quotations. The

only down toner found was just. The intensifiers are absolutely, actually, definitely, really, so

much and very.

(1) Although I would've absolutely love to have won, I'm really pleased with how I

got on and how I am improving in each event.

(2) I'd actually prefer not to win this Golden Boot and for Liverpool to qualify for the

Champions League this season.

(3) I definitely want to fight again this year, either November or December. I don't

want another year off.

(4) I just wish I could hit a couple of those shots again because I felt like I was in the

match.

(5) I really want to try to qualify in the pentathlon.

(6) (...) being on the other side of the fence wishing so much I was an athlete.

(7) I am very determined to keep my focus on doing my best at the Olympics and get

my tactics right (…).

Table 5 below presents an overview of the intensifiers and down toners found in the

English corpus as well as the number of occurrences for both genders.

32

Intensifier / Down toner Men (82) Women (68)

Absolutely 0 1

Actually 1 0

Definitely 1 0

Just 5 3

Really 0 3

So much 0 1

Very 0 1

Intensifiers 2 6

Down toners 5 3

Total 7 (=8.54%) 9 (=13.24%)

Table 5: Overview of intensifiers or down toners used in expressing wishes in English.

4.2 Dutch Corpus Findings

In the Dutch corpus, too, we found 18 different ways to express wishes. In accordance

with the English corpus, we will present the findings of the Dutch corpus similarly to those

presented above.

The first form to express wishes is with the adverb helaas. This adverb represents a regret

about a wish that did not come true. The use of this adverb was found only once in the

following male quotation:

(1) Helaas vond ik mijn draai niet bij de New Orleans Hornets.

A positive adverb that was found in this corpus is hopelijk. This adverb occurs seven times

in a total of 105 quotations from men and two times in 45 quotations from women. These

numbers equal 6.67% and 4.44% respectively.

(2) Hopelijk kan ik het tot een goed einde brengen.

Other than with adverbs, it is also possible to express wishes with the linking verb zijn in

combination with an adjective. In this corpus only one example of this combination was found

in a quotation from a sportsman. The adjective used here is ontgoocheld, which has a negative

connotation. This indicates that the speaker had a wish that did not come true.

(3) Ik ben erg ontgoocheld.

In Dutch, modal auxiliary verbs can also be used to express wishes. The verb hebben was

used three times: once by a man and twice by women (0.95% and 4.44% respectively). This

33

verb was used in the past tense every time, again indicating past regrets. Hebben always

appeared in combination with an intensifier and a past participle:

(4) Ik had graag het WK gereden, maar het is nu zo.

(5) Ik had zo graag die finale gehaald.

Another modal auxiliary verb to express wishes is zouden, the past tense of the verb

zullen. The use of zouden appears five times in the Dutch corpus. One sportswoman combines

this verb with the adjective geweldig to express her wish (6). The other uses of zouden, which

can be found twice in both male and female quotations, are all combined with an intensifier.

(6) Een finale halen zou geweldig zijn.

(7) Ik zou daar heel graag de finale halen en daar ben ik nu dagelijks keihard voor aan

het trainen.

Sportsmen and sportswomen also express their wishes with certain nouns. Nouns were

found in 2.86% of the quotations from men and in 4.44% of the quotations from women. The

nouns used here are (hoofd)doel, drang, hoop and jongensdroom.

(8) Mijn vormpeil opkrikken is nu het hoofddoel.

Also prepositional clauses can be used to express a wish. Two different prepositional

clauses occur in this Dutch corpus. The first one is nood hebben aan and was used by one

sportsman, the other clause zin hebben om was used in 0.95% of the male quotations and in

2.22% of the female quotations.

(9) Ik weet nog niet wat ik zal doen na 30 juni. Ik heb nood aan rust.

(10) Ik heb zin om me nog eens volledig te kunnen uitleven en wil daarbij mijn

ervaring doorgeven aan de ploeggenotes.

A special form to express a wish is the reduced clause om te + infinitive. This form is used

by one sportswomen to explain the reason why the speakers does something. This reason,

then, is a wish that the speaker intends to fulfill.

(11) Op zich zijn dit mooie ereplaatsen, maar ik koers om te winnen en ergens

verwacht men toch wel van mij dat ik dat dan ook doe.

The Dutch verbs used to express wishes are hopen, mikken op, the volitional use of moeten

and proberen, the verb willen and zich voornemen. The verb willen is the most frequently

34

used by both genders: 42.86% in quotations from men and 46.67% in quotations from women

(12). There were also two sportswomen and one sportsman who used the verb willen in a

negation to express that they did not want something to happen. The second most frequently

used verb is hopen, with 38.10% male quotations and 22.22% female quotations (13). The

negated form of hopen was used only once in a quotation from a sportsman. The verb mikken

op occurs in only one male quotation (14), whereas proberen and zich voornemen each occur

in two female quotations only (15 and 16). The volitional use of moeten, finally, is used in

0.95% of the quotations from sportsmen and in 2.22% of the quotations from sportswomen

(17).

(12) Ik wil presteren in Sopot én in augustus op het EK atletiek in Zürich.

(13) Ik hoop dat ik mijn goeie vorm nog lang kan doortrekken.

(14) Ik mik op een plaats in de top 5.

(15) Ik probeer om 1,94 meter te springen.

(16) Ik had me voorgenomen om binnen een maand weer volledig op niveau te

zijn, dus eigenlijk lig ik zelfs voor op mijn schema.

(17) Ik moet hier mijn beste wedstrijd van het seizoen rijden.

Table 6 below presents an overview of all of these different ways to express wishes in Dutch,

indicating the number of occurrences in both male and female quotations. The table also

shows the occurrences in percentages for each gender.

Expression of

wishes in Dutch

Men (105) Percentage Women (45) Percentage

Adverb - HELAAS 1 0.95% 0 0.00%

Adverb - HOPELIJK 7 6.67% 2 4.44%

Linking verb - ZIJN

+ Adjective

1 0.95% 0 0.00%

Model auxiliary verb

– HEBBEN + Past

participle

1 0.95% 2 4.44%

Modal auxiliary verb

– ZULLEN (past

tense)

2 1.91% 2 4.44%

Modal auxiliary verb

– ZULLEN (past

tense) + Adjective

0 0.00% 1 2.22%

Table 6: Overview of the different ways to express wishes in Dutch, indicating the number of occurrences

in both male and female quotations (also in percentages).

35

Noun 3 2.86% 2 4.44%

Prepositional clause -

NOOD HEBBEN

AAN

1 0.95% 0 0.00%

Prepositional clause -

ZIN HEBBEN OM

1 0.95% 1 2.22%

Reduced clause -

OM TE +

INFINITIVE

0 0.00% 1 2.22%

Verb – HOPEN 40 38.10% 10 22.22%

Verb - HOPEN

(negation)

1 0.95% 0 0.00%

Verb – MIKKEN OP 1 0.95% 0 0.00%

Verb - MOETEN 1 0.95% 1 2.22%

Verb - PROBEREN 0 0.00% 2 4.44%

Verb - WILLEN 45 42.86% 21 46.67%

Verb - WILLEN

(negation)

1 0.95% 2 2.22%

Verb - ZICH

VOORNEMEN (past

tense)

0 0.00% 2 4.44%

Table 6 (continued): Overview of the different ways to express wishes in Dutch, indicating the number of

occurrences in both male and female quotations (also in percentages).

When the percentages of the use of intensifiers and down toners in expressing wishes in

Dutch are compared, it can be concluded that sportswomen use more intensifiers than

sportsmen (20.00% compared to 16.19%). In this corpus, sportswomen did not use any down

toner. From the eleven intensifiers and down toners in the corpus, the only down toner found

is gewoon. The intensifiers are (dol)graag, echt, erg, heel graag, natuurlijk, sowieso,

uiteraard, vooral, zeker and zo graag.

(1) Ik wil dolgraag coach worden bij Manchester United, maar er is zeker nog geen

deal.

(2) Ik wil graag tonen dat ik vooruitgang gemaakt heb.

(3) Ik hoop echt dat het in Sotsji goed vriest en de pipe er snel zal bijliggen!

(4) Ik ben erg ontgoocheld.

(5) Wij willen gewoon elke wedstrijd winnen.

(6) Ik zou daar heel graag de finale halen en daar ben ik nu dagelijks keihard voor aan

het trainen.

(7) Maar als sporter wil je natuurlijk altijd meer.

36

(8) Ik wil sowieso de finale halen en dan een goeie vrije kür schaatsen.

(9) En uiteraard wil ik het ook individueel zo goed mogelijk doen.

(10) Ik wil vooral ervaring opdoen.

(11) Dit jaar ben ik daar eigenlijk niet mee bezig geweest, maar ik wil daar zeker

aan deelnemen.

(12) Ik had zo graag die finale gehaald.

Table 7 below presents an overview of the intensifiers and down toners found in the Dutch

corpus as well as the number of occurrences for both genders.

Intensifier / Down toner Men (105) Women (45)

(Dol)graag 6 1

Echt 0 1

Erg 1 0

Gewoon 4 0

Heel graag 0 2

Natuurlijk 1 1

Sowieso 1 0

Uiteraard 2 0

Vooral 2 2

Zeker 0 1

Zo graag 0 1

Intensifiers 13 9

Down toners 4 0

Total 17 (=16.19%) 9 (=20.00%)

Table 7: Overview of intensifiers or down toners used in expressing wishes in Dutch.

5 DISCUSSION

Comparing the language of men and women in a corpus of written quotations has revealed

certain gender differences in the expression of wishes. Based on previous research and on the

study by Newman et al. (2008), various hypotheses on gender differences in language use

were formulated. According to previous research, men used more negations than women (see

table 2). The study by Newman et al. (2008), however stated that women used more negations

than men. Our corpus-based study on expressing wishes confirms the results by Newman et

al. (2008). In the English corpus (Appendix I), negations were found in 7.32% of men’s

quotations and in 7.35% of women’s quotations. In the Dutch Corpus (Appendix II) the

percentages are 4.76% and 8.89% of men’s and women’s quotations respectively.

37

Previous research also stated that women use more modal auxiliary verbs (see table 3).

These findings, too, could be confirmed by our corpus-based study: M: 12.20% vs. F: 22.05%

in the English corpus (Appendix I) and M: 2.86% vs. 11.10% in the Dutch corpus (Appendix

II).

It was hypothesized that, in English, men as well as women could use constructions

consisting of the volitional use of the modals will and would, certain catenatives, adverbs, if-

constructions and imperatives. In our corpus, will was only used to express situations in the

future. Instead of will, we found the modal auxiliary verb need to express volition. Yet, the

volitional use of the modal would, which was found in a number of different combinations,

can be confirmed. To express a wish, would can be combined with the verb to be in

combination with an adjective, a noun phrase and other verbs like hope, like, love and prefer.

The use of catenatives, adverbs and if-constructions could also be confirmed. The corpus did

not, however, contain imperatives to express wishes, but this can be explained by the context

as a speaker is not likely to express a wish by means of an imperative during an interview.

The corpus also presents other constructions to express wishes that were not mentioned before

in previous research: the linking verb to be in combination with an adjective, the use of nouns,

the phrasal verb to look forward to and verbs with a negative connotation to express regrets

about wishes that did not come true.

In Dutch, the use of the verb willen and the volitional use of the verb moeten could be

expected. Based on the book by Vandeweghe (2007), it was also hypothesized that wishes

could be expressed as regrets in the past and by using the subjunctive (e.g. Lang leve de

koning), the adverb hopelijk or by als-zinnen (if-conditionals in English). The results of the

analysis confirm the use of willen and moeten. To these verbs, we can add mikken op,

proberen, zich voornemen and hopen. There were also several expressions of wishes found

presenting regrets in the past, constructed by the modal auxiliary verb hebben in the past

tense, combined with a past participle. Next to examples of the adverb hopelijk, also the use

of the adverb helaas occurred to express a regret about a wish that did not come true. Als-

zinnen or the use of the subjunctive, however, were not found in the corpus. Other

constructions to express wishes that were not mentioned in previous research are: the linking

verb zijn in combination with an adjective, the modal auxiliary verb zullen in the past tense,

sometimes combined with an adjective, the use of nouns, the prepositional clauses nood

hebben aan and zin hebben om and the reduced clause om te + infinitive.

38

In the English corpus the clearest differences between men and women can be found in the

use of adverbs (M: 17.07% vs. F: 26.47%), the modal auxiliary verb would in combination

with an adjective (M: 0.00% vs. F: 7.35%), the phrasal verb to look forward to (M: 7.32% vs.

F: 0.00%) and the use of the verb to want (M: 39.02% vs. 29.41%). In the Dutch corpus the

greatest differences occur in the use of the modal auxiliary verb hebben in combination with a

past participle (M: 0.95% vs. F: 4.44%), the verbs hopen (M: 38.10% vs. 22.22%), proberen

and zich voornemen (M: 0.00% vs. 4.44%, in both cases).

From the results in both corpora, it can be concluded that women use more intensifiers

than men (in English: M: 8.54% vs. 13.24%, and in Dutch: M: 16.19% vs. 46.67%).

Consequentially, this confirms the hypotheses based on the analysis of Brody (1997) that

women are emotionally more expressive than men. There were, however, no clear indications

found proving that men express their feelings or wishes in a more direct manner than women.

Furthermore, it was also hypothesized that there would not be a great number of

differences between the English and Dutch constructions to express wishes. This hypothesis

can be confirmed on word level as well as on phrase level. 7 of the 18 categories in English

and in Dutch show great similarities: the use of the adverbs hopefully vs. hopelijk, the use of a

linking verb in combination with an adjective, the occurrence of modal auxiliary verbs and

nouns to express wishes and the verbs to hope vs. hopen and to want vs. willen. Translations

of certain constructions reveal similarities, too. For example: I would like/love to vs. ik zou

graag. The volitional use of the Dutch verb moeten can be translated by the modal auxiliary

verb need as in ik moet winnen vs. I need to win. Even though the use of imperatives to

express wishes did not occur in our study, it is clear that the request in doe de deur dicht is the

same as in close the door, too.

To conclude this discussion, we need to point out once more that, based on the research by

Killenberg and Anderson (1993), the reader cannot know if a quote was literally expressed by

the interviewee or if it was altered by the journalist. Therefore, we need to take account of the

possibility that the results of our study can be influenced by the gender of the journalist and

need to be considered carefully. It was not possible to further investigate this matter, as not all

the news articles from which the quotations were retrieved showed the journalist responsible

for the article.

39

6 CONCLUSIONS

The purpose of this dissertation was to analyse gender differences and differences between

Dutch and English in the specific context of expressing wishes in interviews from sports news

articles. For this purpose a corpus-based study was conducted. A bilingual corpus was

created, each corpus consisting of 150 sentences retrieved from sports news articles. The

different constructions expressing wishes were categorised, which resulted in 18 different

categories in Dutch as well as in English. Also the number of intensifiers/down toners was

deduced from the corpora because their use can indicate whether someone places emphasis on

his or her utterances.

To establish the gender that used each construction more frequently, the number of times a

construction occurred in the quotations from men and in the quotations from women were

counted. These numbers were then converted into percentages as there could not be retrieved

as many quotations from sportswomen as from sportsmen.

The results of our corpus-based study show that there are indeed differences between the

quotations of men and women when expressing wishes. In the English corpus, we found that

women use adverbs and the modal auxiliary verb would in combination with an adjective

more often than men, whereas in male quotations the use of the phrasal verb to look forward

to and the verb to want appeared more frequently than in women’s quotations. In the Dutch

corpus, the main differences between both genders occurred in the use of the modal auxiliary

verb hebben in combination with a past participle. This construction as well as the verbs

proberen and zich voornemen were more often used by women than by men. Men, however,

exceeded women in the use of the verb hopen. In both languages it was found that women use

more intensifiers or down toners than men, allowing us to state that women are emotionally

more expressive than men (Brody, 1997). It is important, however, to note here that our

analysis solely identified how wishes in quotations from men and women were expressed

differently without pointing out the reasons why these differences exist.

Our study further showed many similarities instead of differences between Dutch and

English constructions to express wishes. It can be assumed that the reason for this lies in the

fact that both languages stem from West Germanic languages. However, further research on

this particular matter is required to confirm or refute this assumption.

40

This corpus-based study not only confirmed that gender differences in language use exist,

it also validated a number of findings from previous research, such as the fact that women use

more modal auxiliary verbs and more negations than men (Newman et al., 2008). Because our

study supports and clarifies, rather than contradicts, previous research, our results can be

considered generalizable.

However, it needs to be emphasized that the role of the journalist is paramount to the

outcome of our study. This study analysed how sportsmen and sportswomen express their

wishes differently as reported in sports news articles, but as the study by Killenberg and

Anderson (1993) shows, journalists can alter the exact words of the interviewee when

transforming the (spoken) interview into a written sports news article. Therefore, it is possible

that the gender of the journalist influenced the results of our study. We thus need to give

careful consideration to the generalization of the results of this study. In order to avoid this

problem in further extensive research, we propose the creation of corpora consisting of

spoken quotations only.

Furthermore, we want to point out that this study is limited in the number of areas of

language use: the creation of larger corpora with sentences taken from different contexts may

lead to more generalizable findings about gender differences in the expression of wishes.

41

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List of Appendices

Appendix I: English Corpus (Enclosed with this dissertation via Minerva)

Appendix II: Dutch Corpus (Enclosed with this dissertation via Minerva)