The True Story of Joan/John

Gender has been described as masculine or feminine characteristics that encompass gender identity sex as well as social roles (Nobelius 2004). According to sexologist John Money, there is a difference between gender as a role and the biologically of differences in sex (Udry 1994). Within scholarly disciplines, cultures and contexts, gender frequently has its own mean, contextual frame of reference and the manner in which it is used to describe a variety of issues and characteristics. The sociocultural codes, conventions and the suggested and literal rules that accompany the notion of gender are vast and diverse. There has been and continues to be much scholarly debate regarding the idea of gender and how it has been viewed historically; as well as changes in the grammatical use of the

Dr. Money developed a theory that argued while genetics are important, a baby is born neutral in regards to gender for the first few years of life and during this time the child’s environment would determine their ultimate masculinity or femininity. Money derived this theory from his research on intersex individuals, but the outcomes of these studies cannot be correlated to this type of case. This

One gender principle that was displayed in the film was bromance, Bromance is a friendship where men are capable of incorporating a deeper more understanding friendship and they use a lot of language and actions to express their feelings (Kimmel 385). A great example of Bromance is the scene where Jeremy had a horrible night and wanted to leave, John pleads him to finish the weekend with Claire. When Jeremy agrees to continue with their plan, John replies I Love You, which is a great indication that they love one another. As time progresses society is learning to accept it and this film did a great job in advertising that men can use their softer side, and that they can express love for their

Isolation can force an individual to make irrational choices by clouding their sense of cogent judgement. In Ross Sinclair’s short story, “The Painted Door,” the characteristics forced onto an individual as a result of confinement are clearly shown. Living on a small farm, John and Ann are faced with winter weather that is almost impossible to travel in. When their closest neighbor is five miles away, it’s hard for them to live in such a world where communication is sparse. Forced to live in such a world of isolation, Steven, Ann and John’s judgement to make rash decisions is limited and has a substantial impact on the individuals internally.

A gender ideology is a “set of ideas widely shared by members of a society that guides identities, behaviors, and institutions” (Wade, et. al. 2015). Until Brandon’s sex was discovered, almost everyone that he interacted with daily believed that he was a male from birth. Nobody really questioned Brandon’s gender or sex because they believed that he exemplified the typical idea of a man. In the film, Brandon’s friends and ex-girlfriends all described him as a male based mostly on Brandon’s gender expression, looks, and hobbies. The people in the film all described how Brandon would wear clothes for men, sit with his legs open, and talk about girls and cars. Even Nissen’s sister described how one time her, Brandon, and others, were in a van and Brandon had to go to the bathroom and tried to pee out of a window. All of these factors made up the people who Brandon interacted with schemas about gender. Nobody ever thought about Brandon maybe being a female because their cultural lens, a male does everything Brandon does, so he is a male. This concept also shows up later in the film when Brandon was questioned by a woman about whether he was truly a male. The deciding factor for this woman on whether Brandon was a man or not, was determined by if he had a penis. This woman’s idea of a traditional man involved a penis; so if Brandon did not have one Brandon could not have been a man. However, the woman, because of her pre-existing conceptions, she did not think that maybe one does not need a penis to be a male. For example, disregarding transsexuals and transgendered people, a male could have been castrated, effectively removing his penis. However, just because his penis is gone, he is usually still seen as a male. Castration of males was done throughout history whether it was Chinese or Roman Slaves (Tougher 2013), or as a dedication to one’s religion

One who claims any gender other than male or female would be considered taboo or highly unusual by our society. Biological sex is often thought to determine one’s gender identity. Though sex and gender align for the mass of our population, there is a minority group that does not feel that they belong to either male or female genders. To understand gender fluidity, one must recognize that sometimes a person’s gender and sex do not align. A person may not feel that their biological sex reflects who they are, they may feel uncomfortable with the expectations and roles placed on them due to their sex. These gender roles are created by social expectations of our western society. Gender roles are merely social constructs, and if one does not want to conform to societies conjectures placed on them due to their biological sex, they should have the freedom to non-conform.

This conflicts badly with his desire for self-identity. In Erikson’s theory of development, he is at the stage of ‘identity vs Role confusion’ (Tapia, 2012). That is why he is unable to resolve his own problems with others and instead results to hurting himself or hurting others. He is also in a confusion of sexual identity. The biggest contribution to this (lack of interest to girls and relationships) is his mother’s behavior, which by now he is rather aware of the situation. John is also dealing with self-guilt. The case in which he can not correct others and blames and punishes himself , this arises from his mother’s behavior. He may feels he should warn her to stop dressing and acting as she does but finds it difficult due to her being his only family and role model(Smith, & Elliott

Gender is a concept constructed entirely by society. We base gender off of what we perceive and what others perceive of us. Until fairly recently, it has been categorized as one of two things: male or female. When we watched the documentary in class, we saw evidence of society 's socialization of young children. Commercials for Nerf Guns, action figures, and cars and trucks were all depicted with young boys as their users. Never did we see a girl playing with GI Joes or with Hot Wheels, only boys played with those. Meanwhile, dolls, baking sets, and make up kits were only advertised to girls, and no boys were shown playing with Barbies or Bratz. Society begins to shape gender notions from a very early age, where people are shown that they are one or the other, either male or female.

Judith Butler (Gender Trouble, 1990) argues that rather than sex determining gender-gender determines sex. Sex is shaped by gender discourses which give us scripts to perform according to whether we are biologically classed as male or female. The continual performance of these scripts on a daily basis is what makes us male or female. The classic example of this is the third sex, yes, the third sex and that is the transgender( born male in a female’s body or

“The social construction of gender comes out of the general school of thought entitled social constructionism. Social constructionism proposes that everything people "know" or see as "reality" is partially, if not entirely, socially situated. To say that something is socially constructed does not mitigate the power of the concept. These basic theories of social constructionism can be applied to any issue of study pertaining to human life, including gender. This is

The concept of gender has a strong social impact on me. When I was born, I was immediately assigned to a biological sex as a female with two X chromosomes. I was then socially classified as a girl in the society with feminine gender roles. Gender is defined as a social principle which attribute to the roles and expectations of males and females through the years of different societies (Phillips, 2005). Gender can be considered as behavioural, cultural and psychological traits

“Gender” is a social construct that is developed solely by our society and the early developmental stages of an adolescent’s life. By introducing youths to the roles, behaviors, expectations and activities that correspond with males or females we give a clear guideline of what is accepted from a young male or female. An individual however can identify his or her gender based on their own system of beliefs without corresponding to their natural biological sex. Our lives are shaped by our true biological identities but the influence of the world and society is enough to define what a male and what a female truly is to an individual.

Gender is a topic that not many people are educated on. When people think of gender, they think of boy and girl, people usually think of a girl having a vagina, and a boy having a penis. Many people have their thoughts on how each sex should behave which would be giving people gender roles, girls should play with Barbie dolls, and boys should play with trucks. There is more to gender than just the vagina and penis, In “Understanding The Complexities of Gender”, Sam Killermann talks about the distinct pieces that also comes with gender, like gender identity, gender expression, and biological sex. When people think of gender, the only part people think of is the biological sex.

The term ‘gender’ was coined by John Money in 1955: “Gender is used to signify all those things that a person says or does to disclose himself/herself as having the status of a boy or man, girl or woman, respectively” (Coleman and Money, 1991, 13). In

When considering gender and sex, a layman’s idea of these terms might be very different than a sociologist’s. There is an important distinction: sex, in terms of being “male” or “female,” is purely the physical biological characteristic differences – primarily anatomical differences. (There are also rare cases of “intersexual” individuals as outlined in the Navarro article, “When Gender Isn’t a Given”.) Gender, on the other hand, is an often misconstrued concept that is commonly mistaken as synonymous with sex. A non-sociologist might surmise the following, “men act masculine and women act feminine, therefore, it must follow that gender is inherent to sex,” however, this is not necessarily the case.