Gender in World Cultures Midterm

4B Movement

a radical feminist and lifestyle movement that originated in South Korea around 2015.

The name comes from four Korean words that all start with the prefix bi- (비/非), which means "no" or "non": [1, 2]

• Bihon (비혼): No heterosexual marriage.

• Bichulsan (비출산): No childbirth.

• Biyeonae (비연애): No dating men.

• Bisekseu (비섹스): No heterosexual sex.

4 Waves of Feminism

First-wave feminism: Legal rights, property ownership, access to education, and women's suffrage (the right to vote).

Second-wave feminism: Workplace equality, reproductive rights, sexuality, domestic violence, and dismantling systemic patriarchy.

Third-wave feminism: Individualism, sex-positivity, challenging rigid gender stereotypes, and intersectionality (how race, class, and gender overlap).

Fourth-wave feminism: Digital and social media mobilization, combating sexual harassment and assault, trans-inclusive equity, and holding powerful figures accountable.

Agency

The capacity of individuals to act independently, make choices, and influence or resist powerful social structures. 

NOTE: Mahmood (2001) modifies the definition: “Agency… not only … the capacity for progressive change [resistance?] but also, importantly, as the capacity to endure, suffer, and persist” (p. 217) 

Asexuality

a sexual orientation where a person experiences little to no sexual attraction to other people.

Binary Opposition

the system of language and/or thought by which two theoretical opposites are strictly defined and set off against one another

Bio-Essentialism

the belief (system) that human behavior, identity, and traits are completely fixed by biological sex or genetics and cannot change.

Biopolitics

the way governments and political systems manage, control, and influence human life, bodies, and populations

Charmed Circle

A conceptual diagram introduced by cultural anthropologist Gayle Rubin in her foundational 1984 essay, "Thinking Sex.” The concept illustrates how Western societies evaluate sexual acts and desires through a strict moral hierarchy. This system divides sexual behavior into what is considered "good, normal, natural, and blessed" versus what is deemed "bad, abnormal, unnatural, and damned.

Cultural Determinism

The belief that the culture you grow up in shapes your entire personality, behavior, values, and choices rather than your biology or genes (aka constructivism)

Cultural Relativism

The idea that cultural values and beliefs should be understood in their cultural context and not judged by outside standards

DHSM

(Default Heterosexual Sado-Masochism)
A conceptual framework created by Natalie Wynn (Contrapoints 2024) used to analyze power dynamics in romance and traditional heterosexual desire

Domino Theory of Sexual Peril

A concept introduced by cultural anthropologist Gayle Rubin in her foundational 1984 essay, "Thinking Sex” describing the belief that allowing one supposedly “deviant” sexual practice will inevitably lead to acceptance of increasingly dangerous or immoral practices. In this logic, sexual boundaries must be strictly policed because crossing one boundary is imagined to threaten the entire moral and social order.

Embodiment

How an abstract idea, feeling, or social rule is lived, expressed, and experienced through a physical human body. Instead of the mind and body being separate, embodiment treats them as one connected reality where culture and history leave physical marks.

Ethnocentrism

The practice of judging and measuring other cultures by the standards, values, and norms of one's own culture, often with the belief that one's own group is superior

False Consciousness

A way of thinking that prevents a person from perceiving the true nature of their social (or economic) situation. A theory developed by Karl Marx to help us examine larger structural inequality. 

NOTE: Mahmood (2001) asks us to slow down the instinct to jump to this conclusion, and instead make it a point of inquiry. 

FGC vs. FGM

FGM (Female Genital Mutilation): The term used primarily by international human rights bodies (like the World Health Organization) and legal systems (including the U.S. government) to emphasize that the practice is a severe violation of human rights, physical integrity, and child protection.

FGC (Female Genital Cutting): A term frequently preferred by grassroots organizations, community-led education groups (such as Tostan), and some researchers. It is considered less accusatory or value-laden, which helps open non-combative dialogues with practicing communities without immediately causing defensiveness or shutting down communication

Genderbread Person

An educational graphic and visual model shaped like a gingerbread cookie that breaks down the different concepts of gender and sexuality.

Gender Unicorn

The diagram breaks down human identity into distinct spectrums rather than a rigid binary:

Gender Identity: One's internal, deeply felt sense of being male, female, neither of these, both, or another gender.

Gender Expression / Presentation: How a person physically manifests their gender through clothing, hairstyle, body shape, voice, and mannerisms.

Sex Assigned at Birth: The biological classification (male, female, intersex, or other) usually assigned at birth based on external anatomy, hormones, and chromosomes.

Physically Attracted To: Who a person feels sexual or physical attraction toward (sexual orientation).

Emotionally Attracted To: Who a person feels romantic, emotional, or spiritual attraction toward (romantic orientation).

Intersex

An umbrella term for people born with reproductive or sexual anatomy, chromosomes, or hormones that do not fit the typical definitions of male or female.

[previously called "hermaphrodite," a term that is no longer used  (as of 2005ish) and now considered to be a slur]

Mati Work

A culturally specific practice among working-class Afro-Surinamese women involving flexible same-sex relationships and mutual support. (subject of Wekker, 2008)

Mother Culture

In social philosophy—specifically popularized by author Daniel Quinn in his 1992 novel Ishmael— "Mother Culture" is a personification of the invisible, collective cultural narrative that whispers to us from birth. It tells us how the world is supposed to work, what is "good," and what is "normal".

Performativity

The capacity of speech, actions, and social behaviors to actively create or bring into being the very things they name, rather than simply describing them

So in terms of gender, Butler (1988) describes gender as something we do rather than something we are. The doing thus creates the category (meaning) of gender: “The body becomes its gender through a series of acts which are renewed, revised, and consolidated through time” (p.523)

Positionality

How your personal social background, identity, and life experiences shape your view of the world and influence your work

Reflexivity

The process of examining one's own beliefs, biases, and role in a situation, recognizing that the observer or actor actively shapes what is being observed or done

Resistance

The ways individuals and marginalized groups protest, challenge, or undermine systems of power, authority, and inequality that oppress them

Sex/Gender Systems

A concept (coined by Gayle Rubin in 1984) to describe the set of social arrangements by which a society transforms biological sexuality into human activity and cultural products

Social Construct

A concept that exists not in objective reality but as a result of human interaction. Put another way, it exists because humans agree that it exists.

Abu-Lughod (2002) - Muslim Veiling

Veiling has different meanings depending on cultural and personal context, including faith, identity, and belonging. Abu-Lughod challenges Western assumptions that Muslim women need to be “saved” from their culture.

Ahmadi (2016) - Hymenoplasty in Iran

Women use hymen reconstruction to navigate strict expectations of premarital virginity. The procedure can be a form of quiet resistance, allowing women to exercise sexual agency while still operating within restrictive gender norms.

Ahmadu (2009) - FGC autoethnography

Drawing on her own experience and cultural background, Ahmadu challenges Western portrayals of female genital cutting, emphasizing cultural context and women’s perspectives. She argues against assuming all affected women experience sexuality or the practice in the same way.

Butler (1988)- Performativity

Gender is produced through repeated actions and behaviors that make cultural expectations of masculinity and femininity appear natural.

Chasin (2015) - Asexuality

Asexuality challenges assumptions that everyone experiences sexual attraction and that sexuality is a universal, fixed experience.

CLS (Claude Levi-Strauss) - Binary oppositions

Humans organize and understand the world through opposing categories, such as nature/culture and male/female.

Dean (2009) - Barebacking in SF

Examines how some gay men who engage in condomless sex assign meanings of intimacy, risk, desire, and community to semen and sexual practices.

Donham (1998) - Male-Male Relationships in Soweto

Explores how same-sex relationships and sexual identities are shaped by local cultural expectations, gender roles, and social circumstances.

Fausto-Sterling (2000) - Intersex infants

Critiques the medical practice of surgically assigning intersex infants to binary sex categories, showing how cultural beliefs influence medical decisions about bodies.

Gottlieb (2020) - Menstration

Examines menstrual taboos across cultures and challenges the assumption that menstruation is universally understood as dirty or shameful.

Govindrajan (2018) - Indian female desire

Explores how female desire is shaped by cultural expectations, relationships, and social hierarchies in India.

Greenhalgh (2012) - War on Fat

Examines how obesity becomes a medical and political issue, showing how weight is linked to ideas about health, morality, and social responsibility.

Guevedoce - Testicles at 12 [Video in class]

Explores a community in the Dominican Republic where some children with a specific variation in sex development experience significant genital changes at puberty, challenging binary assumptions about sex.

Herdt (1994) - Sambia [Video in class]

Examines initiation rituals and cultural beliefs about masculinity and male sexuality among the Sambia of Papua New Guinea.

Jarrin (2017) - Cosmetics in Brazil

Explores how cosmetic procedures and beauty practices in Brazil connect bodies to social status, race, gender, and inequality.

Khan (2000) - Jewish Sperm Banks

Examines how sperm donation raises questions about Jewish identity, ancestry, kinship, and the meaning of biological fatherhood.

Lee & Jeong (2021) - 4B Movement

Discusses a South Korean feminist movement in which women reject dating, sex, marriage, and childbirth with men as resistance to patriarchy.

Mahmood (2001) - Egyptian Islam Movement

Examines how women participate in an Islamic piety movement, challenging Western feminist assumptions that religious devotion necessarily means female submission.

Martin (1991) - Egg/Sperm

Shows how scientific descriptions of reproduction reflect cultural gender stereotypes, portraying eggs as passive and sperm as active.

Monaghan & Just (2000) - bee larvae and onion soup

Explores how classification and cultural assumptions shape how people understand biological categories and everyday foods or organisms.

Ortner 1974 - Nature/culture

Argues that women are often symbolically associated with nature and men with culture, helping explain the cultural justification of gender inequality.

Radiolab (2022) - Normman & Norma

Explores how scientific research and cultural expectations shape ideas about sex differences and what counts as a normal body.

Rubin (2011) - Sex/gender system, Domino theory, Charmed circle

Explains how societies organize sexuality through gender norms and hierarchies that distinguish socially approved sex from stigmatized sexual practices.

Wekker (2007) - Mati Work

Examines mati relationships between women in Suriname, challenging Western assumptions that same-sex intimacy must correspond to a fixed lesbian identity.

Wynn 2024 - Contrapoints: Twilight [Video outside of class]

Analyzes Twilight through themes of desire, romance, gender, and cultural fantasies, exploring what popular media reveals about sexuality and relationships.