Lecture 1: Introduction to Sex and Gender

Sex

Biological attributes/differences (chromosomes, reproductive/sexual anatomy)

• Little change over time

Gender

Socially constructed meaning we give to different groups of people

• gender ends up being how our society constructs our differences, which influences the arrangements of our society

Sex Differences

Biological/genetic attributes & differences between individuals

• a focus on difference between males and females using Darwin’s Theory of Evolution

Gender Polarization

The assumption that the genders are very different, extreme opposites, with very little overlap

Gender Identity

Internal personal experience and naming of OUR gender

Sexual Identity

Who you are attracted to

Gender Stereotype

Societal beliefs and attitudes about what is appropriate behaviours

• external

• constructed

Prescriptions

Things you SHOULD do

Proscriptions

Things you SHOULDN’T do

Consequences of Gender Stereotypes?

1. In how we think we should look

2. In how we think we should act

3. In how we spend our money

True or False: The traits societies assign to masculinity (or femininity) change over time and vary between cultures. We should expect gender to vary

Gender Differences Hypothesis

Predicts men and women are more different than similar

• leads to essentialism

Gender Similarities Hypothesis

Predicts men and women are more similar than different

Essentialism

• (as a group) All women & all men share certain individual experiences because of their biology (female vs male bodies/brains)

• what it means to be a man or woman is fixed by nature. Women are supposed to have one set of traits, men another

Are males and females more similar or more different from eachother?

Similar, because individuals exhibit a wide range of traits and behaviours

Gender Displays

Conventional portrayals of gender based on narrow stereotypes of femininity and masculinity

The Codes of Gender

• Making the invisible visible

• Goffman

• Helps us see how media images rely on narrow versions of gender

• What is presented to us as “natural” differences between men and women in the media are not actually “natural” but culturally constructed

Ritualization of Subordination

How female bodies are used to demonstrate the broader social idea of femininity in a subordinate position to men

• Female powerlessness, often shown laying down and vulnerable, on their knees, draped like objects

Canting Postures

• Body is tilted, places them off center

• Knee Bend gives sense that woman is grounded

• Posture being sexualized

• Head cant — head tilted, bent and angled.