Sociology chapter 12
Sanday's study of the Indonesian Minangkabau
evealed that in societies some consider to be matriarchies (wherewomen comprise the dominant group), women and men tend to work cooperatively rather than competitively regardless ofwhether a job is considered feminine by U.S. standards. The men, however, do not experience the sense of bifurcated consciousness under this social structure that modern U.S. females encounter.
Talcott Parsons
has long argued that the regulation of sexual activity is an importantfunction of the family. Social norms surrounding family life have, traditionally, encouraged sexual activity within thefamily unit (marriage) and have discouraged activity outside of it (premarital and extramarital sex)
gender
in psychology, the biologically and socially influenced characteristics by which people define male and female
transsexuals
transgender individuals who attempt to alter their bodies through medical interventions such as surgeryand hormonal therapy
queer theory
an interdisciplinary approach to sexuality studies that identifies Western society's rigid splitting ofgender into male and female roles and questions its appropriateness
DOMA
Defense of Marriage Act, a 1996 U.S. law explicitly limiting the definition of "marriage" to a union between one man and one woman and allowing each individual state to recognize or deny same-sex marriages performed in other states
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
She coined the term "homosocial" to oppose"homosexual," describing nonsexual same-sex relations. Sedgwick recognized that in U.S. culture, males are subject to aclear divide between the two sides of this continuum, whereas females enjoy more fluidity.
Jagose
Queer [Theory] focuses on mismatches between anatomical sex, gender identity,and sexual orientation, not just division into male/female or homosexual/hetereosexual
gender dysphoria
a condition listed in the DSM-5 in which people whose gender at birth is contrary to the one they identify with. This condition replaces "gender identity disorder"
sexuality
a person's capacity for sexual feelings
gender role
society's concept of how men and women should behave
gender identity
a person's deeply held internal perception of his or her gender
sexual orientation
a person's physical, mental, emotional, and sexual attraction to a particular sex (male or female)
sex
a term that denotes the presence of physical or physiological differences between males and females
Alfred Kinsey
among the first to conceptualize sexuality as a continuum rather than a strict dichotomy of gay orstraight. He created a six-point rating scale that ranges from exclusively heterosexual to exclusively homosexual. See thefigure below.
transgender
an adjective that describes individuals who identify with the behaviors and characteristics that are otherthan their biological sex
homophobia
an extreme or irrational aversion to homosexuals
heterosexism
an ideology and a set of institutional practices that privilege heterosexuals and heterosexuality overother sexual orientations
social construction of sexuality:
socially created definitions about the cultural appropriateness of sex-linkedbehavior which shape how people see and experience sexuality
biological determinism
the belief that men and women behave differently due to inherent sex differences related to their biology
double standard
the concept that prohibits premarital sexual intercourse for women but allows it for men
doing gender
the performance of tasks based upon the gender assigned to us by society and, in turn, ourselves
sexism
the prejudiced belief that one sex should be valued over another