LANGUAGE ATTITUDES AND SOCIAL GROUP MEMBERSHIPS

This study examined the saliency of two independent dimensions of grou p identity-gender and ethnicity-for attitudes toward different languag es in an Israeli context. The study is presented within the framework of social identity theory and treats the implications of multiple grou p memberships for the interpersonal/intergroup continuum of social beh avior. The sample included 343 ninth grade Jewish and Arab students in Israel who responded to semantic differential scales for each of thre e languages: Hebrew, Arabic and English. It was hypothesized that gend er would be the relevant group category for attitudes toward English, which is considered to be ''ethnically neutral'', but not for Hebrew a nd Arabic. For the latter two languages, the saliency of ethnic group membership was expected to override any gender-language link. The resu lts basically supported the hypotheses with the exception that ethnic group membership was a relevant category for English in addition to ge nder.