Choices in Relationships

1
Choices in Relationships

• Chapter Two Gender in Relationships

2
Terminology of Gender Roles

• Sex
• Gender
• Gender identity
• Gender roles
• Gender role ideology

• Gender dysphoria
• Transgenderism
• Transgendered
• Cross-dresser
• Transsexuals

3
Theories of Gender Role Development

• Sociobiology
• Emphasizes that social behavior and therefore
  gender roles have a biological basis in terms of
  being functional in human evolution.
• 2. Social Learning
• Derived from the school of behavioral psychology,
  social learning theory emphasizes the roles of
  reward and punishment in explaining how a child
  learns gender role behavior.

4
Theories of Gender Role Development

• 3. Identification
• Children acquire the characteristics and
  behaviors of their same-sex parent through a
  process of identification.
• 4. Cognitive-Developmental Theory
• The cognitive-developmental theory of gender role
  development reflects a blend of biological and
  social learning views. According to this theory,
  the biological readiness, in terms of cognitive
  development, of the child influences how the
  child responds to gender cues in the environment

5
Agents of Socialization

• Different sources influencing your gender
  socialization
• Family
• Race/Ethnicity
• Peers
• Religion
• Education
• Economy
• Mass Media

6
Gender Roles in Other Societies

• Gender Roles of Women in Afghanistan under the
  Taliban
• Afghan women go uneducated, become child brides,
  produce children, and rarely expect their
  daughters lives to be different.
• Gender Roles among Chinese-Americans
• As a result of immigration, industrialization,
  and urbanization, gender roles of
  Chinese-Americans have become more egalitarian.
• Both women and men are now breadwinners, which
  has resulted in the downward shift of the
  husbands occupational status with more sharing
  of housework.

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Gender Roles in Other Societies

• Gender Roles in Punjab, Pakistan
• Pakistani women reported that they had limited
  control over their lives, as evidenced by the
  expectation of early marriage, quick conception,
  and limited access to contraceptives.
• The women also expressed a strong preference for
  sons, which reflected womens subordinate
  position in society.

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Gender Roles in Other Societies

• Gender Roles in Sweden
• The Swedish government is strongly concerned with
  equality between women and men.
• In 1974 Sweden became the first country in the
  world to introduce a system that enables mothers
  and fathers to share parental leave (paid by the
  government) from their jobs in any way they
  choose.

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Gender Roles in Other Societies

• Gender Roles in Africa
• Many African women who believe in and desire
  better lives will not call themselves feminists
  for fear of social censure.
• Change for people whose lives are based on
  tradition and fitting in can be very traumatic.

10
Consequences of Traditional Gender Role
Socialization
11
Consequences of Traditional Gender Role
Socialization

• The Feminization of Poverty
• The term feminization of poverty refers to the
  disproportionate percentage of poverty
  experienced by women living alone or with their
  children.
• Single mothers are particularly associated with
  poverty.

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Consequences of Traditional Gender Role
Socialization

• The Feminization of Poverty
• The process is cyclicalpoverty contributes to
  teenage pregnancy, since teens have limited
  supervision and few alternatives to parenthood.
• Such early childbearing interferes with
  educational advancement and restricts their
  earning capacity, which keeps them in poverty.
  Their offspring are born into poverty, and the
  cycle begins anew.

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Consequences of Traditional Gender Role
Socialization
14
Female Genital Mutilation

• The reason for the practice is culturalparents
  believe that female circumcision makes their
  daughters marketable for marriage.
• Many daughters view it as a rite of passage and
  of improving their chance for marriage.

15
Consequences of Traditional Male Role
Socialization
16
Changing Gender Roles

• Androgyny
• Androgyny refers to a blend of traits that are
  stereotypically associated with both masculinity
  and femininity.
• Positive androgyny is devoid of the negative
  traits associated with masculinity (aggression,
  hard-heartedness, indifference, selfishness,
  showing off, and vindictiveness) and femininity
  (being passive, submissive, temperamental, and
  fragile).

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Changing Gender Roles

• Gender Role Transcendence
• Although females are becoming more masculine, in
  part because our society values whatever is
  masculine, men are not becoming more feminine.

18
Changing Gender Roles

• Gender Postmodernism
• Gender postmodernism - whereby there would be a
  dissolution of male and female categories as
  currently conceptualized in Western capitalist
  society.
• A new conceptualization of trans people would
  call for new social structures based on the
  principles of equality, diversity and the right
  to self determination.