從華語性別詞語看文化現象與教學應用

Abstract

語言是表現文化的重要媒介，性別是社會構成的重要元素，一個社會的性別如何被看待和建構反映了該族群的文化觀點。傳統中國社會有重男輕女的觀念，對性別有不同的期待，反映在詞語如「男主外，女主內」、「嫁雞隨雞，嫁狗隨狗」、「夫唱婦隨」等。隨著時代變化，現代社會中性別詞語的語義和語境是否反映與傳統相似的觀點與文化現象，抑或有所區別，是本文想要了解的重點。 本文將透過性別詞語的收集和語義分析，再觀察性別詞語在不同語料庫中出現的語境差異，以討論現代和傳統性別文化的異同。本文先從各式文本中收集性別詞語，分類為「性別形象」、「婚姻期待」和「家庭責任」三類，再將各詞語置於三個語料庫中搜尋出現次數，並擷取前後文討論其語境變化。三個語料庫分別為以古文為主的「中央研究院漢籍電子文獻－瀚典全文檢索系統」、以現代文本為主的「中央研究院現代漢語平衡語料庫」和設定搜尋一年期的「聯合知識庫－全文報紙資料庫」。 結果發現，性別詞語表現出與傳統的不同，部分詞語的構詞產生性別角色的轉換，如「『婦』唱『夫』隨」、「『女』主外，「『男』主內」等，反映現代社會性別分工的新可能。部分詞語的語境也發生顯著變化，「男尊女卑」、「男女有別」已很少用於闡述原意。但部分性別詞語也延續傳統的觀點，如「家庭主婦」和「賢妻良母」等詞的大量使用，「剩女」一詞的表現等都反映性別角色在婚姻和家庭中的定位，此外「娘娘腔」、「男人婆」的語境也反映現代社會仍有傳統的性別刻板印象。 最後，本文檢視華語教材中有關性別的章節，建議教師可從「語義教學」、「構詞教學」和「文化教學」等不同角度出發，幫助學生由性別詞語理解現代社會的性別文化現象，對比傳統與現代的差異。

Language is an important medium through which culture is expressed. Gender is an important element of social construction. The way gender is seen and constructed in a society reflects that society’s cultural outlook. Traditional Chinese culture favors males over females and has set expectations toward gender roles. These attitudes are reflected in some gender-related words, such as “nán zhǔ wài, nǚ zhǔ nèi”（男主外，女主內）, “jià jī suí jī, jià gǒu suí gǒu”（嫁雞隨雞，嫁狗隨狗）and “fū chàng fù suí”（夫唱婦隨）. This study aims to determine whether the meanings and contexts of gender-words in modern society still reflect traditional concepts and cultural phenomena, or whether they have changed over time. The gender-words used in this research were collected from newspapers, books, dictionaries and papers. These words were first divided into three categories: “gender figure”, “marriage expectation” and “family responsibility”. The meanings of these gender-words were then analyzed, and three databases were searched to determine the frequency the words appeared in each, and the different contexts in which they were used. These three databases were Scripta Sinica database, Academia Sinica Balanced Corpus of Modern Chinese and Udndata. The results show that some gender-words have in fact changed. For example, the word order of some has been switched, such as “fù chàng fū suí”（婦唱夫隨）and “nǚ zhŭ wài, nán zhŭ nèi”（女主外，男主內）.These new gender-words show that gender roles can be transformed. Gender-words like “nán zūn nǚ bèi”（男尊女卑）and “nán nǚ yǒu bié”（男女有別）have also been used in different ways. However, some traditional notions of gender roles persist. For example, modern culture continues to emphasize gender roles in marriage and family, as shown by the frequent use of the words “jiā ting zhŭ fù ”（家庭主婦）, “xián qī liáng mŭ”（賢妻良母）and the new word “shèng nǚ”（剩女）. Meanwhile, the context of “niáng niáng qiāng”（娘娘腔）and “nán rén pó”（男人婆）reflects gender stereotypes in modern society. Finally, after inspecting the chapters related to gender in Chinese textbooks, this study suggests that teachers teach gender-words from different perspectives, such as teaching semantic meaning, word building and cultural concepts to help students understand cultural phenomena in modern society and contrast the different aspects between traditional and modern culture.