What Influences Gender Role Specifics Within Society? Colleen Ann Jardine Thongsook College, July 2016 Abstract The family unit, education, and the media play a huge role in socially constructing genders to into specific behaviors and roles that are the expected and termed “norms” within society. Children are made aware of the cultural and societal norms through subtle messages at a very young age and it has been embedded in them by the age of 4 or 5. Children, being at a disadvantage accept it as a natural form of behavior which has lasting effects, good and bad right into their adulthood. Unfortunately, not all adults realize the true reality and continue the same cycle with their offspring.
The stereotypical world dictates men have dominant roles compared to women. They are indeed more powerful so as to conclude that women are weaker or of lesser power. Is that remain valid until now? Apparently the answer is yes and no. Yes, because there are still traditional races and countries who treat women unjustly and still sees them as people who should only stay at home.
A women should have a good job, but still be the main care taker of the family. A woman should be strong, but not too strong or shes masculine. These stereotypes are not helpful to society and only lead to judgement. Gender roles don’t just effect women, they hurt men too. "Men are Stuck" Emily Alpert Reyes discusses the stereotypes that surround men.
In today’s society, gender roles are now distributed more equally, and discrimination on the basis of gender has seen a marginal decrease. Burke 2012 states, “In this new age, men are often "house-husbands" while their wives go out to work. Many women who do things typically associated with men are as muscular as men, and indeed look like men. There are policewomen and female soldiers who are rougher than the men.” This shows that there are many male dominated activities that are now being pursued by females. These new developments and changes in gender roles have aided in the fight to have gender inequality and discrimination discontinued both in society and the workplace.
Within modern day society males and females are given the same educational opportunities, the way in which these opportunities are taken is what determines how males and females ought to be treated and thought of by society. Throughout the last century, there has been the identification of superior intellectual levels between males and females, these levels of intelligence are connected to prestige, gender identification and academic success. In “Mind Over Muscle” by David Brooks, the age of information has incorporated the intellectual difference between the sexes by displaying women as more academically efficient than their male counterpart. Throughout history women have been view by society, well by men, as incompetent, uneducated individuals
A majority of the world’s population is female. Yet despite the fact in many cultures females have often been treated as though they were a minority group. They have been the subject of strong negative stereotypes, and they have faced over discrimination in many spheres of life. (Baron, 1997) The difference in the way male and female are treated is a result of gender roles. Gender roles are the expectation, defined by society that indicates what appropriate behaviour is for men and women.
I couldn 't agree more with Mays in this article, a women can be more masculine and that does not make her a man, so why does society feel the need to force strict gender roles on everyone. Most people seem to see the world through male/female lenses because it makes them feel more comfortable and they believe it gives them somewhere to belong, but I feel as though we get so immersed in this strictly male/female world that we fail to recognize that some people don 't see through the same lens that we do. As a society we go through our everyday lives assigning genders to the smallest things like pink is for girls and football is for boys. Mays also talks about the topic of assigning genders to ideas in his article he says “We simply
Humans have always had a unique perspective on gender roles. Throughout history, women have somehow became less superior to men. There are multiple variables to how and why this came to be. Whether it was the agriculture revolution, influential literature, or even climate events from the Mesopotamian civilization, males have managed to be more dominant. There has also been harmful sexism perspectives passed down each generation that could have triggered what women can and cannot do.
This arrangement was practical in pre-modern times, but in contemporary society, such consideration is not essential. Over time social norms have changed, and women made inroads into male-dominated occupations. It is woman skills, not size or strength, which highly rewarded regarding money and prestige. Since 1980s girls in the US were more likely than boys to attend college and the growth of service economy that prefers skills that can learned at school created demand for female employees. For many men, traditional masculinity does not serve them well in the job market.
I think a person’s gender shouldn't matter too much in the role they play in their day to day life. Gender roles have been around forever. They have gotten a lot better, but women and men are still labeled to certain things and jobs. The traditional way of life would be for the man to do all of the hard work and have a job. On the other hand, the woman should stay at home so she can watch the kids and have time for cleaning and cooking.