The Body By Jeanette Winterson Gifts Essay

In “The Story of My Body”, Judith Ortiz Cofer speaks about her experiences growing up as a Puerto Rican in the United States and illustrates how differently she was perceived in those two cultures. She focuses on parts of her identity such as skin, color, size, and looks, and how they served to affect her life and categorize her in that society.

The book Guts is a non-fiction, 162 page book by Gary Paulsen that tells the true stories behind hatchet and the other Brian books. In this memoir Gary Paulsen writes about how plane crashes, swarming mosquitoes, and growing up in northwoods of Minnesota influenced the writing of hatchet.

Gender, by definition, is the state of being male or female typically used with reference to social and cultural differences. Sex, by definition, is either male or female into which humans and many other living things are divided on the basis of their reproductive functions. However, society fails to separate the two. Judith Butler describes in “Phylosophe” that a young man who was murdered because he was dramatically feminine than he was “supposed” to be masculine. In the “Prelude: The Barbershop,” Ashanti Young details of his hardship of being denied from subcultural groups that he wants to identify with. Audre Lorde expresses her tyranny as a black, lesbian woman fighting through criticism and judgement and silence in “The Transformation

What does it mean to be a woman or man? Whether we a man or a woman, in today’s society it is not determined just by our sex organs. Our gender includes a complex mix of beliefs, behaviors, and characteristics. How do you act, talk, and behave like a woman or man? Are you feminine or masculine, both, or neither? These are questions that help us get to the core of our gender and gender identity. Gender identity is how we feel about and express our gender and gender roles: clothing, behavior, and personal appearance. It is a feeling that we have as early as age two or three. In the article, “Becoming Members of Society: Learning the Social Meaning of Gender,” the author, Aaron Devor, is trying to persuade his readers that gender shapes how we behave because of the expectation from us and relate to one another. He does this by using an educational approach, describing gender stereotypes, and making cultural references. He gets readers to reflect on how “Children’s developing concepts of themselves as individuals are necessarily bound up …to understand the expectations of the society which they are a part of” (389). Growing up, from being a child to an adult is where most of us try to find ourselves. We tend to struggle during this transition period, people around us tell us what to be and not to be, Jamaica Kincaidt in her short story, “Girl” tells just that, the setting is presented as a set of life instructions to a girl by her mother to live properly. The mother soberly

What is gender? The answer to that is not so simple. "Gender is what culture makes out of the ‘raw material' of biological sex," (Unger and Crawford, 1995). Also, there is a difference between what is gender identity and what is a gender role; a difference which seems to be even more difficult to differentiate between than the words "gender" and "sex". Media and other parts of our culture seem to believe they know the difference, yet up until a certain period in time, the same stereotypical characters were portrayed and used as role models for others in most media. Women characters being the helpless victims, while the strong men would come to save them (including

Gender is often described as the state of being ether male or female. In most communities,

Gender can also be seen as just being a male or a female. For instance, your role in society. In the book Wicked this can be displayed by the

Gender- refers to who we are as internal whether we prefer to be feminism or masculine. According to Wolf (2015), states “refers to the way we understand ourselves and our gender. It is about the internal sense of masculinity or femininity that a person feels.

Gender is defined as the state of being male or female. Gender consists of the assortment of mental traits that differ between the sexes; thus, gender scripts are the behavior expectations given to males and females. The characters in the movies either feed into or go against gender scripts. Case in point, Edward is a wealthy businessman, and for that reason, his character feeds into the gender script of men being breadwinners and guiders in patriarchal societies. For instance, Edward is displayed as a savior, a hero of some sort, due to the fact that he takes Vivian off the streets, hires her, and transforms her into a well-rounded, respectable woman. Edward is also

Gender is the concept of maleness and masculinity or femaleness and femininity. One’s gender identity is the sense of one’s self as male or female and does not refer to one’s sexual orientation or gender role.

Written on the Body, a novel by Jeanette Winterson, utilizes a genderless narrator to describe their encounters with various lovers, that ultimately combines sex and literature together to form a style of loving another person. Winterson’s protagonist remaining genderless allows the reader to recognize certain ideologies that in using the theory of Feminist Criticism is clearly influenced by certain patriarchal beliefs. These beliefs affect the reading of the narrator as genderless as the reader often oscillates between trying to assign the gender of the narrator as more masculine or feminine based on behavior that fits the patriarchal ideals of those gender roles. The narrator is further used in this novel to portray Winterson’s view of both sex and literature and their intertwining: through a close reading of certain passages, it is obvious that the narrator often equates sex as a form of saying “I love you”. The narrator also often will use text and literary imagery when trying to recreate past physical romances. This view of literature and sexual attraction as a form of loving another person, helps the reader piece together how Winterson wishes to depict the narrator’s limited view of love. Through the theories of both New Criticism and Feminist Criticism, Winterson is able to portray the limits one puts on themselves when adopting the ideologies of patriarchal roles and physical attraction over emotional connection.

Picture this! It is 1992 and a compelling love story which conceal the gender of one of the lovers is composed. More importantly, would it be possible to read this story without determining the gender, sex and sexual orientation of the main character? In Jeanette Winterson’s novel Written on The Body, readers are stimulated to question whether gender is a biological or a social construction. By omitting every reference and clues to the gender of the narrator, readers get almost no subtle details that are typical of a first-person narrator, including name, age, appearance, sexual orientation, or gender. Winterson aims to show us that there are many activities, practices, and roles that are not identified with gender, regardless of what society says.

An individual can either identify themselves with a subculture or social group which results in them having diverse gender roles.

The dictionary definition of gender is “The behavioral, cultural, or psychological traits typically associated with the one sex” Basically whatever is deemed okay for that sex to do physically, mentally, or psychologically is gender appropriate. One's personal gender identity is found in in who they believe they are inside. It is what they like, how they react, and what they choose. These two things often coincide because of various factors such as biology, conformity and the maleness of the human brain.

Gender is not based on physical attributes. Sex is the word that should be used when speaking about biological characteristics. So, based on the definition of gender by LeVay, gender identity is one’s personal attitude towards being more male or female.