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Presley Gender Roles Essay

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According to our text, gender is “the sense of being male or female… gender refers to the social perceptions of maleness or femaleness. All cultures prescribe gender roles for males and females, but these roles differ greatly between one culture to another” (Feldman, 2016, p. 190).
The first time that Presley was really faced with gender related choices occurred just after she turned four years old. It was a typical gender related choice scenario about what toys to play with. She was trying to choose between playing with trucks, dolls, cooking toys or action figures. My partner and I made a choice to not inflict our ideas on her ideas but to offer her the information she would need to make informed choices. Regardless of the gender appropriateness, we chose to show her that men and women can do the same things. For example, females can be tough and play sports and males can cook and clean. …show more content…

At this point my partner and I began trying to point out all of the things that men and women can both do as well as changing out everyday stereotypical roles. For example, he has begun to help more with the housework so that Presley can see that boys can cook and clean too.
At six and a half years old, it becomes clear that Presley identifies with me as the same sex parent more than she does with my partner. She is more interested in doing the things that I do but luckily I take on a variety of gender role tasks that allow her to see that women can do things that are sometimes thought to be masculine. I encourage her to be a helper/ observer but I also encourage her to engage in other traditionally masculine activities such as playing

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