“But What Do You Mean?” Women and Men in Conversation

In the essay, “‘But What Do You Mean?’ Women and Men in Conversation,” author Deborah Tannen analyzes and describes the differences between men and women in aspects such as apologies, critics, thank-yous, fighting, praise, complaints, and jokes. Tannen starts by stating that men and women differ in the way they talk which can be due to their sex and gender. For instance, most of the time men like to talk sports or competitions while women like to talk about fashion and clothing.

Men and women differ in many ways. First, when it comes to apologies, women sometimes apologize too much that is not longer taken as an apology but as a way to start or end a conversation. Sometimes women say “I am sorry” just a speech style. For men, an apology is seemed as putting oneself down, a negative aspect when they supposed to be tough and strong. Next, the way in which men and women make critics is very different. Women tend to give a response in a nice, soft, and tentative manner while men respond without thinking that the person may get hurt. Also, women tend to say thank you for anything, even if is not required. Again, this is just an automatic response. Women also expect that males do this but that is not their behavior or characteristic.