Teasing Apart to Bring Together: Gender and Sexuality in Variationist Research

Abstract

Sociolinguistics has long recognized the crucial interconnection between gender and sexuality. This article situates sociolinguists' concern with this topic within a larger discussion of intersectionality as a framework for theorizing identity. It argues that variationist methods provide a mechanism for redressing certain shortcomings of intersectional analysis that have been highlighted by scholars in other disciplines. To illustrate these points, pitch variation is analyzed among a cohort of Israeli lesbians. The author demonstrates how, despite the fact that gender and sexuality are tightly imbricated in the Israeli context, some speakers linguistically attend to these constructs in identifiably distinct ways. It closes by suggesting implications of this argument for the intersectional project more broadly.