Political and pedagogical implications of attitudes towards women's language

This essay provides a critical analysis of the major attitudinal positions on women's language and assesses implications of these positions for women's self‐identities and for pedagogical approaches designed to facilitate women's communication skills. The positions on women's language that are addressed are: (1) the deficit position, (2) the new deficit position, (3) the difference position, and (4) the code‐switching position.