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" I interviewed more than 100 women about their sisters, but if they also had brothers, I asked them to compare. Most said they talked to their sisters more often, at greater length and, yes, about more personal topics. This often meant that they felt closer to their sisters, but not always. "

Deborah Tannen

Said

Always

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" We all know we are unique individuals, but we tend to see others as representatives of groups. "

" The trickiest thing about the double bind is that it operates imperceptibly, like shots from a gun with a silencer. "

Deborah Tannen

Shots

Bind

" For most women, the language of conversation is primarily a language of rapport: a way of establishing connections and negotiating relationships. "

" I can't tell you how many times I heard from younger sisters that their older sisters were bossy and judgmental. "

" Our ways of relating to each other become like habits. "

Deborah Tannen

Our

Ways

" Where the daughter sees power, the mother feels powerless. Daughters and mothers, I found, both overestimate the other's power - and underestimate their own. "

" In the past, great communicators were great orators, but great communicators today sound conversational, and interrupting is common in conversation. And public discourse is now more about entertainment than enlightenment. "

" Back when the powerful 19th-century senator Henry Clay was called 'the great compromiser,' achieving a compromise really was considered great. "

" Everything we say has metamessages indicating how our words are to be interpreted: Is this a serious statement or a joke? Does it show annoyance or goodwill? Most of the time, metamessages are communicated and interpreted without notice because, as far as anyone can tell, the speaker and the hearer agree on their meaning. "

" For girls and women, talk is the glue that holds a relationship together - and the explosive that can blow it apart. That's why you can think you're having a perfectly amiable chat, then suddenly find yourself wounded by the shrapnel from an exploded conversation. "

" Birth order is fascinating, and it is forever. "

" Our spirits are corroded by living in an atmosphere of unrelenting contention - an argument culture. "

" Mothers subject their daughters to a level of scrutiny people usually reserve for themselves. A mother's gaze is like a magnifying glass held between the sun's rays and kindling. It concentrates the rays of imperfection on her daughter's yearning for approval. The result can be a conflagration - whoosh. "

" My interest in the linguistic differences between women and men grew from research I conducted early in my career on conversations between speakers of different ethnic and regional backgrounds. "

" The effect of dominance is not always the result of an intention to dominate. "

" I think it is important to remember that there are so many different ways to be sisters. "

" We all feel wistfulness or regret about roads not taken. "

" The meanings of words and the uses of words come from practice from the way people in a given culture use those words. "

" People vary. You change your style, your hair, and the way you dress. Talking differently will be a part of that. "

" I've long believed that if you understand how conversational styles work, you can make adjustments in conversations to get what you want in your relationships. "

" When women told me they'd always wished they had a sister, they were thinking of this ideal of mutual encouragement and support. Many of those who have sisters also yearn for this ideal because their relationships with their sisters don't always live up to it. "

" I was one of those daughters who saw my mother as my enemy when I was a teen. "

" In my own writing, I avoid 'female' and try to say 'woman' because I feel that the word 'female' has connotations of not just biology but also non-human mammals. The idea of 'female' to me is more appropriate for a female animal. "

" Sisters, to me, are fascinating because it is a unique connection of the coming together of connection and competition. The fact that you have these age differences is a built-in power struggle, and the fact that you're all trying to get attention and resources from the same parents creates competition. "

" Most non-New Yorkers, finding themselves within hearing range of strangers' conversation, think it's nice to pretend they didn't hear. But many New Yorkers think it's nice to toss in a relevant comment. "

" For many women, and a fair number of men, saying 'I'm sorry' isn't literally an apology; it's a ritual way of restoring balance to a conversation. "

" While the requirements of a good leader and a good man are similar, the requirements of a good leader and a good woman are mutually exclusive. A good leader must be tough, but a good woman must not be. A good woman must be self-deprecating, but a good leader must not be. "

" It is easy to understand why conflict is so often highlighted: Writers of headlines or promotional copy want to catch attention and attract an audience. They are usually under time pressure, which lures them to established, conventionalized ways of expressing ideas in the absence of leisure to think up entirely new ones. "

" In some ways, siblings, and especially sisters, are more influential in your childhood than your parents. "

" There's the bond of a connection and the bond of bondage... When you are connected to somebody, everything each one does affects the other, and it's a kind of bondage. You're not as free as you would be if that person wasn't in your life. "