Who Speaks, Who Listens? Gendered Speech Styles in Will Smith’s Interview with Ellen

Abstract

Prior research on gendered language has primarily focused on everyday conversations and workplace discourse. However, media interviews, where gender intersects with institutional roles and performative identities, remain understudied, particularly from the perspective of Conversation Analysis. This qualitative study addresses this gap by examining a 10-min segment from Will Smith’s Full Interview with Ellen. Using conversation analysis, supported by summative content and comparative analysis, the study explores how gendered speech patterns manifest in a media interview setting. The analysis focuses on five linguistic dimensions: lexical patterns, sentence complexity, assertiveness, interruptions and politeness, and turn-taking strategies. Findings confirm several established gendered language norms: the male speaker exhibits greater assertiveness, topic control, and frequency of interruptions, while the female speaker employs more facilitative, polite, and cooperative strategies. However, these patterns are shaped not only by gender but also by Ellen DeGeneres’s institutional role as host and her identity as an openly lesbian public figure. The study contributes to the understanding of how conversational dominance and linguistic politeness are co-constructed in media discourse. It highlights the need for more context-sensitive approaches to gender and language research, especially in mediated settings where identity, institutional roles, and audience expectations interact.