1. answer the following questions
Is political language different than other uses of language? Or, is all language political? How so?
Do you think language is a symptom or a cause of the political divisions that separate us? What’s your evidence?
Do conservatives and progressives constitute different and opposing communities of practice? Or, is the issue more complex? Why?
2. language is a resource for performing (i.e. constructing) gendered identities. With respect to linguistic relativity, language evolves to reflect gender norms and thus, through practice, language serves to maintain those norms. But, people use language to resist norms, and norms change.
Are indexicality and linguistic relativity two sides of the same coin here? Or, are they opposing forces? Is it more complicated?
