Pink And Blue: Telling The Girls

Gender roles have been used as a way of raising children for generations. While they have not always been the typical “pink is for girls, blue is for boys” stereotypes that we have grown accustomed to, there have always been certain roles for men and women that deem what is appropriate and what is not. Although the idea of gender roles has existed for centuries, the stereotypes themselves have evolved, leading many to believe that they are a social construct. “Up until the beginning of the 20th century, pink was actually more associated with boys, while blue was more associated with girls—illustrating how socially constructed these associations really are” (“Gender and

Gender coding is not a natural or biological characteristic. People are born with different physical and biological characteristics, but make sense of their gender roles through cultural influences. “Stereotypes are amazingly powerful, and we may not realize the degree to which our thoughts, beliefs, and actions are shaped by them” (Silverman, Rader, 2010). Boys and girls are labeled as masculine or feminine, which is considered the “norm” for society. Children are not born masculine or feminine, they learn these roles from parents, peers, media, and even religion. Concepts of gender identity are sometimes placed on children even before their birth, such as with the selection of paint colors for the nursery.” Children begin to form concepts of gender beginning around the age of 2, and most children know if they are a boy or girl by age of 3” (Martin & Ruble, 2004). From an early age, children are encouraged to identify with gender coding. Gender is formed at birth, but self-identification as being male or female is imbedded into their minds by parents and society. A child learns to understand their gender role and their identity by what is taught and expressed to them by others. Yet as a child grows, gender coding can cause cultural confusion, and insecurity issues throughout the course of their life.

Children learn as early as age two what it means to be a “boy” or a “girl” (Aina & Cameron). This is described as gender identity, a person’s sense of self as male or female. Gender stereotyping emerges hand in hand with the development of gender identity in Early Childhood (Halim). Gender roles are society’s expectations of the proper behavior, attitudes and activities of males and females. When babies are born they are either put in pink or blue, as they grow up they still maintain the same “gender” colors. As young children start to socialize, they are playing with either “girl” toys or “boy” toys. When they get older they

Most People have Heard comments of how the colored pink is for girls and blue is for boys. A large percentage of society is carried away by that and buy clothes or decorations according to those colors. Discrimination is based largely on stereotypes that have been generated around the idea of "what is the correct way in which a man or woman should act in society", and their roles at work or in their family. This set of preconceived ideas that we use to analyze and interact with other men and women, are gender stereotypes. The article “When Gender Norms Didn't Work for My Kid” written by Erika Kleinman gives us an insight about her personal experience with both of her daughters and how she managed not to get carried away by what society believes is the right appearance for a girl.

Some believe parents need to be more accepting of what gender their child chooses to be. In Linda DiProperzio’s article, she quoted an associate professor of Women 's Studies at the University of California named Jane Ward, who stated, “Raising a child under these strict gender guidelines is denying them an entire world of colors--they become tracked into the characteristics of their biological sex.” (Par. 7) Moreover, it is stated that limiting the views of a child can, and will, drastically change them and their future self. Not allowing children to be creative in what they choose limits their mindset. It is even worse that these narrow-minded ideas are thought up and enforced by the

Gender and gender roles are a somewhat complicated idea to understand. Contrary to popular belief, gender and sex are two different things in that “gender is not inherently nor solely connected to one’s physical anatomy” (“Understanding Gender”). When parents automatically assign their child a gender based on their sex organs, it leaves very little room for change later in the child’s life, because children born with female sex organs are not necessarily girls, just as children born with male sex organs are not necessarily boys. Rather, gender is based on mindset, personal identity, outward presentations, and behavior of the individual. Binary genders, or the broadly

Gender as a Social Construction This annotated bibliography is focused on research that supports the idea that gender has been socially constructed. Haslanger’s chapter offers an understanding of what is meant by the term ‘socially constructed’ and how gender can be defined from this viewpoint. Zimman complements Haslanger’s argument by explaining that it is our discourse that influences our perceptions of gender. Eckert and McConnell-Ginet’s chapter is helpful when explaining how gender is socially constructed by exploring how from birth we are treated and labeled according to whether we’ are male or female.

“Is it a boy or a girl?” is a question that is commonly used in a world where roughly 350,000 babies are born each day. Questions such as the one previously stated are what helps to determine what gender a child would be. “Learning to Be Gendered” by Penelope Eckert and Sally McConnell-Ginet focuses mainly on the factors that potentially influences gender. These factors can include names, colors, voice change and the societal norm of what a boy and girl should be. Eckert’s main argument is that being gendered isn’t something one can to gain based off of physical characteristics but rather on their own and through their interaction with society. Names and clothing are just a small part of the symbolic resources used to support a consistent ongoing

The sex binary is a fundamental value in American society. Even before birth, people are to be either male or female. The article Doing Gender by West and Zimmerman explains how from an early age, children are taught to identify a person’s sex with that

American custom currently dictates that ‘pink is for girls and blue is for boys’. This gender-specific dichotomy of colors preserves the sexist foundation that girls ought to ‘think pink’ while boys ought to avoid all associations with femininity. In this discourse, I shall discuss Marilyn Frye’s, Sexism to highlight how societal norms such as the aforementioned color-binary in conjunction with, traditions, beliefs, and teachings all establish and sustain a sexist society which, without a full-blown revolution, is forevermore. In her work Sexism, Marilyn Frye analyzes this binary which she claims “characterizes cultural and economic structures which create and enforce the elaborate and rigid patterns of sex-marking and sex-announcing which divide the species, along lines of sex, into dominators and subordinates” (Frye 850).

Written by Lynn Peril, Pink Think: Becoming a Woman in Many Uneasy Lessons provides evidence that between the 1940’s and 1970’s the idea of “think pink” influenced women in the United States. Using an overwhelming number of primary sources, Peril argues that through western consumerism, women are placed into a specific gender role. Along with arguing that toys, education, and even dating are gendered aspects of women’s life, Peril’s research also reveals that women were subliminally told how to appropriately act in a male dominated society. Published in 2002 by Norton, Peril’s book notes three terms that are important to her argument. The first term, ‘pink think,’ can be defined as “a set of ideas and attitudes about what constitutes proper

Babies are commonly viewed as the most innocent lifeforms in the world. Not only does their cuteness touch the lives of everyone they come in contact with, but their inability to carry judgments makes them someone most of us admire. Unfortunately, while the baby may not be able to express their likes and dislikes, their parents have already introduced the baby to the idea of favoritism, even before it makes its way out of the womb. New technology has allowed parents to select the sex of their baby. As a result, the idea behind childbirth being a miracle, as well as a magical process, is now lost. By allowing parents to select the sex of their children, society is enabling people to value one gender over another and neglect the true intentions

A single mom and a widowed grandma raised me. It could be assumed that I would fall in line with stereotypical feminine roles based on what Henslin has to say about gender messages in the family, but nothing could be farther from the truth. He states, “Our parents are the first to introduce us to the gender map. Sometimes they do this consciously, perhaps by bringing into play pink and blue, colors that have no meaning in themselves but that are now associated with gender”, but I started life in a red and blue room and overalls. In a house with three women, there were no gender roles, only jobs to be done. When I gave birth to a baby boy, I set out to raise him gender neutral as I had been. Though there are many social hurdles, over all, I have managed to continue the tradition of trying to remove gender

Directly after a parent identifies the sex of their child, they immediately purchase infant-associated items according to their color. For example, an expecting family may buy their baby girl a pink blanket. Another expecting family may buy their baby boy a blue blanket. While this appears natural and unquestionable, predicaments like these build the basis of our sexist society. When that baby boy or girl matures, they will come to the realization that pink is a feminine color and blue is a masculine color.

Since the beginning of time, gender has always been divided into two categories, either male or female, with few instances that have stepped in between. As civilization has evolved, it has began to learn that this division is a lie, and that it is disgusting, disgraceful, hurtful and untrue at its rotten core. This is because this “division” has never counted for anything but a label and a set of roles as a stereotype, which was unjustly assigned at birth in a societal attempt to conform each and every unique soul into a shape that they cannot fully fit. There should not exist such standards and expectations that do not account for anything besides what one's body has to say, without asking the mind of the thoughtless vessel known as the body.