Stereotypes of the Female Body in the Idioms of Rožaje Speech: Thinness and Obesity

Abstract

In the sociocultural imaginary, stereotypical patterns that shape the image of female physical appearance are constituted, and which manifest themselves in the linguistic picture of the world as conceptual models of aesthetic evaluation of external appearance. This paper will present an analysis of gender-marked idioms of Rožaje speech, which contain stereotypical representations of women's physical build – of thinness and obesity. The analysis is based on a corpus of fifty-two idioms, which were collected through field research using the elicitation method. The results show that women's physical proportions are evaluated in accordance with traditional stereotypical aesthetic ideals: a proportional build and thinness are desirable, but excessive thinness and obesity are negatively evaluated. The analysis shows that phraseology reflects gender stereotypes, and confirms that language is an active medium for evaluating a woman's physical appearance, in the context of gender stereotypes.