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Gender roles seen in males and females
Gender discrimination easy
Gender roles seen in males and females
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Inequality based on gender stereotypes
Gender identity is becoming increasingly ambiguous, with many people refusing to conform to these outdated norms. Historically throughout western culture, gender stereotypes have dictated the relationship between the sexes, as well as, their place in society. Traditionally, men have been portrayed as superior to women, both physically and intellectually. However, behaviour and gene research have disproved the biological determinism used to justify this gender order. Nonetheless, even with this information readily available in Australia, gender order still exists, leading to inequality both socially and professionally.
Gender is a habitus constructed from social and cultural interpretations regarding masculinity
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.
Over the last two decades the Australian population has faced a number of economic instabilities that has seen the gap between the ‘haves’ and ‘have nots’ increase. To determine who the ‘haves’ and ‘have nots’ are an in-depth investigation will be performed examining the circumstances under which the gap can be manipulated. The economic wellbeing of individuals is largely determined by their command over economic resources (ABS, 2009). The wellbeing of individuals who are classified as ‘haves’ are usually people who are asset rich, contain bonds, shares and are fairly affluent. The wellbeing of individuals who are classified as ‘have nots’ are usually the working poor, who have little assets and little investments i.e. bonds. These individuals are usually middle income earners which are categorised as being in relative poverty. Relative poverty as defined by L. Kirkwood, I. Searle, T. Cronk, D. Cave and J. Swiericzuk as the situation of people whose income and lifestyle has fallen below, by more than a certain degree, the average income and lifestyle enjoyed by the rest of society.
Everybody does gender, even without the intention to do it, and we might completely fail to notice it, unless it goes against the binary pattern somehow. Gender roles are designed based on what the genitalia looks like at birth, but they are not genetic. Adults and children are influenced by the implicit rules of gender roles, which define most daily interactions, and influence friendship, study and career choices. Lorber refers to this difference as unequal counterparts in a patriarchal society, especially in the Western society, where women are considered as passive, or “Not-A”; men as dominant, or “A”
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).
Gender roles are often used in our own society to tie people to a certain representation for what is socially acceptable. These roles perpetuate gender inequalities because they often make the female end of the spectrum worth less than the male. One example is equating masculinity with strength and femininity with weakness. Because of this sayings such as “You run like a girl” become negative. Gender roles create a system where people are set to a different standard based off gender alone. In trying to follow what is socially acceptable based on gender people are forced into roles. There is a lower percentage of women in science than men because girls are taught at a young age that being smart isn’t feminine. These roles harm boys too, teaching them that they have to be hyper-masculine to be considered
Gender is also a factor in Australia’s national image (Carter 14). Society deems gender as the biological difference between male and female. However, this belief is problematic because sometimes certain people cannot place themselves in one of those two genders. For instance, there are transgender people. The image of the ‘typical Australian’ is controversial in many ways.
Gender inequality is often a broad, abstract, and vague idea. This is one of the great puzzles of modern society and explaining gender inequality has proven to be a challenging task to say the least. After all the years spend on this subject, we have not been able to discover why the blooming of equality has failed. While some argue that it was wrong to ever challenge the practices that oppress women, others add that the mistake was to believe that women and men are inherently the same and we are simply collecting the inescapable sequence of nature. How much true is in these arguments? Could there be another answer?
For the past century, the United States of America has made countless advancements in technology, medicine, and many other fronts. As a society, it has advanced at an incredible rate, becoming a major world power in an incredibly short period of time. The biggest barriers that America is working on are currently taking place within its own borders; civil rights and the battle for equality have men and women of every race up and arms. Specifically, the fight against sexism is the most modern struggle in America. Discrimination against women is harmful to both men and women; it holds women back into a useless position and forces men to take the brunt of the work. Men are expected to work, but women are almost expected not to, and instead "be nothing more than dangling, decorative ornaments--non-thinking and virtually non-functional” (Chisholm 4). There is progress to be made in the American society in its attitude and treatment of women. Gender inequality continues to be a social problem in the business, family, and personal lives of women.
Our society has been taught that gender roles are inherent, biological and behavioral characteristics. This belief is perpetuated through mass media, toys, clothing trends, advertisements, architecture, food and virtually everything else around us. This process begins at birth and continues through adulthood. These gender roles that society has set before us before us can be demeaning and create obstacles as well.
Throughout today’s society, almost every aspect of someone’s day is based whether or not he or she fits into the “norm” that has been created. Specifically, masculine and feminine norms have a great impact that force people to question “am I a true man or woman?” After doing substantial research on the basis of masculine or feminine norms, it is clear that society focuses on the males being the dominant figures. If males are not fulfilling the masculine role, and females aren’t playing their role, then their gender identity becomes foggy, according to their personal judgment, as well as society’s.
It is no secret that in history women have been generally looked down upon, in the United States women were not allowed to own property (seeing as they were already considered such), vote, or sign legal contracts (Henslin 2011). Of course, over time women have gained more rights and have worked towards an equal footing with their opposite sex shown with the rise of feminism. This, of course, doesn 't mean that the footing is equal. Being a woman still comes with negative connotations seen in casual sexist sayings such as: "you throw like a girl", "she 's just PMSing", and "do not be such a drama queen" all meant to demean and portray females in a negative light. It 's these types of comments that illustrate why girls can typically be too "mean" to each other. Internalized misogyny perpetuated through negative female stereotypes creates a competitive attitude between females. The sociological concept that best fits this hypothesis is symbolic interactionism, the textbook definition being "a theoretical perspective in which society is viewed as composed of symbols that
The sex and gender binary is a socially-constructed classification of sex and gender into two distinct and biological forms of masculine and feminine. The binary is a restricting concept that enforces the ideology that solely two genders exist—it is a social boundary that limits people from exploring gender identity or mixing it up (Larkin, 2016). As Mann depicts it, the binary constrains us to take on one gender identity, and to follow through with the expected roles assigned to that gender. The implications are that it compels people to fit into the binary and follow the patriarchal, heteronormative traditions of society (Mann, 2012). However, the binary was not always so clear-cut, but certain concepts from scientific research such as the
The term ‘gender’ was coined by John Money in 1955: “Gender is used to signify all those things that a person says or does to disclose himself/herself as having the status of a boy or man, girl or woman, respectively” (Coleman and Money, 1991, 13). In sociological terms, gender is a division between men and women which is clear in society throughout the past - for example, in Ancient Egypt with the idea that there was little point in teaching women to read and write. Gender inequalities can be seen throughout many different aspects of our daily lives – from the gender pay gap, to gender discrimination in television adverts.
and wages. It will also tackle what is being done to solve this problem and what
Society has stamped an image into the minds of people of how the role of each gender should be played out. There are two recognized types of gender, a man and a woman, however there are many types of gender roles a man or a woman may assume or be placed into by society. The ideas of how one should act and behave are often times ascribed by their gender by society, but these ascribed statuses and roles are sometimes un-welcomed, and people will assume who they want to be as individuals by going against the stereotypes set forth by society. This paper will examine these roles in terms of how society sees men and women stereotypically, and how men and women view themselves and each other in terms of stereotypes that are typically ascribed, as well as their own opinions with a survey administered to ten individuals. What I hope to prove is that despite stereotypes playing a predominant role within our society, and thus influencing what people believe about each other in terms of their same and opposite genders, people within our society are able to go against these ascribed stereotypes and be who they want and it be okay. Through use of the survey and my own personal history dealing with gender stereotyping I think I can give a clear idea as to how stereotypes envelope our society, and how people and breaking free from those stereotypes to be more individualistic.