Gender bias in linguistics textbooks: Has anything changed since Macaulay & Brice 1997?

Abstract

Macaulay and Brice (1997:798) surveyed example sentences in eleven syntax textbooks published from 1969–1994 and found that virtually all of the authors 'favor male-gendered NPs as subjects and agents, and regularly stereotype both genders'. In this article, we address the question of whether constructed example sentences in more recent textbooks show similar gender bias. We present an analysis of six syntax textbooks published from 2005–2017, from which we randomly sampled 200 example sentences each. We find that the gender skew and stereotypes reported in 1997 are still present today. Male-gendered arguments are almost twice as frequent as female-gendered ones, and more likely to occur as subjects and agents. In addition, example sentences often perpetuate gender stereotypes. We discuss some broader implications and potential interventions to prevent the implicit perpetuation of gender biases in linguistic materials.