Gender Roles In American Society

Throughout history, women have been regarded as of lesser value than men particularly in the public sphere. This is the result of gender stratification. Gender stratification refers to the issue of sexism, “or the belief that one sex is superior to the other” (Carl et al., 2012, p. 78). The theory that men are superior to women is essential to sexism. Sexism has always had negative consequences for women. It has caused some women to avoid pursuing successful careers typically described as “masculine”—perhaps to avoid the social impression that they are less desirable as spouses or mothers, or even less “feminine.”

Gender roles are defined differently by people and are usually centered on opposing conceptions of femininity and masculinity. They are a set of societal norms dictating what types of behaviors are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable for a person based on their actual or perceived sex. Gender roles now compared to back in the day have very much changed, but there still remains a strong influence as to the way a woman should act and how a man should act. In places such as America, now, women and men both have jobs and can still balance spending time with their family and taking care of children whereas back then, women were housewives and were not able to hold a job because that was the man’s responsibility. The traditional roles of men and women are also looked at, as well as behaviors of men and women that are considered socially appropriate. Gender roles vary greatly from one culture to the next, from one ethnic group to the next, and from one social class to another. But every culture has them, they all have expectations for the way women and men should dress, behave, and look.

Women are stereotyped to be home bodies that cook, clean, and have children and raise them. Men are stereotyped to do the masculine jobs around the house, and go out and bring home the money for the family. These roles and stereotypes are dissipating throughout our society as society grows and develops, and becomes more equal. However, some stereotypes are still fully believed by some people, because that is how they were raised. These stereotypes and labels do not define us purely based on our gender, and it is possible to break these stereotypes each and every day.

Throughout history, men and women have been viewed in utterly different spheres. Men have been, and still are, believed to be the hard working individual who is in charge of “bringing home the bacon” and supporting the household finically. On the other hand, women are expected to have little to say, the house spotless, supper on the table, the children bathed, fed, in bed, and educated, all while maintaining a flawless hairdo and makeup. These stereotypes seem a bit offensive nowadays, but if you really consider it, it has been and most likely will be this way for our entire existence.

The lives of women in America have been impacted by socially constructed gender roles that have limited their growth as individuals and their roles in society. Since the mid-19th century women have been involved in social action to fight gender constraints, internalized sexism and the backlash from men who have not wanted to lose their privilege and control.

Gender roles are sets of societal norms dictating what types of behaviors are generally considered acceptable, appropriate, or desirable based on their sex. The concept of gender roles are quite simple, yet can be very biased towards both genders. Men and Women are equal enough to where a woman and a man can do whatever their mind wants to accomplish. Believing that you can do anything you want will always help you to succeed in life. I do not believe in there being such things as "male jobs" or even "female jobs." Having gender roles is very comical. At the end of the day, as long as the job is completed, who cares what gender it took to get it done. How effectively do you feel, that the US could be ran, if gender roles were never an aspect

It seems like beliefs and facts are interchangeable in American society today. That being said, there are many examples of this in contemporary American society such as the belief that crime is rising, the age of the earth, and child vaccination. Although these issues are perplexing to many in this country and worldwide, we are going to focus the fact that a good percentage of the American population does not believe that rising global temperatures is caused by human activities when ninety seven percent of climate scientists believe it to be true (NASA, n.d.). Public opinion in the United States has increased dramatically in the past ten years in the belief of this fact, but there is still a good percentage of the population that still believes

Throughout time gender is something that has been constantly changing due to people becoming more acceptable with who they really are. Today's times there is plethora of what someone may consider themselves as. Like whether they identify as male, female, transgender etc. Society has become more acceptable with the idea and since then gender roles have changed. because this is something that is constantly changing gender roles for a transgender person they may take on the responsibility of caring for the household , being finan1cially stable and caring for the children. "Ischomachus, I said, this is just what I'd like to learn from you. Did you teach your wife yourself what she needed to know or did she already know everything she was supposed

Throughout the course of history, the roles of men and women have always been directed by gender. In American culture, the male stereotypic role has long been associated with authority, strength, aggression, competitiveness, and dominance. In contrast, female stereotypic roles have been associated with being loving, compassionate, nurturing, and sympathetic. Traditionally, men have worked outside the home and functioned as the sole breadwinner for the family. They held some of the most important jobs in society, such as military men, doctors, lawyers and politicians. Women, on the other hand, were long considered naturally weaker than men and incapable to perform work requiring muscular or intellectual ability. For this reason, throughout most of history, women generally had fewer legal rights and occupational opportunities than men. Motherhood and wifehood were considered a woman’s most important profession and they were expected to stay home and run the household sphere, while working to improve society by raising moral children. It wasn’t until the 20th century that women in America became more “equal” to men. Since then, they have progressed considerably in all aspects of public life – politics, occupation, education, etc. Despite women’s indisputable gains,

Over the years, the perspectives of men and women have continued to be polar opposites. From the time we are children, society portrays gender as men being controlling and unemotional while women are the opposite. Young boys are brought up to “become men” and to adopt the roles society forces on them while women are dehumanized and portrayed as submissive to males (The Mask). These roles have altered slightly over the years but have always been separated by the characterized gender roles in society. Women are to be working in the kitchen and keeping the home, children, and man happy while the man of the household is the breadwinner and comes home to a wife making dinner while he rests from

Gender roles determine the way society works, and the way it views people. Whether it is considered unfair or not, there are many factors that are created from gender roles. Almost all parts of English life from 1674 to 1913 was influenced by gender(Clive, 1.) This way of life made a lasting impression, causing the years to follow to develop and abide by what is known as gender roles. Although gender roles have become a lot more diverse in society, there are still stereotypes and misconstrued gender identity, gender-specific expectations, and gender-specific separation and gaps that still exist today.

Society has been changing since the dawn of time, so the idea of gender roles should continue to change over the course of time. Gender roles should have no place in today's society, since a lot of people are working jobs whom they have family to support and they could be a stay at home spouse or just looking to find a job to support themselves.

I believe that gender roles are still relevant in American culture in the 21st century. There is a great statement about gender that was presented in the lecture PowerPoint Sex vs. Gender: “In our society, gender is a master status. In other words, gender impacts almost every single area of our lives, including our relationship with others. If we don’t know what someone’s gender is, then we often don’t know how to react with him or her and we get uncomfortable. As a result we like to know what people sex and gender are.” Today, however, we're less likely to stereotype though there are still narrow- minded people around.

On a different note, Schmitz and Sarah (1998) examined traditional gender roles among men and women in the United States as well as in Mexico. The study revealed distinct differences between traditional gender roles perceptions held by Americans and Mexicans. The authors state that family settings in Mexico have been characterized by a dominance of the husband. The women are expected to make sacrifices for the sake of their families. They engage in household chores while the men are tasked with the role of providing income to the family. Some of the ultimate sacrifices that the women have to make include: the acquisition of education, development of careers, and having a social life. On the other hand, men enjoy all these rights as their work is majorly within the public sphere and their involvement with their family’s actual functioning is minimal. Due to Mexicans’ beliefs that gender roles stabilize families, they believe that “men should play the role of decision makers while women should play the roles of homemakers and family caretakers” (Schmitz & Sarah, 1998, p.140). On the other hand, the study found out that gender roles in the U.S were not generally delineated according to gender since they are more focused on the attainment of gender equity. Therefore, household chores can be done by either gender. However, the general trend was that women mostly performed household chores especially in households where both the husband and the wife were professionally working.

There are a lot of things constant in life; like education, family, and work. In all of these constants there is a constant of there own; gender stereotypes. These standard based on gender that can be seen as far back as shakespeare and is clearly noted in Shakespeare's Macbeth, which emphasize on how males should act. The ideas of how women should act and presented in Judy Brady’s “Why I Want a Wife”, From the time of Shakespeare of the late 1900s you can see a distinct way men and women are portrayed. Even though women can now hold a job and can vote there was a time where the stereotype was that women couldn't do any of these. As times change so do the stereotypes of each gender.