Day one,
As you know I am a very busy college student with classes, extra circulars, homework, friends, and a boyfriend. This week though in my gender and society class we talked about primary and secondary groups. We also talked about doing gender and how gender structures interactions. In the next few days I will be looking and analyzing how these things work in my every day life. But for today I want to explain these few things and how they work or are looked at in society.
In this I am going to make a definition for each one of the three words by looking at our textbook for the class "Gender: Ideas, Interactions, and Institutions" and my lecture notes. What I got for Primary groups is that it is a small intimate group of people that spends a great deal of time together and also play a role in developing a personal identity. A great example of this is Family. Then what I got for Secondary groups where that they are larger than primary groups, temporary/seasonal, there is not an intimate aspect of it, and they normally have one or two goals. An example
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The biggest thing was that gender socialization in through out your whole life. I thought that at a certain age it would stop. As a college student I have the majority of my gender identity but as I get older and experience new things I keep adding gender norms to develop more of my gender identity. Another thing I realized was that my actions when I 'm with my sister verse my boyfriend are completely different. I am absolutely strange and break a lot of gender norms when I 'm with my sisters. When I am with my boyfriend and we are out we break gender norms as a couple. Individually though we do not break gender norms. All I can say is that from now on I think I will always be aware of gender norms after this exercise especially my own. Now this does not necessarily mean I will change I just will be more awake whether or not I am obeying or breaking gender
“Boys will be boys, and girls will be girls”: few of our cultural mythologies seem as natural as this one. But in this exploration of the gender signals that traditionally tell what a “boy” or “girl” is supposed to look and act like, Aaron Devor shows how these signals are not “natural” at all but instead are cultural constructs. While the classic cues of masculinity—aggressive posture, self-confidence, a tough appearance—and the traditional signs of femininity—gentleness, passivity, strong nurturing instincts—are often considered “normal,” Devor explains that they are by no means biological or psychological necessities. Indeed, he suggests, they can be richly mixed and varied, or to paraphrase the old Kinks song “Lola,” “Boys can be girls and girls can be boys.” Devor is dean of social sciences at the University of Victoria and author of Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits of Duality (1989), from which this selection is excerpted, and FTM: Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society (1997).
Suggested roles of all types set the stage for how human beings perceive their life should be. Gender roles are one of the most dangerous roles that society faces today. With all of the controversy applied to male vs. female dominance in households, and in the workplace, there seems to be an argument either way. In the essay, “Men as Success Objects”, the author Warren Farrell explains this threat of society as a whole. Farrell explains the difference of men and women growing up and how they believe their role in society to be. He justifies that it doesn’t just appear in marriage, but in the earliest stages of life. Similarly, in the essay “Roles of Sexes”, real life applications are explored in two different novels. The synthesis between these two essays proves how prevalent roles are in even the smallest part of a concept and how it is relatively an inevitable subject.
As Carol Brady said, “You mustn’t let the boys upset you.” The establishment of groups, in the society, occurred since the civilization began. Some examples of the groups formed are groups of men and women, rich and poor, and between coworkers. However, the common differences occur between the groups of men and women. Individuals of the society define masculinity and femininity as what they were taught while growing up, either by their family, friends, or television.
Society places ideas concerning proper behaviors regarding gender roles. Over the years, I noticed that society's rules and expectations for men and women are very different. Men have standards and specific career goals that we must live up to according to how others judge.
When you mention gender roles in society the first thing that comes to mind usually are stereotypes, or the set labels that society has established on how everyone acts based on the different biological, social, and cultural categories they fit into. Throughout history these stereotypes that pertain to genders roles in society have been proven true. Gender roles refer to a behavioral and social norms that are widely accepted for people of a certain sex. In this report I will discussing the gender roles of the two most recognized types of gender, man and woman, from the perspective of a man and a woman who have lived 65+ years. I will also discuss how those roles have influenced society and how they have changed gradually over the years.
Sexual violence is sometimes thought of as a natural part of life. That men have an inherit biological trait that predisposes them to violence and that it cannot be helped. The famous quote is “boys will be boys” meaning that men have no control over their actions and that if they sexual assault someone, that it is just human nature. This is in fact false. There is nothing in the biological makeup of males that can explain away sexual violence. It is a learned cultural behavior generated by gender norms and the medias perpetuation of sexual violence.
Since the beginning of time men have played the dominant role in nearly every culture around the world. If the men were not dominant, then the women and men in the culture were equal. Never has a culture been found where women have dominated. In “Society and Sex Roles” by Ernestine Friedl, Friedl supports the previous statement and suggests that “although the degree of masculine authority may vary from one group to the next, males always have more power” (261). Friedl discusses a variety of diverse conditions that determine different degrees of male dominance focusing mainly on the distribution of resources. In The Forest People by Colin Turnbull, Turnbull describes the culture of the BaMbuti while incorporating the evident sex roles among these “people of the forest”. I believe that the sex roles of the BaMbuti depicted by Turnbull definitely follow the pattern that is the basis of Freidl’s arguments about the conditions that determine variations of male dominance. Through examples of different accounts of sex roles of the BaMbuti and by direct quotations made by Turnbull as well as members of the BaMbuti tribe, I intend on describing exactly how the sex roles of the BaMbuti follow the patterns discussed by Freidl. I also aim to depict how although women are a vital part of the BaMbuti culture and attain equality in many areas of the culture, men still obtain a certain degree of dominance.
Activities, interactions, and responsibilities are assigned to classes, such as Wife, Handmaid, Martha, or Angel, and there is little to no overlap between the classes. Gender roles are much less specific in today’s society, but gender roles do exist. West and Zimmerman’s “Doing Gender” explains what some of these gender roles are. People assume facts about people to be true based on the gender that they are; a man is automatically assumed to be a good leader while a woman is usually considered bossy when they work together. A baby dressed in pink is always a girl and is a “sweet princess” but a baby dressed in blue is obviously a boy and is told that he is “strong” and “a fighter”.
Very few novels in American Literature can earn the title of timeless. These novels transcend the ages, because they possess a greater meaning. Their stories teach people about life, the glory of the human soul, and all it can endure to overcome. Three novels in particular get to the very heart of feminine struggle. Though they touch not on women’s struggle to vote, they reach the higher plain of women’s struggle to be seen as who they are and not what society wants them to be. To Kill a Mockingbird, The Color Purple and The Bluest Eye all deal with the topic of women trying to overcome society. Although these novels were written in the mid to later half of the twentieth century, they go back to a time when the Great Depression was touching all walks of human life. Each of the main characters in these novels does not fit society’s view of femininity during the time period. Although the main characters in the three stories do not fit society’s idea of femininity, they each, in their own way, overcome this and show a greater beauty of strength.
Once I learned a little more on gender expectations I began to realize how glad I was that I never was forced to follow them. When I got to middle school gender roles hit an ultimate high throughout my peers. So many people were using them that I got stuck in the expectation of what girls were supposed to follow. I
Without gender, a child may not be able to integrate into society as easy as other children, feeling a sense of disorientation and misplacement. Identity is strongly correlated to the cultural beliefs and social contexts of society, hence affecting gender, since gender is something that is everywhere in our daily lives. Gender entails cultural beliefs at a marco level and also includes the systems of behavior and organizational practices at the interactional level, selves and identities at the individual level (Ridgeway & Correll 2004). According to Ridgeway and Correll (2004), cultural beliefs about gender and their effects in social relational contexts are among the main principles that maintain and change the gender structure. Social relational contexts involve any situation where individuals define themselves in relation to others to understand the situation and act in an everyday interaction. Symbolic interactionism places a lot of significance on the salient of language and social interactions as main features of the development of a sense of self, viewing society not as an external constitution but rather the result of a patterned web of interactions where people interact in countless settings using symbolic communications, and the reality people experience constantly changes (Germov & Poole 2011). According to Stryker and Vryan (2003), symbolic
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.
Secondary groups sometimes don’t need to have face-to-face interaction because of social network, which are held together by ties. As stated by Charles Horton Cooley, “secondary groups are groups marked by impersonal, instrumental relationships, those existing as a means to an end” (Cooley 159). Secondary groups are larger than primary groups because secondary groups are people that do not have a personal relationship, and their involvement is temporary. For an example, a colleague is a secondary group because one may spend time together at work, but they interact on a less personal
Gender is an important aspect of our social life; it comprises of power relations, the division of labour, symbolic forms and emotional relations (Connel, 2000).
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.