Yuanqi Li
11.27.2014
Linguistics 3A
Social and Biological Gender Differences
“Shenzhen: 2.08m Yuan; Beijing: 2.02m Yuan; Shanghai: 2.01m Yuan; Hangzhou: 1.78m Yuan…”[1], announced by Baidu, the largest Chinese web search provider, gives marriage costs in 2014, China. Suffering this high marriage cost for a decade, Chinese are becoming numb with these data. Statics show that marriage cost is 150 times higher than 30 years ago. Jianzhong, a RUC sociology professor says, “Increasing marriage cost shows women’s status in marriage is moving up”. It is true. Treated much fairly these decades, Chinese women show their energy and ability not only in the society, but also in marriages. However, when considering a successful marriage, what is
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With many women’s liberation movement around the world, women’s social status has improved, which is much better than hundreds years ago. However, as Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet, “Frailty, thy name is woman!”, this was a problem in the past, and will be a problem in the future. People should consider this problem in marriage. Women are hard to find jobs and promotions. Though law enforces firms to hire women, they are still suffering discrimination. This problem leads to a weak position for women in the marriage. Spontaneously, women need financial support from their husbands. As takers, women lose their initiatives in families. In some sense, they become appending to their husbands. In case marriages broke, they will be left forlorn and without a protector. In China, women are going to live with their husbands, sometimes with the whole family of their husbands. Women need to handle many complex relationships with husbands’ families. In a big family, they are always considered as strangers, making them unable to deal with family issues. What’s worse, they are even considered only as fertility tools sometimes. What they can do is to give a son to their husband’s family. On the contrary, men are free to go to work, to enjoy and to play outside. Marriage means they have a fulltime housekeeper in their home. Women are locked after getting marriage. These problems need to be considered in a marriage. Before getting
According to Hinduism the female was created by Brahman as part of the duality in creation, to provide company to men and facilitate procreation, progeny and continuation of family linage. The Vedas suggest that a woman’s primary duty is to help her husband in performing obligatory duties and enable him to continue his family tradition. Her primary duty is to give birth to his children and take care of them. Hinduism is a predominantly male dominated religion. Woman play a secondary role. The situation is gradually changing. It is difficult to draw generalizations about the status of present day Hindu women because of society is complex. In general, life in cities is much different from life in the rural areas. Those who live abroad live in different conditions than those who live in the country. Yet, we have ample indications that women are still subject to many restrictions and disabilities in rural area as well as urban areas. The financial independence of woman and the education levels of the family play an important role in this regard. Women in urban areas face numerous challenges in their professions and personal lives. But overall, life is better for them compared to the past. Love marriage outside of the caste or community are scorned and sometimes the couples are killed or excommunicated by the elders in the family or village. Widows can now have a life of their own and even remarry. They draw a lot of sympathy. But
Marriage “The Evolution of Matrimony” written by Stephanie Coontz, is about the social change in marriage. Marriage has been an important part of most societies in the world. It is about how marriage has changed in the past thirty years. The author points out the changes in marriage pervades the social, economic and political aspects of society. The changes have been at different rates depending on the region.
The idea of women being the ‘nurturers’ and the men being the ‘providers’ has been around for ages. Both articles suggest that this idea no longer fits in with the modern ideas of marriage because marriage is now seen as an equally shared experience. The concept that the work in a marriage and raising children should be shared equally between partners has become an expectation. Each article points out expectations their partners have and how these assumptions lead to angry
In Andrew J. Cherlin’s essay “American Marriage In Transition”, he discusses how marriage in America is evolving from the universal marriage. Cherlin’s definition of the universal marriage in his essay is the man is the breadwinner of the household and the woman is the homemaker. In the 20th century according to Cherlin, the meaning of marriage has been altered such as the changing division of labor, childbearing outside of marriage, cohabitation, gay marriage and the result of long- term cultural and material trends (1154). During the first transition of marriage, Cherlin discusses how in America, Europe, and Canada the only socially accepted way to have sexual relations with a person and to have children is to be married (1154). The second change in marriage occurred in 2000, where the median age of marriage in the United States for men is 27 and women is 25 (1155). Many young adults stayed single during this time and focused on their education and starting their careers. During the second change, the role of law increasingly changed, especially in the role of law in divorce (1155). It is proven in today’s research marriage has a different definition than what it did back in the 1950’s. Today marriage can be defined as getting married to the same gender or getting remarried to someone who already has kids. The roles in a marriage are evolving to be a little more flexible and negotiable. However, women still do a lot of the basic household chores and taking care of the
Most females are not respected and are heavily pressured by their parents. Many Chinese women are expected to be in arranged marriages and are not respected in their family or the work-place. Woman that aren’t even born yet suffer from infanticide. If the parents came to find that they were having a girl from ultrasound- they would abort that child and try for a boy causing pre-birth ultrasounds to be banned. “Negative social consequences, particularly sex discrimination. With boys being viewed as culturally preferable, the practice of female infanticide was resumed in some areas shortly after the one-child policy took effect.” (Document E) “I hate to say it but the one-child policy should party be blamed for some social issues in youth today.” “She wished she has a brother or sister to share all the attention.” (Document F) This evidence supports the claim that the one-child policy was a bad policy because women have always been culturally no preferable, causing unborn females to be aborted.
In “For better, for worse: Marriage means something different now,” Stephanie Coontz reveals the worldwide changes in people’s attitudes and behaviors towards marriage. According to Coontz, education and the social norms are the reasons why marriage has become nonessential. Being single and going through a divorce are more acceptable now. The motivations of marriage have turned from economic dependence into personal willingness. In fact, Coontz’s words make me wonder the true meaning of marriage. Even though the meaning has changed over times, I believed that I still hope to get married.
Marianne Weber argued that marriage was the linchpin of patriarchal domination as women were being dominated by their husbands. According to Weber, once a woman married they were seen as property of their husband. Women being addressed or seen as “property” was supported by “legal codes…religion and the economy” (Inst. Comments), which I believe that it made it difficult to see any positive changes. Women were dependent on their husbands for economic support, which gave them more power over their partner’s and their overall household. Weber argued that “the wife is economic dependent of her husband… Even in cases where she works, full – or part-time, her income typically is only a fraction of his” (L&N 206).Even though women who work do not make as much money as their husbands, I agree with Weber, that those women who have an external money supply do become more independent, although they are not getting paid as much as their partner. Women’s employment opportunities outside the home have helped
In “The State of Marriage of the 90s” the author, Sally Macdonald states that marriage has majorly changed from the sixties . The stereotypical gender roles in marriage have been blurred and instead of the the man being the “breadwinner”, women are also becoming the breadwinner to make this a team effort. This article connects to Jhumpa Lahiri’s “A Temporary Matter” because Shoba is a business woman and is just as much the breadwinner as Shukumar is. This author writes about how marriage has changed so much and some people get married for forever or just for a temporary time, Shoba and Shukumar are the ones that were married for a temporary time and fell apart over something they could’ve worked through. Divorce rates ranged from six to
Established with Adam and Eve, still surviving, marriage is the oldest institution known. Often the climax of most romantic movies and stories, whether it may be ‘Pride and Prejudice’ or ‘Dil Wale Dulhaniya Ley Jaein Gey’, marriage has a universal appeal. It continues to be the most intimate social network, providing the strongest and most frequent opportunity for social and emotional support. Though, over the years, marriage appears to be tarnished with high divorce rates, discontentment and infidelity, it is still a principal source of happiness in the lives of respective partners. Although marriage is perceived as a deeply flawed institution serving more the needs of the society than those of the individuals, nevertheless, marriage is
Sex and gender play a big part in american society today and are often misconstrued. These two topics have become progressive as people are starting to express their gender and sexuality in ways other than what is and has been considered the norm. Many people believe that sexuality and gender are synonymous with one another. Gender is socially constructed while sex is biologically determined. In society’s past, Americans often strayed away from discussing controversial topics, but with the rise of different ways of addressing people, it is deemed more important to understand. Along with the blurred lines of gender and sex comes sexuality, who someone is attracted to sexually. When people stray from society’s heteronormative mindset, they are often faced with many more challenges than the average hetero man or woman. People often have the preconceived notion that if something does not concern them, then they should not be involved in it. A person who could be your neighbor, co worker, or even child, may have to deal with the troubles of people confusing their gender identity with their sex. While also facing challenges that deal with the sex of the person they choose to love. Learning the difference between gender and sexuality will open the eyes of many people and see how the two are different but relate to one another very much.
As woman is always a sufferer for no fault of her, always victims of male dominated society. She has to play different role in her life. When girl is born, she has to become the target of criticism in many forms for being born as a girl. In her childhood she has to depend on the father. Women always depend on husband after the marriage, and in her old age she depends on the son for her subsistence. As a mother she has to obey her sons, as a wife she has to obey her husband and as a daughter she has to obey her father. Despite her great sacrifices, she faces several male-dominated sufferings. The personality of the typical woman was overwhelmingly swamped by the male dominated attitudes against the backdrop of an exclusively
This film shows how the gender roles are created by society instead of the individuals. As per society, the women’s primary role should be taking care of the family while the men’s primary role should be taking care of financial work. After marriage, women’s interest and passions slowly fade out as she gets busy in taking care of children and the husband. For instance, Ayesha’s (Mr. Mehra’s daughter) mother-in-law often disapproves
There have been significance changes in these practices and they remain significantly distinct in Urban and rural areas. For instance, free marriage is promoted now. Rural women, unlike before have more freedom, they have their own choice in migrating to the new cities to work where they are often seen as the “cheap” labor. Unlike traditionally, women are economical independent of their husbands. There is huge gap between urban and rural China, especially when it comes to the gender equality. This fact, adds further complexity in explaining the marital and family situations. Rural china still reflects on following their ancestral customs whereas the urban China is following the footsteps of the developed nations. There is increasing preference for nuclear family. Furthermore, urbanizations have changed beliefs of people when it comes to children. Having children was considered first priority before, but now most of these
One of the main causes that marriages are not lasting is the change in the roles of woman today. Prior to the 1980’s it was the man’s responsibility to earn money and financially provide for his family, whereas the
Even though we say that women today should have equal rights amongst men, we still associate the word women to household activities than to men; therefore, making it just like the practice during the Anglo-Saxon period. Although, they differ in the way that today, there are already more opportunities for women to do in the society. There also equal treatment when it comes to working, wherein jobs that used to be for men only are now also open to women with potentials. Some survey shows that women of today are already known to have a higher rank than men. Some statistics show that there are also families wherein women work while men stay at home and does all the household works. Which shows that somehow, society did change its treatment towards