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Abstract:
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Using the social networking site Facebook as a corpus , I collected 1 ,500 random samples of interactions between friends . I tracked the use of jokes and disparaging humor between same - and opposite -gender pairs to discover that there is a strong correlation between the style of joke -making evoked by the speaker and the gender of both the speaker and the hearer . The men in the study were about eight times more likely to make insulting or degrading jokes with other men than the women were with each other . Following the study is a discussion where I address methods of politeness across genders , approaches to humor , and how sex , culture , and gender expectations influence our communicative choices . Though the discussion is based in our linguistic choices , the results of the study reflect trends that are present in countless aspects of society , and the issues that are raised go far beyond the spoken word . |