My New Gender Workbook Analysis

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Within the 21st century, arising conflicts involve the role of gender. More and more people question the correlation of their gender to their daily lives. A few even objectify the social constructs of their assigned biological sex and advocate life styles that oppose the gender binary norm. In My New Gender Workbook by Kate Bornstein, the author examines interesting concepts of gender that have a significant impact on society. To illustrate this, Bornstein concentrates on the effects of gender towards an individual’s identity, desire, and power; all common reappearing themes throughout her book. Now to understand the themes, let’s evaluate the arguments and examples provided by the author. A number of factors altogether estimate who you can be, but a major contribution to determining a person’s identity is gender. Whether we like it or not, society tries to categorize …show more content…

For the longest time and a continuous factor, an individual’s gender influences their authority, access to resources, and their lifestyle. To illustrate this, the author presents a gender pyramid that correlates power and gender identity. At the very top is the “perfect gender”, or a person that represents a high amount of power and can be described as white, middle aged, well-educated, heterosexual, upper class, etc. (p. 87). This group is shown to have the most privileges than the people below the pyramid. Their freedom of self- expression often leads to the belief that their kind has the power to oppress everyone else. Of course, such ideas are unjust and cruel. The further down the pyramid a person is, the further away the qualities are expressed by the top, and the less likely their gender is perceived as real (p. 89). Which causes conflict with low-authority people, but their arguments challenge the superior. After all, no one should have the power to decide what is good or bad for each

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