SOC-101 Ch. 9 Constructing Gender and Sexuality

Gender

•Essentialists see gender as biological or genetic and believe that gender is: •a simple, two-category (binary) system •determined by your chromosomes, hormones, and genitalia •permanent and unchanging

The Women's Movement (cont'd.)

•1st wave: mid-19thC through 1920; focused on gaining suffrage for women •2nd wave: 1960s-1970s; focused on women's equal access to employment and education •3rd wave: 1980s-present; focused on diversity among women's experiences and identities

Sociological Theories of Gender Inequality: Conflict Theory

•Conflict theorists believe men have historically had access to most of society's material resources and privileges. Therefore, it is in their interest to try to maintain their dominant position.

Socialization, Gender, and Sexuality: Early Socialization

•Families are usually the primary source of socialization and greatly impact gender role socialization. •Social learning theory suggests that babies and children learn behaviors and meanings through social interaction and internalize the expectations of those around them.

The Women's Movement

•Feminism is the belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes and the social movements organized around that belief. • In the United States, the history of the women's movement can be divided into three historical waves.

Sociological Theories of Gender Inequality: Feminist Theory

•Feminist theorists apply assumptions about gender inequalities to social institutions to illuminate how gender inequality affects all areas of social life.

Gender, Sexuality, and Life Chances: Feminization of Poverty

•Feminization of poverty refers to the economic trend that women are more likely than men to live in poverty, due in part to the gendered gap in wages, the higher proportion of single mothers compared to single fathers, and the increasing cost of child care.

Sociological Theories of Gender Inequality: Functionalism

•Functionalists believe that there are social roles better suited to one gender than the other, and that societies are more stable when certain tasks are done by the appropriate sex. •According to Talcott Parsons: •Men are more suited for an instrumental role (the person who provides the family's material support and is often an authority figure). •Women are more suited for an expressive role (the person who provides the family's emotional support and nurturing).

Sex and Gender (cont'd.)

•Gender refers to the physical, behavioral, and personality traits that a group considers normal for its male and female members. •Gender identity refers to an individual's self-definition or sense of gender, while gender expression refers to an individual's behavioral manifestations of gender. •CIS GENDER- gender identity/expression aligns with the sex assigned at birth •TRANSGENDER- gender identity/expression is different than sex assigned at birth •GENDER NON-CONFORMING- gender identity/expression differs from societal expectations about gender roles

Socialization, Gender, and Sexuality

•Gender role socialization is the lifelong process of learning to be masculine or feminine, primarily through four main agents of socialization: families, schools, peers, and the media.

Socialization, Gender, and Sexuality: Peers

•In Western societies, peer groups are an important agent of socialization. •Teens are rewarded by peers when they conform to gender norms and stigmatized when they do not.

Sociological Theories of Gender Inequality: Interactionism

•Interactionists emphasize how the concept of gender is socially constructed, maintained, and reproduced in our everyday lives.

The Men's Movement

•Male liberationism originated in the 1970s to discuss the challenges of masculinity •Subsequently, the movement has split into the men's rights movement and the pro-feminist men's movement

Gender (cont'd.)

•Most sociologists use a constructionist approach and see sex, gender, and sexuality as social constructs, much like we see race as a social construct. •For instance, queer theorists emphasize the importance of difference and rejects ideas of innate identities or restrictive categories of gender and sexual identity •"Queer" has been used as a derogatory term, stigmatized then taken back by activists as term of power •Questions the assumption of heterosexuality •People have more complicated identities, including heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality and more...

Intersex : A person whose chromosome or sex characteristics are neither male nor exclusively female.

•Previously called "hermaphrodite", but this is not the preferred term anymore. •It is estimated that 17 babies in 1000 are born intersex. It's more common than you think! But since we tend to see sex in a binary of male or female, intersex people are characterized as a medical abnormality and surgically "corrected".

Socialization, Gender, and Sexuality: Schools

•Schools also socialize children into gender roles that accord with their sex. For instance, research shows that teachers treat boys and girls differently. This may teach children that there are different expectations of them, based on their sex.

Gender, Sexuality, and Life Chances

•Sex and gender affect almost every significant aspect of our lives. Even lifespan is different depending on sex!

Inequalities of Sex, Gender, and Sexuality

•Sex, gender, and sexuality are all bases of hierarchies of inequality in our society. •Homophobia is a fear of or discrimination toward homosexuals or toward individuals who display purportedly gender-inappropriate behavior. •Misogyny is an ingrained prejudice against women; dislike, contempt, or hatred of women. •Sexism, gender inequality, and homophobia can be found in past and present societies.

Sexuality and Sexual Orientation

•Sexual orientation is the inclination to be heterosexual (attracted to the opposite sex), homosexual (attracted to the same sex), or bisexual (attracted to either sex). Those who are asexual may simply reject any sexual identity at all.

Sex and Gender

•The terms sex and gender are often used interchangeably, but sociologists differentiate between the two. •Sex refers to an individual's membership in one of two biologically distinct categories—male or female. •Primary sex characteristics: biological factors, such as chromosomes, hormones, and reproductive organs, that distinguish males from females •Secondary sex characteristics: physical differences between males and females, including facial and body hair, musculature, and bone structure, that are unrelated to reproduction

Socialization, Gender, and Sexuality: Media

•There is no question that sex-role behavior is portrayed in a highly stereotypical manner in all forms of the media: television, movies, magazines, books, video games, and so on.

Gender, Sexuality, and Life Chances (cont'd.)

•Women are disadvantaged in institutional settings in our society. •Compared to men, women are more likely to: •do a disproportionate amount of housework. •earn less than their male peers at work. •live in poverty