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More handpicked essays just for you.
The influence of society on gender
Societal norms and gender stereotypes
How does gender affect self identity
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“Gender bender” is known as a person who bends the rules and standards of what is not expected from his or her gender. Gender roles are the biased ideas that society has placed on females and males. To break the bias standard that is placed on genders, I decided to bend the rules somewhat by asking a guy out on a date. I have personally never asked a guy out due to the conceived thought that the guy should always ask the girl. Before performing this task, I felt out of my realm,and a sense of desperation. While then carrying out the date, awkwardness seemed to over take me as I began falling out of my comfort zone. Through this process I learned that I have been warped by societies definition of gender, as I did not feel right taking the main role of the guy. Gender bias has socially constructed men and women into a preconceived standard on how they should present themselves. Before asking the guy out many emotions seemed to over take me. I did not want to prelude to my date that this was a class …show more content…
Because I had this quality, I thought it would be pretty easy to socialize. To my surprise it was not easy for me to socialize with my date. Overall, I was mainly surprised how much people depend on their gender roles. Something as simple as asking a guy out made me feel so different about myself. Have I defined my gender role or has society told me what my gender role should be? The gender bender activity helped me to realize that society has shaped my gender role in many ways. According to Kirk and Okazawa-Rey, “Values do not come from facts or from analysis of a situation but rather from people’s beliefs in principles like fairness, equality, or justice” (Womens Lives p.g. 55). On the other hand, would I have not felt as awkward if I was not discriminated against. In all truthfulness I felt that my date was distant from me because I asked him out as a
Is Wally Lamb, author of She's Come Undone, "qualified" to write a first-person narrator in a female voice? After all, as a man, what does he know about women's issues? In this essay I will discuss the issue of "gender-bending" writers and discuss Mr. Lamb's use of such tool.
Both Deborah Blum’s The Gender Blur: Where Does Biology End and Society Take Over? and Aaron Devor’s “Gender Role Behaviors and Attitudes” challenges the concept of how gender behavior is socially constructed. Blum resides on the idea that gender behavior is developed mainly through adolescence and societal expectations of a gender. Based on reference from personal experiences to back her argument up, Blum explains that each individual develops their expected traits as they grow up, while she also claims that genes and testosterones also play a role into establishing the differentiation of gender behavior. Whereas, Devor focuses mainly on the idea that gender behavior is portrayed mainly among two different categories: masculinity and femininity,
Betsy Lucal, "What it means to be gendered me: Life on the Boundaries of a Dichotomous Gender System."
The Kaleidoscope of Gender: Prisms, Patterns, and Possibilities written by Joan Z. Spade and Catherine G. Valentine is a book about the sociology of gender and the construct thereof. The writers use a metaphor of a kaleidoscope to illustrate their interpretations of the topic. A kaleidoscope is a toy consisting of a tube containing mirrors and pieces of colored glass or paper, whose reflections produce changing patterns that are visible through an eyehole when the tube is rotated. Utilizing the similitude of the kaleidoscope, this collection presents gender as a result of always transforming patterns get under way by prisms that underlie change, both straightforward and complex, bringing about an extensive variety of possibilities. The book
In “The Gender Blur: Where Does Biology End and Society Take Over?” Deborah Blum states that “gender roles of our culture reflect an underlying biology” (Blum 679). Maasik and Solomon argue that gender codes and behavior “are not the result of some sort of natural or biological destiny, but are instead politically motivated cultural constructions,” (620) raising the question whether gender behavior begins in culture or genetics. Although one may argue that gender roles begin in either nature or nurture, many believe that both culture and biology have an influence on the behavior.
Most of the current social work clients and workers are women. This gender is also over-represented among women, which implies that women continue to face considerable issues in the modern society despite the changes in the traditional role of men and women in the society. Social welfare policy are usually developed and implemented to confront various issues in the society including the plight of women. However, recent statistics demonstrate that social welfare policy does not always meet women’s needs effectively. This is regardless of the fact that sexism and heterosexism play a crucial role is shaping social welfare policy. Therefore, it is important to develop effective social welfare policy
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.
I found the topics discussed last week really interesting, that of gender blending, but the genderfuck panel ready caught my attention. I come from a close-minded, religious family that bites into society’s expectations. They remain living in the binary world that has taught us that there are only two acceptable genders, male and female, and as a result everything we do is shaped by that idea. Therefore, my parents reinforced the gender expectations by the way they raised me. They taught me how to act, what I can and can’t say or do and even what to wear. My toys, my clothes, my girl friends all influenced what it meant to be a girl. Growing up I never questioned it, since that was the norm for me; my parents set the perfect example of what
The terms sex, gender and sexuality relate with one another, however, sociologists had to distinguish these terms because it has it’s own individual meaning. Sex is the biological identity of a person when they are first born, like being a male or female. Gender is the socially learned behaviors and expectations associated with men and women like being masculine or feminine. Gender can differentiate like being a man, woman, transgender, intersex, etcetera. Sexuality refers to desire, sexual preference, and sexual identity and behavior (1). Sexuality can differentiate as well like being homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, etcetera. Like all social identities, gender is socially constructed. In the Social Construction of Gender, this theory shows
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.
Gender is such a ubiquitous notion that humans assume gender is biological. However, gender is a notion that is made up in order to organize human life. It is created and recreated giving power to the dominant gender, creating an inferior gender and producing gender roles. There are many questionable perspectives such as how two genders are learned, how humans learn their own gender and others genders, how they learn to appropriately perform their gender and how gender roles are produced. In order to understand these perspectives, we must view gender as a social institution. Society bases gender on sex and applies a sex category to people in daily life by recognizing gender markers. Sex is the foundation to which gender is created. We must understand the difference between anatomical sex and gender in order to grasp the development of gender. First, I will be assessing existing perspectives on the social construction of gender. Next, I will analyze three case studies and explain how gender construction is applied in order to provide a clearer understanding of gender construction. Lastly, I will develop my own case study by analyzing the movie Mrs. Doubtfire and apply gender construction.
Identities are an important part of the human experience. One of the many identities that creates a person is gender. Society, being the entity establishing social norms and social roles, plays a part in effecting the individual’s gender, and how they choose to express themself. The underlying or overlying identities also have the same effect. Gender is not only an identity, it is a lifestyle inside and out. Gender, like race, class, and sexuality; is not limited to the binary scale, and that is normal, natural, and human. The concept of gender is man-made, but it forces one’s hand to analyze the thought processes behind an individual's perception on gender through self, through society, or through the dichotomy and/or correspondence of the
As a woman, I can encounter many advantages in life. Typically a man is expected to pay for the first date if one is request this entitles me to free food, a movie or such. Rewind to the part that I said “typically”. Two days ago I went on a date with a man, I did not get my coffee paid for. This is because, just because it is expected, it does not mean it will happen. As a female I have many privileges, not to argue that males do not have just as many. Many of these privileges go unnoticed at times. Today, I went to class wearing an “Iowa” baseball cap, male sweatpants, no make-up, and a loose fitting blue sweatshirt. The average person would not see anything wrong with my class attire. Imagine if a male went to class in attire opposite of that, he would be wearing a floppy hat, female yoga pants, make-up, and a tight-fitting pink sweatshirt. Most would have a different opinion and view on the way they he dressed and it would not be seen as normal. Pink is obviously for girls, right? That might be what an opposing view would think. In that case, blue is for boys. However, no one lo...
It will be one of the luckiest things in the world if people could just do what they love in their careers, and pursue their dreams without any fears or worries about how society and others judge them. However, women in this society do not obtain the same rights that men own; many inequalities hinder women to live and work. From this class, I learned a lot about gender affects work, and women and men’ roles can be very different in the work. In many industries, even though women get same education and professional degrees as men do, they are hired at lower rates than men are. Many women meet glass ceilings and find it is hard to attain the highest status in the profession, and this causes the society locks women out of higher level
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.