Enculturation is when people learn about their own culture either passively or directly. We are constantly learning about our culture even when we do not realize it. We learn about our culture through different medias, such as our parents, relatives, and peers. My earliest enculturation experience is when I was in kindergarten. I learned about culturally accepted behaviors for both genders and experienced double standard between male and female. My family and my peers were the most influential in this enculturation experience as they were the people I associated with during my early childhood. My early childhood experience of double standard has shaped my values and how I perceive my culture. Double standard varies culture by culture, in this paper, I will be explaining my double standard enculturation experience in my Chinese culture.
In the Chinese culture, we are known to be a male dominant culture. Many traditional Chinese family values the males in the family more than the females because males are usually the head of the family. Males are given more freedom when they are growing up. Female children are often restricted to do many activities because of society expectation for females’ role and behavior. For instance, males tend to participate in masculine activities like Tae Kwon Do and football while females would participate in feminine activities such as sewing and dancing. Not only there were gender appropriate activities, but there were gender appropriate toys. In
Growing up in Iran I had automatically had less control over my autonomy. This is due to the male dominant society that has placed limitations and expectations on females. These exceptions and limitations can range from enforcing a strict dress code to not having the civil right as a female to be alone in public alone without placing herself in danger. Through socialization these have become social norms in the Iranian culture that have resulted in explicit and implicit gender roles. According to Berger and Luckmann, socialization can be deconstructed into two parts: primary and secondary socialization (1967). In primary socialization, a child is taught by significant others what are appropriate
Evidence that everyone desires a boy can be found throughout the film. In fact, preference for boys over girls is not just a fad but rather deep-rooted in Chinese society. Feudal ideas that men superior to women is embedded and prevails in Chinese culture
Gender issues are central to any culture, because gender is a fundamental means of understanding social reality. Both Australian and Chinese cultures are patriarchal in nature. Last names are carried through the male, not the female. Stereotypes about gender abound in both Australian and Chinese societies. In both Chinese and Australian cultures, it is more likely for a man to be in a position of economic or political power than a woman. Women are more likely to tend to domestic labor. However, Australian culture is more gender egalitarian than Chinese culture. The one-child policy in China has made it so that many families will abort female children in order to have a male child. This would not be considered an ethical
That gender of the child is a strong predictor of how parents behave toward their children and in the selection of the toys and clothes they give to them. Boys are allowed more
Sociologist Dalton Conley wrote his book, You May Ask Yourself, addressing how “gender is a social construction” that is so normal for society to think how a man or woman should act towards the public. Society often categorizes roles that females and males are suppose to play in, but not only are they categorized they are also being taught what their gender role is suppose to do. The beginning of gender socialization can start with a child who is not born yet by simply having the parents purchase items that are all pink if its expected to be a girl, but if its expected to be a boy then everything they purchase will be blue. Conley states that gender roles are “sets of behavioral norms assumed to accompany ones’ status as male or female” (Conley [2008] 2013:134). So even when a child is growing into their infant years, toys are made specifically for their gender. By examining how social construction places gender in categories it becomes apparent that males and females get differentiated a lot which emphasizes inequality between them.
Few toys were aimed equally at both genders. Even board games, while intended for both sexes, usually seemed aimed more towards one gender or another. Both sections had a lot of gender- stereotypical toys. General ideas on girls’ and boys’ behaviors and interests were very prevalent in the toys intended for each gender. After really looking at the toys in both sections it is easy to understand why stereotypical ideas about both genders are so strong since these ideas are introduced at such a young
Our roles as men and women start at the hospital when we are born. Boys get blue blankets while girls get pink blankets. The toys we play with growing up are targeted at either males or females. Toys that are made
Toys also influenced children with gender roles. In our society, the typical expectations of men is to financial support the family, and for females it’s to cook, clean, and take care of the children. “Both wives and husbands tend to perceive this as a “fair” arrangement” (Zimmerman 30). To instill this idea in young minds, there are toys that influence these gender roles. Boys have toy tool sets, promoting hands on work. Girls on the other hand have cooking and cleaning toys such as the Easy Bake Oven or toy vacuums. Also “parents tend to encourage more gender-typed activities. One study found that household tasks differ along gender lines. American boys are more likely to mow the lawn, shovel snow, take our the garbage, and do the yard work, whereas girls tended to clean the house, wash dishes, cook, and baby-sit the younger children” (Newman 133). Girls also like to play “house” fostering wife and motherly qualities such as taking care of the family. These toys help with socialization making children believe and understand that these are the norms of our society. So in conclusion to toys, “Sex-specific toys foster different traits and skills in children and thereby serve to further segregate the two sexes into different patterns of social development. “Boys’ toys” encourage invention, exploration,
Gender role is defined as the socially constructed and culturally specific behavior and appearance expectations imposed on women (femininity) and men (masculinity). Many girls are subjected to gender role stereotyping and different treatment Through socialization, individuals learn to behave in accordance with the expectations of others in the social order (Hult, 83.). Gender ideology is involved when one attaches a color such as pink and blue to sex and when one designates types of toys as male, female or neutral. Most play behavior is an outcome of gender role stereotyping that stems from cultural ideology. Early research provides that by first grade, boys recognize sports, whereas girls recognize grades
Second, China's traditional culture system ideas about the nature of women has not been shaken, although a long time shouting slogans gender equality, but to establish gender equality and women's rights and cultural patterns have not really started. In the traditional culture of inertia, or the idea of men as the main link between the concept is still a mainstream society, "without issue for the big"
and the activities they encourage. In one study parents were asked to sort toys into masculine,
Society has clearly defined boundaries between what is considered to be male or female. The development of an individual’s gender role is formed by interactions with those in close proximity. Society constantly tells us how we should look, act and live based on gender. Family, friends and the media have a tremendous impact on how these roles are formed and the expected behavior of each gender role.
Gender role is defined as the social position and behavioral norm that is considered appropriate for an individual of a specific gender in the society (Liu, 2003). Every society has its unique culture and gender role is one of the products of a society’s history and culture. It is not set up by a single person within a short period, but by countless people in the society for thousands years. Parents started to shape their children’s gender by dressing and naming them according to their gender soon after birth. (Eckert and McConnell-Ginet) As children grow elder, they are exposed to a wider world and are then socialized by agents outside their family, such as schools and media companies. This essay investigates whether schools and the mass media contribute to stereotyped gender role in the Chinese society. It is believed that they are the two major socialization institutions promoting and manifesting gender stereotypes in the society.
Nineteenth century America was a patriarchal society centrally focused around men as the sole provider for the family. The concept of patriarchy is simple; men hold all power in society and women are diminished to only a role of wife and mother. While a patriarchal society does not necessarily correlate with the oppression of women, America gave more power to men through every societal advancement. During the time period, no one imagined slavery would increase the injustice to women; however looking back, it is blatantly clear. When slavery arose as a major necessity in the South, the aspect of patriarchy that led to the mistreatment of women became more prevalent. Through slavery, differing views on the treatment of slave women arose.
Throughout the course of human history, societies worldwide tend to follow a specific pattern of male domination in politics, economics, and culture. From the earliest city-states of Mesopotamia to the massive empires of China and Rome, women were forced to take a limited role in society. This systematic oppression of women is indicative of a patriarchal society, in which “women have been subordinate to men in the family and in society generally” (Ways of the World 59). Though these civilizations share the characteristic of male supremacy, each had different practices governing interactions between the genders. Each society had a unique idea of exactly what rights women were afforded and how the patriarchy was enforced. The Mesopotamian, Chinese, and Greek civilizations were undeniably patriarchal, but how the dominance of men was expressed varied between each society.