Analyzing Kate Mcmullan's 'If You Were My Bunny'

Feminine characteristics are thought to be intrinsic to the female facility for childbirth and breast-feeding. Hence, it is popularly believed that the social position of females is biologically mandated to be intertwined with the care of children and a 'natural' dependency on men for the maintenance of mother-child units."

Many live under the assumption that those who come to the United States want to become Americanized and assimilate to the melting pot our culture has formed into. This is the populations ethnocentric belief, which is the belief that the ways of one’s culture are superior to the ways of a different culture, that wants others to melt into the western ways. In Ann Faidman’s The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Faidman fails to completely remain objective when demonstrating how cross-cultural misunderstandings create issues in the healthcare field, specifically between the Hmong and western cultures that created dire consequences between the Lee’s and their American doctors. Faidman uses her connections with the Hmong and the doctors who cared for them in order to disclose the different views, beliefs and practices the Hmong and Western cultures practiced. With her attempt to be culturally relative to the situation, Faidman discusses the series of events and reasons as to why the Lee’s faced the fate that they did and how it parallels to the ethnocentrism in the health care system.

However, the boys were viewed as “that’s just how boys are”. The gender roles were clearly reflected within out household. Boys had the expectations of getting a good job and provide for their family when they married. Girls were to get married, cook/clean and maintain the household, take care of the children and always remember that they were the moral compass of the family unit.

In this session, I will discuss the gender roles in my family. The definition of gender role is the degree to which a person adopts the gender-specific behaviors ascribed by his or her culture (Matsumoto, D. R., & Juang 2013, 156). For example, traditional gender roles recommend that males are aggressive, angry, and unemotional. It goes further and explains that the male should leave the home every day to make a living and be the main wage earner. The traditional gender role for the female purpose is to stay at home and care for the children. It explains that the female is to be nurturing, caring, and emotional (Matsumoto, D. R., & Juang 2013, 156). These traditional roles for female and male are the opposite of one another. It is believed that the culture is likely to influence our perception about gender role in a family. In my family, my parents utilize the traditional gender role. Growing up, my father went to work every day and my mother stayed home with me and my sister. I believe my parents were influence by their parents and their culture to be traditional gender role parents. My father explained to me that they chose traditional parenting role because both sides of the family utilized traditional parenting gender roles. I believe my parents felt pressure to obtain the gender roles of the mother staying home with the children while the father worked. However, when my younger sister was old enough to go to school, my mother started to work. It was believed that when

In this story, Carolina and Savvie are sisters that can't be apart from each other. “I will Follow you” by Roxane Gay follows a story about these two girls that have lived a very difficult life and all they have is each other, they keep thinking back and forth about their very traumatic past as little as ten and eleven years old. Savvie and Carolina were kidnapped and molested, after six weeks of them being kidnapped by this perpetrator, they try to maintain a normal life but they keep getting flashbacks. When the perpetrator (Mr.Peter) returns to their lives he sends a letter from prison to the girls and asks them for forgiveness. These girls are put to the hardest test, will they let Mr.Peter still take advantage of them after they are

In a society filled with gender stereotypes, children often adopt gender roles as they move from childhood to adolescence because of the many factors that influence their views to the point they will deny certain roles because it does not fit the gender bias. During the early years, boys and girls will usually be drawn towards gender specific activities. Playing house for example, they little boy will imitate going to work, while the little girl will imitate cooking in the kitchen and playing with the baby doll. Gender stereotypes are embedded in our culture as a social identity giving “norms” to how gender is defined. This paper is going to discuss the child’s earliest exposure to gender roles in the home from clothing, toys and expectations to society’s role in gender bias on early childhood development.

Once a child is born, he or she learns to view the world based on the behaviors of others. The child’s primary caregivers, usually the parents, and others present in the child’s environment, such as siblings, peers, teachers, and even the media, contribute to the development of the child’s perception of himself, those around him, and society overall. This concept is called socialization. “The way we are, behave and think is the final product of socialization” and it is through socialization that we “learn what is appropriate and improper for both genders” (Crespi, 2004). This concept of gender socialization leads to the inescapable

In the world of toy marketing, choices are made with direction put in place for both genders (girl and boy). For example, as I walked down each toy aisle, I felt the gender conformity among the parents as they were with their children. With multiple aisles and two dominant colors (pink and purple) designated for girls, the message (in my perspective) marketed on the toy package yelled: “Your ambition is to be stylish, while a nurturing mother who partakes in domestic works!” In addition to the toy packages being in pink, the words (on the toy) were predominately frivolous and amusing. On the contrary, the boys’ aisle contained wide varieties of colors, although the color blue caught my eye the most. The boys’ toys entailed sports, building sets, as well as action figures. Conversely, the message in my perspective, marketed on the toy package screamed: “You have the power to do whatever you want; however, it is imperative that you build yourself physically, as well as train yourself in order to properly excel.” This type of act, referred to as the social role theory—“a gender difference that mainly results from the contrasting roles of females and males” (p.165),—gives a great cause of difference in gender regarding power, nurture, and

Sandra Bem’s book, The Lenses of Gender, discusses the three lenses of gender: androcentrism, gender polarization and biological essentialism. The first sense of gender Sandra touches on is androcentrism, which is the idea that men create the standard for society and females do not meet the standard. The most important concept in this reading is the idea that women are naturally given the caregiver role because they bear children. This is important because men are given the responsibility of defending the family and collecting food, “because they were bigger and stronger and also because they did not have their mobility limited by the continuous presence of children” (Bem, 1993, p. 31). The significance of this is that it seems to be the biggest

The way, in which gender roles are portrayed in children’s literature, significantly contributes to the development of children’s gender roles and how they are perceived by society.

A significant point in Bems’ (1993) chapter in Lens of Gender on gender identity was the concept of the self-fulfilling prophecy when it comes to the treatment and development of young boys and girls in society. The first point discussed is how the ‘maternal instinct’ is not so biological as much it is women being confined to the private sphere, in turn having the most interaction with children. This point stood out as I was reading because I have known from a young age I did not want children. Many told me that my opinion would change when I grew older, and when you have your own child being a mother comes naturally. As I reflected I was reminded of the point later made by Bem (1993) that “adults in the child’s community

Sharon Begley bring to light that many of the studies claiming sex differences within the human brain have been falsified. Many of these types of studies depict things that separate people of different genders into stereotypical depictions of gender roles. Gender roles and expectations can have negative impacts on parenting and growth development. The point that I found both interesting and important is how adults treat and or classify infants before the infant has self-recognition of their own gender identity. It never truly occurred to me that adults are mostly responsible with how children perceive their own gender. Beginning with gender conformity, I found the results regarding doll preference to trucks very interesting. Children have been

1016) even from a young age little girls are expected to act motherly or at least become familiar with the kind, modest, motherly attitude. A prime example of this is children’s toys particularly baby dolls. Baby dolls teach young girls the stereotypical motherly role. Girls are taught how to take care of and care for something like a mother does with her child. For example, baby dolls nowadays are made to urinate so the child can actually change their diaper. Young girls can talk to the baby, bathe them, all things a mother is expected to do in today’s stereotypical, ideal, gender role, influenced

Gender should not be intertwined with the term sex, which refers to the physical differences in individuals. Instead, gender is the idea of being male or female, and it is well understood by the time children reach the preschool years. Differences in gender become more pronounced as children age, and societal expectations are reinforced by parents and peers. Behavioral differences may be evident since parents may treat their child differently according to gender. A big example of this is how parents may react to a child’s first

To start with gender roles I would like to explain a little more what results the research come up with. Firstly, the typical gender roles in the 1963 edition were the “old”, conservative stereotyping of sexes. Probably the most striking example for this can be found in the kitchen of the “rabbit house”. In the 1963 edition it is only mother rabbit that is standing at the stove in the kitchen, stating the stereotypical role of a woman, to do the housework. However, in the 1991 edition the image had been revised. It is not only the household equipment that has been renewed, but father rabbit appears with mother rabbit in the kitchen as well. Moreover he is there to help in preparing for breakfast, so now the male member of the