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Studying gender roles in literature and life
Gender roles and literature
Studying gender roles in literature and life
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Mills, S. (2012). Gender Matters: Frminist Linguistic Analysis. London : Equinox.
Gender Matters is a collection of various essays on feminist linguistic texts analysis, by Sara Mills. Mills develops methods of analyzing literary and non-literary texts, in addition to conversational analysis based on a feminist approach. The author draws on data from her collection of essays gathered over the last two decades on feminism during the 1990s. The essays focus on gender issues, the representation of gender in reading, writing, and in public speaking. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of feminists’ analysis of sexism in literature and the relation between gender and politeness. The article is informative for my research paper, as my topic is going to cover language analysis of the text and who women reading and writing differs according to the discourse analysis within linguistic, psychology, case studies audiences and surveys. The book would be helpful, particularly the last three essays that discusses gender, public speaking, the question of politeness and impoliteness in public speaking. Mills’ analysis is not complete without including the idea of global notions of both women and men, to see whether women and men write and read in the same way globally. Therefore, an update would enrich the book’s discussion section. Although, Mills addresses the class and race theme in language and public speaking, I will only look into the role of language that plays a part in doing or reducing gender in literary, non-literary texts and in conversation.
Butler, J. (2006). Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge.
Gender Trouble published in 1990 by Judith Butler, argues that feminism was and still relaying on the presumption that ‘women’ a...
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...ignificant evidence for my research argument indicates that the nature of gender/sex consists of a wide consensus. The latter is significant to original sex differences in brain structure and the organized role through sex differential prenatal hormone exposures through the term used in the article as (the ‘hardwiring’ paradigm). The article is limited to scientific shortcoming that presents neuroscientific research on sex and gender for it lacks an analysis that goes beyond the observed results. The article is based on neuroscience studies and how it approached gender, yet the article suggests that gender should be examined through social, culture studies, ethnicity and race. This article will not form the foundation of my research but will be used a secondary material. The neuroscience evidences will be used to support my argument and will be used as an example.
In the book Difference Matters, Brenda J Allen, begins writing about how gender matters in society. One of the main topics that she talks about is how in today’s society the male gender is the more predominate gender. As the reader, she has brought to mind many new ways to view how males earn more money then females, how we classify jobs as masculine or feminine, and also how society excepts males’ vs females to act and preform in the work force.
As we discuss the articles of Anne Fausto- Streling, “The Five Sexes, Revisited” and Marjorie Garber, “The Return to Biology” in class we came to see how these two articles could bring up such controversy. As they question our perspective on human nature as we have always known it to be, from “The Five Sexes, Revisited” stating “absolute dimorphism disintegrates even at the level of basic biology” (176), to “The Return of Biology” saying “Society mandates the control of intersexual bodies because they blur and bridge the great divide” (184). We see many different aspects on how human biology or culture is more than what meets the eye. All I can begin to say is everything we, as the human species, do revolves around dimorphism no matter the questions or contradictions that may arise. The idea that only two sexes exist is still firmly maintained in our society as how things are suppose to be aka the “norm”.
The second a baby is born the gender they are born with influences how people treat them. The gender they are born with will influence what they wear, what toys they play with, how they are treated etc. Gender is not rooted in the brain or genetically determined but environmentally determined. By defining the importance of recognizing that gender is not rooted in the brain and genetically determined and by refuting those who claim that gender is predetermined at birth and rotted in the brain by presenting cases of children who have identity issues based on their preferred sexuality and how they were raised, one will be persuaded that gender is not predetermined and rooted in the brain and that the way we are raised determines how we see our gender. Is gender rooted in the brain automatically or does America’s culture teach girls to play with dolls and boys to play with cars?
...rms of power and source of pride in society. Emphasizing sexism in language and rising the concern with words can be a vital feminist strategy to provoke social change (Weatherall, 2002). Language can produce a false imagination and represents women and men unequally, as if members of one sex were somehow less wholly human, less complex, and has fewer rights than members of the other sex. Sexist language also characterizes serotypes of women and men, sometimes to the disadvantage of both, but more often to the disadvantage of women. (Wareing & Thomas, 2012). As a result, it is necessary that individuals have the right to define, and to redefine as their lives unfold, their own gender identities, without regard to genitalia, assigned birth sex, or initial gender role. Language about women is not a nonaligned or an insignificant issue but profoundly a political one.
Butler, J. 1990. Gender Trouble. Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. London and New York: Routledge.
Gender Schema can be simply described as a child’s general understanding of society’s definition of male and female. The ideas of gender, that our culture has set up, effects children tremendously. Children categorize certain things and ideas as for boys or girls, there is really no in between. Younger girls tend to wear pink or colors that are considered “girly” simply because that is what they have been taught. It’s the same things for boys. Younger boys are taught to that they have to act tough and that they cannot be sensitive. Sandra Bem covers this a lot in her article “Gender Schema Theroy”. “Children are being taught sex-appropriate skills, personality attributes, behaviors and much more.”(Gender Schema Theory para. 1) We must realize that these things are taught not only by parents but by our society.
... women speak. However, while Gray states that need a translator to help them with communication, Cameron claims that the differences in how men and women express themselves are minor and do not affect understanding of the opposite sex. The key contrast in the approaches undertaken by Gray and the feminists is why those discrepancies exist. According to Gray, the concept of the two sexes is a reason of its own for the intersexual communication. On the other hand, sociolinguists have proved that the notion of "performing gender" through language is key to understanding the great extent of sexism, stereotyping and incompetent guesses hidden in the popular self-help books, which promote the view that men and women come from different planets and thus create the unjust society, in which women occupy the role of the 'second sex' as opposed to men, who are the 'norm'.
Women and gender studies contribute greatly to our understanding of the social and cultural world we inhabit. Studying the complex issues of this field has instituted many key insights. Two major insights that positively affected our society are the awareness through learning and through this awareness activism that can ensue.
We are in a world which is divided by lines of gender, race, class and age. “We also live in a world which is increasingly saturated by the media and information and communication technologies” (Gill, R. 2006). Which is the main reason for why I have decided to write an essay on language and gender. The main outcome I aim to find: Is there a difference in the language male and females use? If so specifically what is different? E.g. who uses more slang? Is there more grammatical errors with men? Do men tend to type longer or shorter tweets? Social Media is becoming a key area in the world of linguistic research and is one of the main reasons why I
Throughout her entire discourse of feminist critique, Butler identifies certain problems and attributes reasons for the continuing subjugation of the `subject'. Initially Butler's predominant issue is the concept of `gender' and identity. The concept of Descartes `core identity' does not seem to work for Butler. Inspired by Foucault and Nietzche, Butler follows in the theory of "there is no doe...
Sexologist are indecisive between gender explanations based on nature and culture. John Money’s he claimed, to divide pre- ad postnatal influences and attribute them to biology and culture respectively, since social influence enter the brain and are therefore also physiology.
Today the issue of the difference between men’s and women’s use of language raises hot debates among sociolinguists, psychologists and other scholars. They create various theories that complicate the issue because of the fact that they observe gender differences from various perspectives. One theory is known as “genderlect”, which according to The Free Dictionary is a variety of speech, writing, or conversational style used by a particular gender. An analysis of the writings of both genders reveals one main difference between them: men focus more on status in their writings while women focus more on a connection with the reader (Lyons).
I went to Old Orchard mall in Skokie to observe people and children on December 22, 2016. I heard the sound of children playing. I decided to observe children from 12:00 to 1:00 pm. There was all kind of diversity. There were White, African, Asian and hispanic. The children wore winter jacket, as well as boots and winter hat. While the girls wore wearing scarf, gloves snow pants. There were approximately 4 boys and 3 girls present. The children both boys and girls were White, African and Asian. The children ranging from 10 to 12 years old. There were their parents watching over them.
I do believe there is a major difference in the way boys and girls express emotion. When it comes to showing emotion if a boy shows any he would be consider wimpy by society. Boys that want to show their emotions will more than likely not do so because they are afraid of what society will think of them. According to the text men are defined by their activities, accomplishments and position while women are defined by appearance or by relationship with others (Wood, p. 119). Gender roles are automatically assigned to us from society and it’s based on the activities we do, how we speak, how we act and etc. If we were to do something out of the norm it would definitely be noticed.
In the early days most pregnant women would rely on their grandmother’s silly predictions or other old wives tales to predict whether their unborn baby was a boy or a girl. However, women had no way of knowing the sex of their baby until the actual moment of birth. The idea of gender determination has always been a challenge, and to this day one still cannot fully understand the concept of gender determination. However, with the use of modern day technology and much research, experts have found ways to determine the sex of unborn fetus.