Looking at the Functionalist perspective it is perceived that the transgender community goes against society’s traditional concept of sex and gender. Transgender gender-nonconforming individuals face many obstacles in a society that is unforgiving of any individual who does not fit into the “appropriate” expectations or behaviors of gender identity or a gender binary system. The rules of behavior in our society that are considered “appropriate” for women or men inhibit us all. This is the social construction of gender roles, patterns of socially defined behaviors and expectations that are associated with the female and male; men have to dress, act, and speak in a hard, masculine way, while women are to be feminine and soft. There’s not much room for individuality there and for some of us, this is a little more challenging. There seem to be some misconceptions about gender and sex, I believe it is much more complex than we came to …show more content…
For instance in January 2015, President Obama spoke to the protection of transgender individuals in his State of the Union address. "As Americans, we respect human dignity,[…] condemn the persecution of women, or religious minorities, or people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. We do these things not only because they 're right, but because they make us safer." (Advancing Transgender Equality, 20 Jan. 2015). This statement was not just historical but a positive move forward for the transgender community. By February, the White House changed its position on transgender officers, saying the transgender community has every right to serve in the military. President Obama went even further for transgender rights in the military when he personally invited Senior Airman Logan Ireland, an openly transgender member of the Air Force and his fiancée to attend an LGBT(Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender) pride reception at the White House in a male military
The medicalization of transgender tendencies, under what was Gender Identity Disorder, was demoralizing to all transgender people. This resulted in a form of structured and institutionalized inequality that made an entire group of people internalize their problems, making them question not only their own identity, but also their sanity. Therefore, the removal of this disorder from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 2013 and the newest editions was important in that it shows society’s recognition and acceptance of the transgender
For instance, sociologists would argue that characteristics of the male gender in a given society include independence, and dominance whereas females express more passive behavior. Gender identity, on the other hand is an individual’s sense of their gender or in other words, their sense as to whether they are feminine or masculine. Therefore, transgender is a term related to “people whose gender identity is different from the gender commonly socially assigned to them on the basis of their biological sex” (Morrow & Messinger, 2006, p. 7).“Biological theories assume that gender should be consistent with biological sex and there are only two genders and two sexes” which does not correspond to transgender people. Furthermore, transgender is also used as a general term to include people such as transsexuals and cross-dressers
Imagine going through life believing that you were born into the wrong body. This is how a transgender feels as they go through life. A transgender is a person who whose self-identity does not conform unambiguously to male or female sex. This topic is very controversial due to many arguments about the differences between the male and female physique. The natural biological differences between males and a females play a huge role in this controversy.
Transgender is defined by Wikipedia as, “the state of one's gender identity (self-identification as woman, man, neither or both) or gender expression not matching one's assigned sex.” The article explains how a transgender individual may define themselves as having the characteristics that are normally associated with a particular gender but will choose to identify elsewhere on the gender continuum. It use’s the love story of Rhys Ernst and Zackary Drucker as an example. It took five years for Zackary to transition from male to female and Rhys from female to male. But both truly believe that they were born the wrong gender, and choose to correct this wrong with hormone treatments, surgery and personality changes that to the more tradition eye may seem absurd and abnormal. This is one of the main reason such transgender couples are talking about their transformations. To beach this gap between transgender’s and the rest of the population. It is believed that by educating society, we are more likely to accept something than if we do not fully understand the parameters that surround such an issue.
The eye opening article utilized for this analysis is titled, “Trans Women at Smith: The Complexities of Checking ‘Female’” ,written by contributing writer, Sarah Fraas on August 24, 2014 (pg 683-685). Fraas starts off by introducing the audience with a school that accepts trans women, Mills College, and talks about how glorious this decision is. The author then begins to talk about other schools not as accepting as Mills, especially Smiths College. She spews many facts and analysis on the issues trans women face today throughout the article including how transgender women are not gaining enough support to succeed, most transgendered women are neglected in school, and the fact that many have been accused of being a woman for the “wrong” reason. She also mindfully includes the image of a woman of color holding up a sign saying, “Support your sisters, not just your CIS-ters!”. The author utilizes this image to show people that we are all one whether we
In this article, Shaw and Lee describe how the action of labels on being “feminine” or “masculine” affect society. Shaw and Lee describe how gender is, “the social organization of sexual difference” (124). In biology gender is what sex a person is and in culture gender is how a person should act and portray themselves. They mention how gender is what we were taught to do in our daily lives from a young age so that it can become natural(Shaw, Lee 126). They speak on the process of gender socialization that teaches us how to act and think in accordance to what sex a person is. Shaw and Lee state that many people identify themselves as being transgendered, which involves a person, “resisting the social construction of gender into two distinct, categories, masculinity and femininity and working to break down these constraining and polarized categories” ( 129). They write about how in mainstream America masculinity and femininity are described with the masculine trait being the more dominant of the two. They define how this contributes to putting a higher value of one gender over the other gender called gender ranking (Shaw, Lee 137). They also speak about how in order for femininity to be viewed that other systems of inequality also need to be looked at first(Shaw,Lee 139).
I chose the topic of transgenderism. Transgender is when an individual tries to switch genders. Transgender comes from the Latin words trans, meaning “across.” Transgender literally means “across gender.” Many trans-individuals decided later on in their lives that they want to switch genders, and other people argue that they were born the wrong gender. Trans-people experience many difficulties throughout their lives. Switching genders makes their lives more challenging, because of many reasons. Their lives are more challenging because of their religion, whether or not they are accepted. The military is very strict, and will not accept trans individuals whatsoever. Insurance companies sometimes will not accept them as well. Trans people are not always accepted by certain occupations. Growing up in schools, trans people are all treated differently regarding to which bathroom/locker room to use. There is a huge debate whether or not trans students are even allowed to participate on sports teams, and if they are, which team to be on. Other obstacles such as birth certificates, passports, and driver’s licenses are all major issues as well. Trans people have to decide if they are willing to come forward, and say ‘This is who I am.’ But before trans-people can come out to other, they must come out to
When an individual identifies themselves as transgender, it means that they feel that their biological gender does not match with their psychological gender. To put that into a simple man’s term, the individual feels they “were born in the wrong body”. For example, a man feels that he was meant to be born a woman and vise-versa. It does sound rather unusual, but why should that matter? An individual should be able to make his or her own decisions about how they live their life. Unfortunately though, not everyone feels the same way about this. That is how the controversy is created. This is why transgender rights should be strengthened in America not only because it is morally correct, but also because it would ease the lives of the people within this group, reduce the discrimination and harassment rates of transgender individuals, and help establish awareness.
In today's world there are many different sexual identities a person can adhere to, instead of just being heterosexual or homosexual. What a sexual identity is, is how one refers to think of oneself in terms of whom one is romantically or sexually attracted to. A type of sexual identity is when a person both male or female feel like they are inside the wrong body and they wish to have a sex change. Individuals who identify themselves as transgender aren’t usually adults, in some cases it is children who go through the stages of feeling out of place with there bodies and wish to change it. Some people in today's society would find it very odd that children would wish to be in a different body, in order to understand why this is happening you would have to know what exactly is transgender and transsexual, what causes transgenderism, and the early signs of transgenderism. This phenomenon has been around for a very long time and due to the fact that there is a large misunderstanding there is much confusion when faced with it. In order for one to understand how children become transgender or transsexual one must know what transgender and transsexual mean, what causes transgenderism, and the early signs of it and be mentally prepared for what is to come. Most of the responsibility in understanding transgender children falls on the parents of transgender children.
On May 12, 2014, President Obama spoke out on Gay Civil Rights. “You will see a tim...
Transgender Today Nowadays, there are lot of unexpected changes coming in our lives every day which are challenging to our society. Gender issues are one of the hot topics among new changes. Transsexuality is a critical part of this gender issue. After reading the article “Night to his day” by Judith Lorber, I found a clarification regarding the social construction of gender. While looking for some facts about transgender, I have also found a lot of articles with different points of views from researchers, scientists and individuals who have transformed from their origin to transgender men/women.
I live on a site called Common Thread Co-op and it’s very close to campus; easy to arrive on the way to Main Street. It has four buildings and other condominium apartments built with red bricks nearby. This place hosts Americans, and Latinos from Puerto Rico, Colombia, and Peru. In front of these apartments, Saint James Church is sited and surrounded by a big parking lot with enormous gardens at the front side lateral of the principal building. This place is a representation of the American culture combined with the Hispanic lifestyle. Each family shares the same religion and traditions from their original countries. As it’s mentioned in Chapter 12, the functionalist view focuses on the fact that families gratify the needs of its member’s children and parents and contributes to social stability considering 6 main functions: reproduction, protection, and socialization, regulation of sexual behavior, affection and companionship, and provision of social status (page 284).
Around the world, gender is genuinely seen as strictly male or female. If you step out of this “social norm,” you could be considered an outcast. This disassociation includes, biological males/females, intersexed, and transgendered individuals. These people are severely suppressed by society because their gender identification, behaviors, and even their activities deviate from the norm. Most Americans are exceedingly devoted to the concept that there are only two sexes.
...interpret for them. The term gender is a little sexist because it associates sex with social status. As for me I think that gender is a little out dated. Sex is a sufficient enough classification to separate men, women, and the people who are confused about what they are. Works Cited “The meaning of gender” by Jacquelyn B. James, retrieved on June, 04,2003 from http://www.radcliffe.edu/quarterly/199804/meanings_gender.html “Transexuality…a small prime for the confused but sympathetic person” by Janis Cortese retrieved on June 04, 2003 from http://www.io.com/~wwwave/sxlty.cgi Transgender Inclusion–The Widening Field by Jack Drescher, MD, retrieved on June, 04,2003 from http://www.haworthpressinc.com/store/Toc/J236v06n02_TOC.pdf”Gender Issues” by Theresa D. Balayon, retrieved on June, 04,2003 from http://www.teenfad.ph/library/fadsource/gender.htm
I am a heterosexual female. I have had many bisexual and homosexual friends. I, at one time experimented with bisexuality, however, I do not feel that homosexuality or bisexuality is for me. Marrying a female, I believe, would leave me yearning for more. I have needs that a female cannot fulfill including sexual satisfaction. I do not think I have ever met any transgendered individuals. I never understood transgender. As I stated earlier, I have never really been like typical girls. I like to wear men’s shirts and jeans. I also enjoy doing things that males do, however, I still consider myself a female. This is the very reason it does not make sense to me. However, I may understand it better if I were a male and acted and dressed like a female. I have seen many