Education And Vocational Achievements Of A School Cohort

Gender derives its formative meaning from culture and societal values, it is not a universal entity as there are various cultures, societal values, beliefs, and preferred ways of organizing collective life across the globe and even within a single culture the meaning of gender varies over time. Chapters three and four of Gendered Lives by Julia T. Wood helps to insightfully look at those views, and rhetorical movements (women and men’s movements) that have overtime influenced, defined and given various meanings to gender (masculinity and femininity).

Gender refers to the socially constructed categories of feminine and masculine. It is one of the major factors in social difference and inequality in today’s society. Gender inequality refers to unequal treatment or perceptions of individuals based on their gender. It arises from differences in socially constructed gender roles. Using a paragraph based approach I intend to individually analyse various aspects of gender differences referencing to the theory of socialisation and also making links to the works of Marx, Durkham and Goffman. My essay will cover different aspects of gender inequalities still present in today’s contemporary society.

Traditional gender roles (men performing instrumental tasks and women performing expressive tasks) are viewed as important not only for the individual but also for the economic and social order of society. Failure to maintain the traditional division of labor is believed to lead to destruction of family life as well as higher rates of crime, violence, and drug abuse. Human capital theorists claim that sex differences in promotion rates are due to sex differences in commitment, education, and experience; women are believed to have less to offer employers. Even if these differences exist, this position ignores the fact that women are in a system of inequality, where social expectations prevent them from having qualifications that are similar to men. The conflict perspective emphasizes men’s control over scarce resources. The gendered division of labor within families and in the workplace results from male control of and dominance over women and resources. Differentials between men and women may exist in terms of economic, political, physical, and/or interpersonal power. Men remain the head of household and control the property. Also, men gain power through their predominance in the most highly paid and prestigious occupations and the highest elected offices. Liberal/Equal Rights Feminists – seek equal access for females within the current social system; focus is on equality of opportunity (e.g., civil rights and occupational equality). Radical/Transformative Feminists –

Gender roles describe the normative expectations of a culture group regarding the position that both sexes should hold in society. It also refers to the division of labor tasks, differences in behaviors, preferences, abilities; personalities that society expects of specific genders, (Kaiser, C. R., & Miller, C. T. 2009). It concerns the processes of how gender roles socialize and interact with each other in society as a whole and as an individual, (Stockard & Johnson, 1980; Thomas, 1986). Gender role deals with identity and at times are conceptualized as the acceptance and identification with social roles and behaviors associated with

Nancy Krieger defines gender as cultural agreements, social constructs, behaviors, roles, and relations that occur between men and women (Krieger, 2003). Gender is an important social determinant because the social constructs of gender give a good snapshot of what we value in today’s society. In society we expect men to be the “bread-winners” in the relationship because men are viewed as the more superior gender, and in the United States money is valued therefore the bread-winner is too.

The process of gender socialization reveals much about how gender identities are formed, but gender is not just a matter of identity: Gender is embedded in social institutions. This means that institutions are patterned by gender, resulting in different experiences and opportunities for men and women. The concept of the term “gendered institutions” means that entire institutions are patterned by gender. In a gendered institution, men and women are channeled into different, and often differently valued, social spaces or activities and their choices have different and often unequal consequences. Gendered institutions are the total pattern of gender relations, which includes the following (Acker 1992): stereotypical expectations, interpersonal relationships, and the division of labor along lines of gender. As well as, the images and symbols that support these divisions and the different placement of men and women in social, economic, and political hierarchies of institutions.

“The social construction of gender comes out of the general school of thought entitled social constructionism. Social constructionism proposes that everything people "know" or see as "reality" is partially, if not entirely, socially situated. To say that something is socially constructed does not mitigate the power of the concept. These basic theories of social constructionism can be applied to any issue of study pertaining to human life, including gender. This is

According to feminists the socialisation process functioning in the family and away encouraged females to accept the traditional gender roles which rooted female difficulty in the private domestic sphere and in the public sphere of employment and political and social life. Nevertheless, because these gender roles were socially constructed rather than biologically strongminded they could be changed by various political and economic strategies and the improvements in female educational and employment opportunities which happened from the 1980s forwards welcomed as indications of reduced gender inequality and not as flying in the face of human nature as was implied in biologically based arguments. (sociology tutorials, 2016)

The term gender refers to the characteristics of a person despite the person’s biological sex. Gender role, which is the focus of sociologists, is the anticipated attitude and behavior that a certain society connects with each sex. With this definition, gender is placed evenly in the sociocultural context. Events that previously occurred had a vital impact on gender roles. Due to this, the study of gender emerged as one of the significant disciplines in the field of sociology in the twentieth century. The gender issues were studied using various research and theory. The research on gender issues provided a testament that all social interactions that occur, and the institutions where they occur, are gendered in one way or the other. Sociologists explain gender roles with respect to various theoretical perspectives. The perspectives are the ways of perceiving social reality that guide the process of research and provide a method for understanding the data. The sociological perspectives on gender roles include functionalism, conflict theory, symbolic interaction, and feminist sociological theory (pearsonhighered.com).

Gender inequality is a social problem that is widespread in society. It is referred to as the unfair treatment of individuals based on one 's gender. Historically, laws have opposed women to go to school, access certain jobs, and purchase property. Gender inequality has been experience through culture – honor-killing, sex-selective abortion, and society – occupation, gender roles, and education. The social expectations of men and women differ between cultures that are constructed socially and culturally. These expectations are displayed in roles, and behavior believed both by men and women and their interdependent relationships. Gender inequality can be further understood through the structure of sexism. Discrimination takes place in gender inequality for the reason that men and women are treated on the basis of gender alone (Amjad, R., Ashfaq, M., Kousar, R., Saghir, A., 2010).

Social status and structures have definitely shaped the construction and experience of gender inequality. Men and women are constantly analyzed, compared, and grouped together in society. The result of this yields discrepancies in how sexes are viewed by society. Throughout my examination and explanation of gender inequality, I concluded both men and women are victims to gender inequality.

Gender is a learned social construction on what you do. It is a cultural system based on the binary opposition of men and women but there are also variations

The concept of gender denotes the distinction between culturally driven and created roles of masculinity and femininity. These specific and normalized attitudes and behaviors transcend and effect how differently men and women live their lives. Based on society’s continual re-enforcement of such gender stereotypes, we see an on-going dilemma of gender inequality. Though some may argue that men experience gender inequality, this seems to exist on a much more invasive level for women. As of recently, the awareness of gender inequality in the workplace has increased. With the fight for equal pay and equal respect, society is already making strides towards the equality of women. With that being said, one aspect of gender inequality that seems

It is only recently that sociology has begun to explore the topic of gender. Before this, inequalities within society were based primarily on factors such as social class and status. This paper will discuss gender itself: what makes us who we are and how we are represented. It will also explore discrimination towards women throughout history, focusing mainly on women and the right to vote, inequalities between males and females in the work place and how gender is represented in the media.

The two themes that need to be discussed in order to explain gender differences are difference and inequality. Difference is how men and women are differentiated. It is the way social relationships, processes and institutions distinguish between men and women that sociologists are interested in. also how them processes “create meanings about femininity and masculinity” (Marsh and Keating, 2003 p.265). Inequality refers to the way gender distinctions and inequalities are linked together, as well as power relations and hierarchy. Sociologists are trying to determine whether inequalities between men and women are due to social distinctions (Marsh and Keating, 2003). Feminist sociologists argue that women experience a drawback