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Power dynamics permeate every aspect of our daily lives, and communication is no exception. In the case of women, some of them firmly believe that using excessive polite forms may be perceived as weakness, hence adopting more assertive ones instead. However, is assertiveness actually the solution for being considered as more professional and competent? In this research project, I analyse the communicative style chosen by four Hispanic women depending on the environment and their motives behind it.

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Rimm and Masters (1979) provided on of the most thorough definitions of assertive communication to date: "Assertive behavior is an interpersonal behavior involving relatively honest and direct expression of thoughts and feelings that are socially appropriate and take into account the feelings and welfare of other people” (cited in Pipas and Jaradat, 2010, p. 650). However, the adoption of one communicative style over another is closely linked to our social environment. As Brown and Levinson (1987) explain, "patterns of message construction, or ‘ways of putting things’, or simply language usage, are part of the very stuff that social relationships
are made of (or, as some would prefer, crucial parts of the expressions of
social relations)" (p. 55). Henceforth, how we decide to "stand our ground" will have a direct impact in our social image, especially if it does not align to what is considered as socially acceptable as a woman.

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Itakura (2009) analysed feminine communicative styles among English and Japanese monolingual women. The results of the study show that “the effectiveness of using a feminine style of English or of Japanese in monolingual contexts depends upon professional roles and contexts” (p. 90). In other words, there is not a “size-fit-all” way of communicating in environments of power imbalances. Another significant article, by Domagalski and Steelman (2007), researched the impact of gender and status on workplace anger expression. The results indicated that “emotional restraint is the most frequent method of handling anger across all groups. Lower status males, however, directly express their anger around higher status members significantly more frequently than do lower status females” (p. 297). Overall, in professional settings, women become more mindful about how they express anger and complains, specially when there is a high power distance.

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The research was conducted through virtual meetings at Webex, since the participants are currently located in different countries (United States, Mexico and Spain). Due to the time zone difference and our academic schedules, the meetings will probably took place in the afternoon in North and Central America and at night in Spain. The interviews were semi-structured, with some questions that provided the general guidelines of the conversation.

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- Age: 20-29 (100%).
- Race/ethnicity: Hispanic (100%): Latina (75%), White (25%).
- Birthplace: Mexico (50%), Ecuador (25%), Spain (25%).
- Current level of education: Master's (75%), PhD (25%).

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All in all, even if the participants’ profile was quite homogeneous, the participants’ responses were not. Some of them used politeness for showing care, and others for putting distance. Some of them used direct style for bonding with other women, and others for defense.
Some of them felt that they should have replied more assertively in uncomfortable situations, but they feared their safety. Overall we can see that, although all of them took different approaches in similar situations, it still worked for them.

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Brown, P., & Levinson, S. C. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge University Press.

Domagalski, T. A., & Steelman, L. A. (2007). The Impact of Gender and Organizational Status on Workplace Anger Expression. Management Communication Quarterly, 20(3), 297–315. doi:10.1177/0893318906295681

Itakura, H. (2009). Gender and Professional Communication: The Role of Feminine Style in Multilingual Workplaces. In Cheng W. & Kong K. (Eds.), Professional Communication: Collaboration between Academics and Practitioners (pp. 71-92). Aberdeen, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press. Retrieved March 8, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1xwb74.9

Pipas, M. D., & Jaradat, M. (2010). Assertive communication skills. Annales Universitatis Apulensis: Series Oeconomica, 12(2), 649.

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Click here to access (quotes in Spanish).

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The research provided some common patterns among the four participants. Overall, none of them uses only one communicative style, but the factors that cause them to make the switch differ. Some of them adapt it only to the gender of the speaker, whereas others speak to men and women the same way and only pay attention to the power distance in professional settings. However, the majority of them felt the need to be more indirect and careful when interacting in their institutions abroad, as international students. An unexpected finding was that while some women use extreme forms of politeness for bonding with other women, others use the same techniques to put distance with men who made them feel uncomfortable. In situations where there was street or workplace harassment involved, the majority admits that they would have liked to react differently, but they did not do it for safety's sake (either physical or financial).