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Article published In: Sex, Death & Politics: Taboos in Language
Edited by Melanie Keller, Philipp Striedl, Daniel Biro, Johanna Holzer and Benjamin Weber
[Pragmatics & Cognition 28:1] 2021
► pp. 57–86

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Obscene language and the renegotiation of gender roles in post-Soviet contexts

 | Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich
Published online: 16 March 2022
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/pc.00021.luc
Abstract
Mat is a specific domain of Russian obscene vocabulary including words related to sexuality. The first sociolinguistic studies on mat emerged after the fall of the Soviet Union, concomitantly with the formation of Russian gender studies in the early 1990s (Tëmkina, Anna & Elena Zdravomyslova. 2003. Gender studies in post-Soviet society: Western frames and cultural differences. Studies in East European Thought 551. 51–61. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar: 51). Until today, research on gender and taboo in Russian has been exiguous. Many scholars claim that the use of mat is a male prerogative (Uspenskiĭ, Boris. 1994. Mifologicheskiĭ aspekt russkoĭ ėkspressivnoĭ frazeologii [The mythological aspect of Russian expressive phraseology]. In Boris Uspenskiĭ, Izbrannye trudy [Selected writings], vol. 21, 53–128. Moscow: Gnozis.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar: 56, Doleschal, Ursula & Schmid, Sonja. 2001. Doing gender in Russian: Structure and perspective. In Marlies Hellinger & Hadumod Bußmann (eds.), Gender across languages: The linguistic representation of women and men, Vol. 11, 253–282). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar: 274), whereas women’s use of mat is heavily sanctioned in society. Through data from a survey I carried out with 772 participants, I illustrate that mat is strongly present in women’s language use and that stereotypical gender conceptualizations are undergoing change. From the participants’ answers it emerges that discussions about the use of obscene language play a critical role in the multifaceted process of renegotiation of gender roles in post-Soviet contexts.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Mat and its place in obscene vocabulary
  • 3.Mat between mythization and censorship
  • 4.Study design
  • 5.Demographics
  • 6.Mat usage ratios
  • 7.Mat usage contexts and criteria
    • 7.1Female respondents
    • 7.2Male respondents
    • 7.3Summary
  • 8.Gender metaphors
  • 9.Mat vocabulary
  • 10.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
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