GENDER AND CULTURE

Gender and Culture

Gender and Culture

Introduction

This paper discusses about the cultural constructions of femininity and masculinity, where people are socialized into gender identities and their behaviors and attributes are categorized in regards with gender categorization; either femininity or masculinity. If we analyze these gender attributes, masculinity and femininity, we will come to know that they are what a person perceives himself nor herself to be, they are rooted in our cultures and this is how people categorize us. This cultural construction of gender attributes are more sociological than biological, it is the societal decision that what is to be considered as masculine and what is to be considered as feminine. Generally a male categorizes himself as masculine and a female categorize herself as feminine, because these are the social definition given to them by the society. However if we talk about the personality attributes of a person, a male can see himself as feminine and a female can see herself as masculine, regardless of their biological gender. If we talk about gender identity, then it should be distinguished from other gender related phenomenon like gender role, which are actually the expectations of role that are perceived by the society according to the biological gender of the person, for example women are expected to do domestic work whereas men are expected to be the source of earning and the working person. The concept of gender stereotypes is also at times confused with gender identity, but they are very different in every aspect. Gender stereotypes are the where the particular personality traits are associated with the biological gender of the person. If we look at the precise perspective of gender identity, it incorporates all the meanings that are associated with someone on the origin of gender identification; in fact these self generated meanings are at times a source of motivation to produce a certain kind of gender related behavior. This means that a person with a more masculine personality has a self motivation to act masculine; however what is masculine to him depends on the social and cultural norms in the region in which he is living, and same goes for person with a feminine personality.

Discussion

In this paper we will discuss about the western culture and their inception of femininity and masculinity, they will also be discussed in respect to their development and how they came into being. We will also be discussing the measuring criteria for masculinity and femininity, in regards with both psychological and sociological perspective.

The Inception of Masculinity and Femininity

Since we will be discussing about the western culture, stereotypical segregation of characteristics are in a way that men are usually associated with certain personality traits which includes being instrumentally oriented, competitive and aggressive. Same goes for women where they are associated with personality traits of being passive, expressive and supportive. When talk about the inception of masculinity and femininity, early school of thought was based on the inborn differences in characteristics, temperaments and personality traits of men and ...