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Gender and code choice in Bruneian Facebook status updates
Author(s) -
DAUD NURDIYANA,
MCLELLAN JAMES
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
world englishes
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.6
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1467-971X
pISSN - 0883-2919
DOI - 10.1111/weng.12227
Subject(s) - emotive , code (set theory) , code switching , psychology , social psychology , computer science , linguistics , sociology , philosophy , set (abstract data type) , anthropology , programming language
This study investigates language use by Bruneians on Facebook in terms of relational maintenance strategies, the correlations between gender and code choice, the use of emotive language and emoticons, and non‐standardised orthographic forms. A total of 240 Facebook status updates by undergraduates of Universiti Brunei Darussalam were examined. The results show that undergraduates use different categories of maintenance strategies in order to maintain relationships with other users through Facebook status updates, and that gender influences the existence and frequency of a number of linguistic variables in such updates. Women within the sample code‐switch more than men, whereas men use a single code more than women. Women use more emotive language and more emoticons on Facebook more than men do, whilst men use more non‐standardised orthographic forms than women. The implications of these results are discussed.