Gender Socialization

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Gender Socialization

• Jess MacDonald

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The Historical Context of the Study of Gender

• Feminism
• The belief that women and men are or should be
  equal
• 3 Waves of Feminism
• 1st Wave 1848-1920 (political rights)
• Seneca Falls Convention
• We hold these truths to be self-evident that
  all men and women are created equal
• 19th Amendment
• 2nd Wave 1960s-1970s (social/civil rights)
• 3rd Wave 1980s-present (economic rights)

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Feminist Theory and the Study of Gender

• Broad wide ranging theories that look at social
  phenomena and ask
• What about the women?
• Why are the structures set up the way they are?
• How can we change it?

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Sex vs. Gender

• Sex
• The biological characteristics that differentiate
  women and men (XX or XY Chromosome)
• Gender
• The socially constructed patterning of
  masculinity and femininity, and of relations
  between women and men

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Doing Gender Socializing Gender in Society

• Doing Gender
• (West and Zimmerman, 1987) the ongoing process
  through which people create gender for themselves
  and others by acting and appearing the way we
  should as men and women.
• Gender as a social construction
• Symbolic interaction

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Significant Others

• Birth
• Parents
• Mead Play stage
• Education System/ Teachers

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Women and Men
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Women and Men
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Women and Men?
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Socialization The Importance of Peers and Others
in Society

• Cognitive categorization into one group of the
  other
• Gender expectations for women and for men
• Sanctions for not behaving the way a man or woman
  is supposed to behave

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Socialization The Media

• Film, TV, advertising
• Reinforce mens and womens roles
• Jean Kilbourne Killing Us Softly

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Implications of Gender and Gender Inequality

• Violence against women
• Around 18 of American Women have been raped
• But only 26-37 of rapes are reported
• 1 in 4 college women will survive an attempted or
  completed rape
• A woman is battered every 15 seconds in America

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Implications of Gender and Gender Inequality

• Disordered Eating
• 50 of girls 11-13 feel that they are overweight
• 8 million people in the US have an eating
  disorder
• 7 million women
• 1 million men
• 1 in 200 women in the US have anorexia nervosa
• Eating disorders have the highest mortality rate
  out of any mental illness

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Implications of Gender and Gender Inequality

• Prohibits gender equality
• Family and Home relations
• Work and economic opportunity