SA 150 Chapter Notes - Chapter 9: Standpoint Theory, Queer Theory, Gender Identity
12 Dec 2016
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CHAPTER 9: GENDER AN D ETHNICITY
▪ GENDER AND SEX: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?
− Sex: the biological division into male and female
▪ Anatomical/biological characteristics of women and men
▪ What you are born with
− Gender: the parallel and socially unequal division into femininity and masculinity
▪ The roles and characteristics society assigns to women and men
▪ How you choose to see yourself and how you live your life
− Gender role: set of attitudes and expectations concerning behavior that relates to being male/female
▪ Differs across cultures: in content (specific expectations) and the severity/permissiveness with which society treats
those whose behavior contravenes the expectations for their gender
▪ FEMINISM AND GENDER THEORY: 4 CATEGORIZATION
− Feminist liberalism
▪ Liberal Feminism
▪ Identifies women as a class entitled to rights as women
▪ Values the contribution of women in the public realm of workplace and examines whether women receive fair pay for
the work they do
− Fight for pay equity
▪ The guarantee that women in traditionally women-dominated industries receive compensation similar to
the salaries of those working in comparable professions that are typically dominated by men
▪ Securing benefits for women on maternity leave (rights to claim EI and return to the same/equivalent job in same
company after a fixed period of time)
▪ Criticism: universalizes the position of white, middle-class, heterosexual western women
− Fails to recognize the social location of this category of women enables them to receive benefits not available to
other women
− Favoring white, middle-class women over women of different ethnicities and classes
▪ Making women equal to men in terms of employment opportunities and salary
− Feminist essentialism
▪ Looking at the differences between the way women and men think while arguing for the equality in that difference
▪ The differences between the way women and men think
▪ Argues for equality/female superiority
▪ Woe’s orality ad their ateral thikig iole soial ors that are more/less nature to them
▪ Criticism: generalizing the western model
▪ The potetial for oe’s differees fro e to e positiely alued
− Feminist socialism
▪ Revise Marxism so it accounts gender
− Sexuality and gender relations should be included in analyses of society
▪ Approach that involves looking at the intersections of oppression between class and gender, focusing mainly on the
struggles faced by lower class women
− Feminist postmodernism
▪ Approach that involves looking at women more as subjects (ex. People with voices and standpoints of interpretation)
who guide research, rather than as objects being researched
▪ Standpoint theory
▪ Queer Theory: approach that rejects the idea that gender identity is connected to some biological essence
− Proposing that gender reflects social performance on a continuum, with male and female at opposite poles
− Rejects the idea that male and female gender are natural binary opposites
− Gender identity is related to the dramatic effect of a gender performance
▪ Ideology of fag: set of beliefs and sanctions that is invoked throughout society to keep people in line
− If you violate a gender role: you must be gay
▪ Criticism: leads to no conclusions
− Problematizes other people’s olusios ad geerates o solid riteria for judgig better/worse positions
▪ Satisfies itself with constructing a feminine space where intellectuals aggressively play out tentative ideas
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Document Summary
Sex: the biological division into male and female: anatomical/biological characteristics of women and men, what you are born with. Gender: the parallel and socially unequal division into femininity and masculinity. The roles and characteristics society assigns to women and men: how you choose to see yourself and how you live your life. Gender role: set of attitudes and expectations concerning behavior that relates to being male/female: differs across cultures: in content (specific expectations) and the severity/permissiveness with which society treats those whose behavior contravenes the expectations for their gender. Identifies women as a class entitled to rights as women: values the contribution of women in the public realm of workplace and examines whether women receive fair pay for the work they do. The guarantee that women in traditionally women-dominated industries receive compensation similar to the salaries of those working in comparable professions that are typically dominated by men.
