Gender As A Social Construction

Social construction has been around since the beginning of time. It is the idea that a persons understanding of how society works is socially constructed. For example, the notion that women should wear makeup or that men should be interested in sex are both social constructs. Social construction is integral in society as it influences how people judge others and view the world. Social construction heavily affects gender and sex. These affects can be negative as they create prejudices and assumptions about different genders and sexualities. One can see this through how women receive more judgment than men or how men are expected to be dominant in society. Social construction perpetuates negative assumptions and judgments towards sex and gender issues.

The idea of social construction, to put it simply, is that our society creates norms to categorize people. The norms created usually coincide with the time period in which they were made, however, the expectations of society change over time. For example, fifty years ago people were still being shunned for interracial relationships, however, in current times, it’s not that big of a deal. Constructing norms has had a very prosperous run in society, ideals that were created years and years ago are still being held as fact today; specifically, those regarding gender. If we use animals as a comparison, we can realize that sexuality and gender in humans is a socially constructed idea that is used to put people into categories to fit the ideals of

Through a symbolic interactionist perspective, the social construction of gender will be analyzed by examining differences between the sexes and the expectation to follow the social norms of how people are supposed to dress, socialize with, and behave taught by common institutions of socialization.

Prior to this moment I had never really felt pressured from society to fit my gender. I had seen many ideal beauty standards for females that I never felt I met but I had never had a moment where I felt like my appearance was associated with my gender. This moment was really jarring to me because when I decided to cut my hair short, I never once thought about how this would change the perception people had about me; It seemed like a small cosmetic decision.

People learn to “do” gender is almost another way of expressing that gender is our everyday life. Doing gender can be seen as a way people all believe in their own religion. While reading throughout chapter 3 “The social Construction of gender” Judith Lorber (1994) taught me that gender construction starts with assignment to a sex category. This highlights the understanding that gender can be displayed through variations of trade marks such as the way a parent may dress or name their new born baby to keep people from asking whether it is a boy or girl. Most importantly what I found interesting while engaging in this week’s article “Toys are more divided by gender now than they were 50 years ago”. Elizabeth sweet expressed doing gender behind

Social constructionism addresses that gender does not exist as a form of classification, but instead it marks social differences between varying individuals. Sally Haslanger gives us a broad definition

During this week’s readings and discussions we talked about how gender has a major effect on everything we use and do in life. "Gender is constantly created and re-created out of human interaction, out of social life, and is the texture and order of that social life" ( Lorber, 55). As I read the Social Construction of Gender some new perspectives that I considered that I didn’t previously consider was that "gender is a daily part of our lives" (Lorber, 55). I feel like if gender is a major part of our lives we as people should better know how gender roles work.

There are many different ways that people understand what their culture prescribes as appropriate behavior for males and females. While there are a variety of ways that people are socialized and acculturated with respect to gender, mass media, in its various forms, is the primary way that people learn "how to act" as a girl or boy. Mass media is a powerful method of communication, entertainment, education, and socialization. The necessity and the relevancy of mass media becomes more prominent and urgent in the 21st century world, as the 21st century landscape is exceptionally more mediated than in previous eras of human history. It behooves producers, distributors, and consumers of mass media to understand and consider the interplay between power and discourse within the context of mass media. Where is the power of mass media and who wields it? What does the political economy of power in mass media reflect about the structures and mechanisms at work in society? How does mass media work within a context of power and discourse? The paper argues that mass media is used as part of a power strategy so as to inoculate and perpetuate specific discourses that are lived in the everyday experiences of subjects within such systems where mass media is used in such ways, particularly the experience of being male or female, or another gender altogether. Mass media has the

(a) What is a social construction and why is gender considered one? (b) In what ways is gender a dichotomy?

The social construction of gender is basically the presence of gender roles, which can be defined as “expectations regarding the proper behavior, attitudes, and activities of males and females” (Schaefer 251). Functionalist and conflict theorists have differing views on the roles that gender roles play in society. However, both agree that there is a differences between the gender roles of males and females, and both agree that men have more practical roles, while women have more emotional roles.

men". They do not have to behave or dress as men to have the social

Social construction is what the society thinks is right or wrong when it comes to crime, through the things that are done and said with other people. Social construction of gender is due to biological facts with social implications. There is a view that there is a difference between sex and gender. Sex is the biological traits, that society uses to allocate people in the male or female category. The sociology of gender looks how society influences our perception on the difference between masculinity and femininity. Masculinity is what society thinks is the appropriate behaviour for a ‘male’ and femininity is what society thinks is the appropriate behaviour for a ‘female’. Women as a group lack the level of cultural power as men. Some women challenge gender norms by refusing to let dominance portray their femininity. Gender norms are what are learned throughout our childhood when we socialise. We are taught was is expected from our gender through our parents/guardians. We are also taught through socialising at school, the media and other social institutions e.g. Facebook. https://othersociologist.com/sociology-of-gender/

Per anthropologist Carol Vance’s essay on social construction theory, social constructionism is a theory that argues that what we have come to know and understand as “natural” about ourselves in terms of how we define our gender, sexuality and our bodies is, in reality, socially constructed. People associate meanings to body parts, feelings, sensations, “make erotic acts into social identities, and create norms distinguishing between acceptable and unacceptable sexualities”. Essentially, things are perceived as sexual or as belonging to a certain gender because we’ve deemed and learned to contextualize them so. Social constructionism refutes the cultural influence model which

Culture is important in every aspect of life. But what roles do gender and equality play within a society or the culture within that society? Culture of course, is vital because it molds the way things are done within the society. Culture was also defined in the World Conference on Cultural Politics as “‘the whole complex of distinctive, spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features that characterize a society or a social group. It includes not only arts and letters, but also modes of life, the fundamental rights of the human being, value systems, traditions and beliefs.’” (Schalkwyk 2000, pg. 1) Culture is a part of who we are, it is a chunk of our life, it affects how we live and how we choose to live every day.

In the article Gender as a Social Structure: Theory Wrestling with Activism was explained how gender is a structure that has affected all aspects in our society. Since gender is a result of sociocultural it creates the roles that both men and women should follow if they want to be accepted in society, which have created inequality for women. I agree with the author that gender is a social structure that affect our identity; however, our identity can be affected different depend on society that the individuals live in. Since there are so many structural factors that affect our identity such as ethnicity, cultural background, family values, and religion. The social structure of gender could be encouraged by the way parents act with their children, by their beliefs about how their children should behave and by the toys they buy for them. For example, girls are expected to play with dolls and be lovable, nurture, and emotional. Boys are expected to play with action figures and be aggressive. As a result, clothes, toys, and the language used with children has constructed gender roles at a young age. This could prove how social influences affect gender notions, behaviors, and institution concerning gender. Furthermore, cultural and religious have an influential impact on gender identity and in many ways, promote stereotypes beliefs against women and lead to inequality. For example, when a society depends on religious or cultural motives we see that women are viewed as weak or