The Importance Of Gender Roles In Society

Conversation is a normal part of every day life. People converse everywhere they go; whether they are with their friends’, at school or even while at the store, a conversation is bound to ignite. While communicating has its ups, it also has its downs; these ‘downs’ can happen especially when men and women are communicating because, according to Deborah Tannen, they have different communication styles. Tannen illustrates this in her video, He Said, She Said: Gender, Language, & Communication, where she talks about and gives many examples of how men and women differ in their conversational approaches. I definitely agree with Tannen in regards that conversation between the sexes is asymmetrical.

When a person is born, they are either male or female. Before they are born, their parents are going to set goals and expectations for them. Sometimes parents will name their child after a famous celebrity hoping they will be just as great as them. Each gender will have different ways they should live their life in order to stay within their gender role. Some will meet the expectations and other will not. That does not make them look less of their gender, they will just be expected to meet them. Over the years, some gender roles have submerged and others have risen above. They will be able to show how the gender roles are supposed to be in jobs, education, and marriage and also how they can benefit from stepping out of the gender roles.

In the essay, “But What Do You Mean?” author and linguistic expert Deborah Tannen argues her feelings on how men and women vary in their use of conversational “rituals.” She states that males have a tendency to use wording to sustain dominance in conversation; however, women seem to take in to account the feelings of others. Tannen identifies seven categories in which men and women differ in communication. First, women use apologies to assure other people. Men can misapprehend these apologies as taking blame rather than as the ritual reassurance that women mean for it to be perceived. This supports what Tannen says in her essay, “But there are times when ‘I’m sorry’ isn’t self-deprecating or even an apology” (Tannen 380). Second, men are more straight-forward when criticizing more than women; women “soften” their criticism with the purpose of sparing the feelings of the person they are criticizing. Third, women often say “thank you” ritualistically, most of the time to equate the two in the conversation. Fourth, men enjoy “verbally sparring” more than women. Because of this difference, women are under the impression that they are usually condemned in a conversation. Fifth, women and men use praise differently. Women tend to expect praise open-heartedly when they are praised. Men, on the other hand, often confuse that not criticizing is praise enough. Sixth, women converse their complications in order to share their experiences; they complain not to solve their

In present day all around the world, society has certain expectations for the actions and behaviors of males and females. There are many factors in our everyday lives that contribute to the gender norms that society has set. This essay will discuss how situations in life can play a part in how people treat other people based on their gender. It is believed that males are the leaders of our world, but in present day woman can do as much as men can do. From The Journal of Marriage and Family, Hu states, “Differentiated gender roles in adulthood are rooted in one’s gender role socialization. In order to understand the persistence of gender inequalities in the domestic sphere, we need to examine the gendered patterns of children’s housework time.”(2015, P.1). Gender roles are society’s expectations of the proper behavior, attitudes, and activities of males and females that they must be taught. These roles define how females and males are viewed in society, their household, and workplace. In The Journal of Sports behavior by Hardin, he states, “Although gender role differences from biological and “Natural” exists in popular consciousness, research has long demonstrated that instead, many are long time socially constructed… Individuals understand their gender because they are given names and treated in particular ways, such as dress in pink for girls and blue for boys, that reflect social construction of gender. Bandura's social cognitive theory is key in understanding the factors in socialization”(2009, P.3). Bandura's theory of of social cognition is that behavior, environmental events, and cognitive factors are the main keys that shape attitudes and actions of an individual. Although, gender roles play a very big part in our society, specific genders are treated differently while dealing with peer influence, media influence, as well as employment.

Study on gender role stereotypes has shown that there are several negative effects of stereotyping. The study on how gender role stereotyping effects children is not as prevalent because most believe that it doesn’t matter, since children are just forming their stereotype so children do not care. However, some psychologists have done some research on it, and from their research found out that children used a mixture of moral and social conventional reasoning

When thinking of gender roles in society, stereotypes generally come to mind. Throughout history these stereotypes have only proven to be true. Major historical events have had a huge impact on the way men and women are seen and treated. In this way, women have always been secondary to males and seen as the fragile counterparts whose job is to take care of the household and most importantly, be loyal to her husband no matter the circumstance. Gender roles throughout history have greatly influenced society. The slow progress of woman’s rights throughout humanities led to an explosion of woman’s rights throughout the 20th century and that trend will only continue on into the rest of the 21st century.

In Deborah Tannen’s article, “But What Do You Mean?” she enumerates seven different ways that women and men tend to have a kind of struggle. Tannen discusses how the men and women have different ways of speaking. The seven main differences are classified and divided into: apologies, criticism, thank-yous, fighting, praise, complaints, and jokes. First, men don’t correctly interpret apologies; they often implicate blame with apology, synonymous with putting oneself down. On the other hand, women apologize to calm other people. Second, criticism from men is straight and without a filter; women do not go as hard in their criticisms in order to not destroy that people feelings. Third, most of women use “thanks” automatically; it is easy for them to express their gratitude, although for men it doesn’t work like that. Fourth, during discussion of ideas, men would go as tough and merciless as they can, arguing every opinion or idea in the strongest terms. On the other hand, women would take that arguing as a personal attack. Fifth, men believe that the fact of saying nothing is a way to praise, while women every time they think they have done a good job, praise is expected. Sixth, men interpret complaints as a way to request the solution of a problem; women complain in order to sympathize and feel sorry for other people. Seventh and last, the sense of humor is also different. Sometimes women can view men’s jokes as being offensive. Men’s humor consists more of

Gender roles determine the way society works, and the way it views people. Whether it is considered unfair or not, there are many factors that are created from gender roles. Almost all parts of English life from 1674 to 1913 was influenced by gender(Clive, 1.) This way of life made a lasting impression, causing the years to follow to develop and abide by what is known as gender roles. Although gender roles have become a lot more diverse in society, there are still stereotypes and misconstrued gender identity, gender-specific expectations, and gender-specific separation and gaps that still exist today.

First, Communication is different in many ways between men and women when the two are communicating the woman may say something one way and the man could take it in a completing different way.

There have always been many differences between men and women throughout the years including the way they think, speak, show emotions, and face problems.Many people say that men and women “speak in different languages”. Between the male and female sex their communication skills are opposite of each other. When they speak they also have contrasting tones and behavior. Men and women have different outlooks on what words mean to them. Men have conversations about sports, politics, dirty jokes, and cars. Meanwhile women gossip, discuss the latest trends, and talk about food and movies.When women talk they tend to talk with feelings, emotions, and imagery. When men talk they do not go into great detail about a topic or talk with emotions. Language

Cross cultural stereotypes set forth limits on sexes that are false and inaccurate. The inaccurate assumption of listening between men and women. The stereotype put forth is that women feel freer to talk at home and away from the public, therefore portraying that

The most important thing people need to realize is that men and women come from different worlds. Women’s way of communicating is like living on the beach, open and carefree. Men’s way of communication, on the other hand, is the opposite. It is like living in a cave, quiet and cooped up. Accepting that there are differences, such as the way men and women listen, act, and sometimes the level of emotions expressed will help each understand how to communicate better with one another. Noted linguist, Dr. Deborah Tannen, studied this problem. In her article, “Sex, Lies and Conversation: Why It’s So Hard For Men And Women to Talk to Each Other?” She explains the differences, and shows how problems go away once the differences are understood. If everyone would learn these differences, life would be so much easier.

Gender roles govern the way that most of the world’s population interact with one another. Many African cultures uphold deeply patriarchal gender roles which dictate how women and men interact with one another. Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie, a staunch feminist, gives readers a look into Nigerian gender roles in her short story Birdsong. Her writing in Birdsong and her TEDtalks explore and expose how these gender roles are harmful and how important it is for many stories of young women of color to be heard.

Society today places many ideals when it comes to proper behaviours regarding gender roles. These are considered societal norms that are widely debated and controversial. Society has created a norm, which encompasses specific expectations and rules that change the daily lives of men and women, giving them specific tasks and behaviours to abide by. These standards are known as gender roles, which are defined as distinguishing actions, thoughts, and feelings of males and females. Gender roles are said to be a result of nature, which is a natural process, every male or female is to follow. On the other hand it can be a result of nurture, which changes ones way of thinking and adapting their lifestyle to fit their environment. Either way gender roles are a part of someone’s life from the moment of their birth, as they develop, and long after that, this proves that gender roles are influential to a person’s life and development. This essay examines how media such as music, family life, and different parenting styles encompass gender roles and teaches behaviours regarding them. Therefore, gender roles define males and females are a result of nurture and not nature.

The assertion that men and women communicate in different ways, about different things, and for different reasons seems to go un-argued and is accepted as true by a vast majority of Americans. It is the reason why we