What Makes A Boy Or A Girl?

In Jacoby’s essay, one of her main points is that girls and parents stereotype masculine and feminine knowledge. High school girls may believe that science and math is for boys, while English and the arts is for females. Math is seen as “too hard” and a “waste of time” to young girls, ultimately resulting in them announcing to their parents that they will not be taking math or science for their last years of high school. Jacoby argues that if girls were to say they will not be taking English anymore, parents would be horrified and that parents would be less sanguine about the decision if the girls were boys. She also believes adolescent girls fear unattractiveness and avoid being typed as “brains.”

Gender coding is not a natural or biological characteristic. People are born with different physical and biological characteristics, but make sense of their gender roles through cultural influences. “Stereotypes are amazingly powerful, and we may not realize the degree to which our thoughts, beliefs, and actions are shaped by them” (Silverman, Rader, 2010). Boys and girls are labeled as masculine or feminine, which is considered the “norm” for society. Children are not born masculine or feminine, they learn these roles from parents, peers, media, and even religion. Concepts of gender identity are sometimes placed on children even before their birth, such as with the selection of paint colors for the nursery.” Children begin to form concepts of gender beginning around the age of 2, and most children know if they are a boy or girl by age of 3” (Martin & Ruble, 2004). From an early age, children are encouraged to identify with gender coding. Gender is formed at birth, but self-identification as being male or female is imbedded into their minds by parents and society. A child learns to understand their gender role and their identity by what is taught and expressed to them by others. Yet as a child grows, gender coding can cause cultural confusion, and insecurity issues throughout the course of their life.

Did you remember the saying “boys will be boys?” It usually came from a teacher or parent after two boys got into a fight or when a boy was pulling on a girl’s hair just “because he liked her.” This leads to the question “Why do adolescent girls mature faster than boys?” From the body to the mind, we women are on the fast track while men are still in the Dark Ages. For the majority, girls start acting more mature earlier than boys. Most scientists will agree that the reason girls mature faster than boys is because of earlier brain reorganizing, earlier development in the womb, as well as the society that we all grow up in.

This continues through life, and gets more prominent as life goes on. We saw in the episode of “Freaks and Geeks” especially, boys are expected to act like boys and girls are expected to act like girls. When the nerdy boys in the show acted “not manly” or like a “sissy” they were shamed. The coach told them to stop acting like girls and put down their make-up, and when Sam’s sister saves him from the bully, he is taunted for having a girl fight his battles. This constant emasculation of this specific group of boys leads to their bonding. However, it does not lead to their assuming that they are women, since they are being told they are not women. However, since they identify as males, they

academic gender stereotypes, girls believed they are academically superior to boys F (1,203) = 41.50, p < .001. Furthermore, results show that boys favor the idea that girls are academically superior as they advance through school F (4, 203) = 12.86, p < .001. In academic gender meta-stereotypes results were analyze by using between- subjects ANOVA. Results for the second DV provided insight on girls belief of academic gender meta-stereotypes did not increase as they advance through school F (4, 203) = 0.52, p = .719 whereas boys believe that adults seeing girls as academically superior did increase as they advance through school F (4, 203) = 12.24, p < .001. Findings in the current study suggest that boys believe that girls are academically superior to them, but they also believe that adults share the same belief as they do (Hartley & Sutton, 2013).

Growing up as a boy and growing up as a girl are two different things. Society has a set of expectations on people depending on their gender. I believe that it is a parent’s job to inform, not enforce, their kids about these standards. If a child wants to break their traditional gender role to find out who they are, then that’s perfectly fine. The parent should be completely accepting of their child no matter the clothes, sexuality, or the general appearance choices they make. Nevertheless, a parent should also be responsible for warning their child about society and those who will make an attempt to make them feel less about themselves. No matter the gender, people will try to bring them down, and kids need to be aware of that at one point in their lives. Sending a child out into the world without warning them is as dangerous as tossing them into the sea without a life vest; they’ll either learn to swim and defeat their problem, or they’ll drown in their struggles without a resolution. Both genders should be taught the basic lessons, such as treating people with respect and having an open mind. Personally, I’ve felt that my sister and I have different expectations from my brother. Typically, my brother is expected to be a strong and assertive figure, while my sister and I are expected to be proper and

The sex binary is a fundamental value in American society. Even before birth, people are to be either male or female. The article Doing Gender by West and Zimmerman explains how from an early age, children are taught to identify a person’s sex with that

In “Becoming Members of Society:Learning the Social Meanings of Gender,” Aaron H. Devor battles the topic of gender identity with an excerpt from his book, Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits. Children grow up being defined by a certain gender. From birth, they learn the language and how to act if you are a male or a female. Boys turn into men and should act masculine. Females turn into women and should act feminine. There is no middle ground for the gender identifications to intertwine. Everyone learns to behave in accordance with their gender identity and it is a lifelong process. And as people move through life, society demands different gender performances.

I remember being in Pre-K, when they gave us our first handbook and one of the first things we learned in class was to identify ourselves as boys or girls. How could we do so? There were two drawings on the book; one of a naked boy with a blue background that explained boys have a penis and another of a girl with a pink background that explained girls have a vagina. Besides that, my parents were always very strict about how ladies behave, how they dress, and how they not play rough with boys. In middle school, I went to a Christian school were they constantly told me the differences between a male and female and clarify all the time that I was a female, just in case I forgot.

Gender difference is being taught to our young people from birth as they are labelled pink if it is a girl and blue if it is a boy. There was a case study carried out where they switch the colours, and put the girls in blue and boys in pink, this was to see how differently the children were treated because of what they were wearing. Some people were saying look at him he’s a big boy and this was really a girl but just wearing blue. The boys were getting, isn’t she lovely because they were pink. This is the social norm for people to segregate our children based on gender because of what they are wearing. This is evident by Earnshaw’s Infants’ Department.

Gender roles are defined through positive and negative reinforcement. If a person who’s opinion is valued by the individual says a phrase such as: “Oh, Sarah, what a pretty dress!”, the child will most likely perform the same action appropriate for his/her gender. Through observing and imitating others the children learn how the society wants them to act. I selected this theory because, in my opinion, this is the way in which most children act. A girl sees an actress on TV and wants to get the same outfit; she sees her older sister’s actions and repeats them without realizing it.

The different expectations for each gender are blatantly obvious in many situations. These expectations create double standards for different aspects of adolescent life. “Girls can be athletic. Guys can have feelings. Girls can be smart. Guys can be creative. And vice versa. Gender is specific only to your reproductive organs (and sometimes not even to those), not your interest, likes, dislikes, goals, and ambitions.” This quote is from Connor Franta’s A Work in Progress about the revelations in the field of gender roles and suppositions (Kerr). Many parents worry about their female teenagers being out late at night, yet male teenagers are allowed more freedom. This is due to the fact that females are seen as weaker and easy targets for gender based crime

Stories surround most young children in a pleasant way. As soon as they will listen to a book, they are shown different adventures and characters that they are supposed to wish to be. When they finally pick out books for themselves there seems to be an idea of a divide between what a boy will choose to read and what a girl will. This anxiety is not new, but instead the product of thoughts founded back in the 19th century. Although not as present in today’s literature, the separation of what a boy or a girl will read is still presented as if it a problem in the book market.

Imagine a five year old girl, her birthday is a few weeks away and her mom is questioning her about toys she would like to have. She tells her mom she wants a race track and the newest Hot Wheels set. Her mother is quick discourage this request and suggests asking for something more “girly” because race cars are for boys. The little girl is disappointed but abides by her mother’s request and instead asks for a new doll house. In our current culture, there is a huge difference between what is considered to be for girls or boys. From birth, children are told what colors and styles of clothing they wear, what toys they should play with, and emotions they should feel. Often, girls are told they cannot play with toys considered to be for boys and boys are told they are not allowed to play with toys considered to be for girls. Children who do decide they want to play with the toys not traditionally for their gender are often scolded by family members, pushing the children back to their gender-specific toys. In early childhood the decisions that determine who a child is to be are made by their parents or guardians. Gender socialization starts at birth and continues from adolescence, to adulthood, causing specific and detrimental differences in the way the genders behave.

Anytime anyone is about to have a baby the first question is "Is it a boy or a girl?" People ask this question because there is a difference between the two genders. Several are curious to know whether the baby will turn out to be a sweet young lady or a strong young man. Even as children, the distinctions are obvious and stand apart. A young girl may ask a boy "What's that?" A young boy may ask a girl "Where's yours?" This is their first step towards self discovery. Everyone knows there is a difference but no one ever stops to see how many there truly are. There are numerous reasons why someone has become the gender they are, which is why the two appear different. Various people have been in the fight for equality