Gender And Gender Roles

Your _____ depends on whether you were born with distinct male or female genitals and a genetic program that released either male or female hormones to stimulate the development of your reproductive system.

In many shops, there seems to be an obvious separation between boys and girls items, for example, the birthday cards, books, clothes, and toys. This is shown in a variety of ways the boy's items are mainly the color blue and the books have pictures of either action figures, superheroes or tools. Whereas the girl's items are mainly the color pink. The books show pictures of fairies, princess, and Bratz. The cards also have the theme of the color pink for girls and blue for boys. The girl's cards have a lot of sparkles and pretty pictures whereas the boy's cards are covered in camo kind of illustrations and also have action figures on the covers. The children's clothes are separated into sections where there are labels for the boy's clothes and labels for the girl's clothes. The girl's clothing is all pretty and pink, it is covered in sparkles. Whereas boys clothing has camo patterns, blue colors, and pictures of action figures.

When a person is born, they are either male or female. Before they are born, their parents are going to set goals and expectations for them. Sometimes parents will name their child after a famous celebrity hoping they will be just as great as them. Each gender will have different ways they should live their life in order to stay within their gender role. Some will meet the expectations and other will not. That does not make them look less of their gender, they will just be expected to meet them. Over the years, some gender roles have submerged and others have risen above. They will be able to show how the gender roles are supposed to be in jobs, education, and marriage and also how they can benefit from stepping out of the gender roles.

Literature throughout history has displayed to us the evolution of the male and female gender roles in society. Women have been described as ‘the angel in the house,’ whilst men are typified as dominant and prevailing in comparison to women. The gothic genre in literature is used to personify and exaggerate these stereotypes, by using gothic motifs such as dream sequences and themes such as horror and terror. Not only does the gothic exaggerate the stereotypes, but it also allows them to be contravened, due to the transgressive nature of the genre. The psychoanalytical aspect of this genre, allows for repressed desires to be made eminent and therefore characters can transgress and in the process, cross their contemporary gender boundaries. Keats uses the gothic device of Negative capability in order to conceal the transgression of the females in his poetry, Carter revised gothic fairytales in order to display them from a feminist approach and Stoker uses gothic themes, set against the backdrop of the fluidity of Fin de siècle period, to allow characters to stray from their gender stereotypes.

Gender Roles can be defined as roles society expects people to play on account of their sex life. Like all roles, gender roles are made up of sets of expectations, so they can be thought of as sets of expirations, so they can be thought of as sets of expectation that are attached to sex.(pp: 220 John E. Farley & Michael W. Flota).

Men collectively choose to receive psychological help less than their women counterparts. The sex distinction in help-seeking behavior occurs even when both women and men are equally afflicted. If male help-seeking behavior is to be increased, the reason for its neglect must be considered. Increasing our awareness of factors that may deter men from exploring psychological guidance may help in accessing reluctant men, allowing them to see past their preconceived ideology of masculinity.

“I was young and dumb,” said Kim Spight, a forty-year-old FedEx sales manager who became pregnant her freshman year at Howard University. Ms. Spight had the mindset to succeed so instead of dropping out of college to raise her daughter, she kept studying until she received her masters degree and now manages a 12-person sales team in Dallas. Meanwhile, her daughters father continues to work odd jobs and live at home with his mother (Cauchon, 2013). Can you believe at one point in time this reality wasn’t heard of or seemed impossible to achieve? Gender roles continue to transform year after year in relationships where men have began welcoming in the ideas of being a stay at home dad while the mom is the breadwinner. Women have the capability of climbing up the ladder in the workplace and even a little change has swept through different cultures. Let’s take a leap into the past to see just how gender roles have transformed history in the workplace, culture, and marriage.

A great percentage of people in today's society would agree with the consensus that manhood is and should be based on masculine features and ambitions in order to be accepted as a manly male; Paul Theroux begs to differ in his formal essay, “Being a Man”, as he contests this norm by avidly stating that forcefully adopting manly attributes while growing up is “emotionally damaging and socially harmful” (Theroux). He strongly exemplifies his understanding to the reader through personal experiences and ridiculing the silly gestures that both men and women make, and remain faithful to, in order to substantiate their purported gender roles in society.

Gender socialization often begins early once parents are shown the sex of their child; from then on, baby showers are planned according to gender “appropriate” colors, which are often pink for girls and blue for boys. Even differences in how children are spoke to can be picked up easily in Western cultures. Girls are called pretty and sweet, whereas boys are handsome and strong. Ultimately, the way children learn to identify with their gender culture is in part due to not only family and friends, media, schools, and religion, but also from the toys that may inexplicitly advertise gender expectations. Gender-typed toys may be bought for children as a way for parents to encourage and reinforce gender-appropriate behaviors. However, recent debates have engulfed toy manufacturers and major retailers, which has brought about changes in toy design and marketing in an effort to make reflect more realistic and gender neutral options.

There are billions of people in the world with many different ethnicities, backgrounds, religions, and beliefs. There are many families with their own characteristics and ways of running their home, whether they are Hispanic, Native American, or African American. Perhaps they are in upper class or maybe they live below poverty. They could be a Muslim or Catholic and perhaps they believe education is not the key to success, but the real key is hard work. Regardless of these variations, one factor that plays a role in all aspects: gender. When a person is born, they are automatically dressed in either blue or pink. The newborn is either boy or girl. Have people thought about why girls wear dresses or why boys wear jeans and sneakers? There is more to what culture tells us, when it comes down to how we play our gender roles. It is really about how our bodies are naturally made that determines our gender role. It is not, society that tells a person they can be a mother because only women can give birth to children. It is not culture that makes men stronger or bigger, it is hormones and the natural structure of males to have more muscle

Gender roles are the preconceived ideas we have of how someone of a specific gender should think, act dress and speak. These exist in modern Western society, even in New Zealand where we often like to think they do not, because they are the ideals of our parents which their parents passed on to them. As most of our knowledge regarding gender is taught to us at a very young age by our parents, there is little room for change.

From the day that we are born our gender is influenced to partake in certain gender roles depending on our sex. One’s sex is distinguished by biological characteristics that set us apart, while our gender “consists of whatever behaviors and attitudes a group considers proper for its males and females” (Henslin 292). Males are influenced to partake on more aggressive roles to show power and dominance, whereas, female are influenced to partake on more nurturing and subservient roles. However, if one fails to do so they are labeled a feminist “not masculine/feminine enough” or gay/lesbian.

The male gender role is beginning to emerge as an important and legitimate controversial topic. There are two conditions that defined a male: biological and social. Biology provides a dichotomous male and female prototypes. Male babies are traditionally born with one X and one Y chromosome, as well as the genitalia, called the testes. A key biological function of males is the reproduction, in which a male attempts to produce offspring that will carry their genes. Males typically have higher testosterone levels than females, which stimulates the development of male secondary sexual characteristics, such as aggression, growth in hairs, testes, and muscles. However, the social components of a male play a significant role in the definition of a

Gender roles are the roles in life that society deems appropriate for each gender to play. These roles are recorded in countless ways, such as art, literature, and media. In order to understand gender roles in literature, we must have a good knowledge as to why gender roles even exist. It is common to try to categorize things and people; this is part of human nature. It is no surprise that men and women have been categorized as well. Throughout history have been wars, famine, and plagues. It is in those times that gender roles are the most inforced. It is “In periods of cultural insecurity” that “the longing for strict border controls around the definition of gender” and other things become much more

“Let the boys be boys.” You’ve heard this phrase before. Often repeated by parents regarding their little boys. So what makes a boy, a boy? Rambo like characteristics? Muscles? Short hair? Wearing blue? Wearing T-shirts and jeans or playing with sporting equipment? Well last I remember, the main characteristics boys shared were penises. The role gender association play in the lives of our children can sometimes affect them negatively. The messages that gender roles send, is that in order to be part of society, you must fit into the norm or the status quo or most importantly what society