Tutorial Notes for Gender and Sexuality Essentialism versus Social Constructionism Nature versus nurture Examples of Essentialism Sociobiology Evolutionary psychology Orthodox Freudian Psychoanalysis Critiques of Essentialism Essentialism ignores historical and cultural variation in gender roles and definitions. Social roles can have biological effects as well as vice versa. Tendency to generalize from particular cases to whole populations and different social contexts (e.g. Freud and his female patients). No identified gender characteristics genes. Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology based on speculation without hard evidence. The role of power is ignored - people are often compelled to behave and think as they do under promise of rewards and threat of sanctions. Social Constructionism R.W. Connell identifies four aspects of social construction of gender: 1) Power Relations 1
2) Production Relations - division of labour 3) Cathexis - Emotional Relations and roles 4) Symbolism Gender Socialisation How do children learn to be male or female? Play Children's literature School Mass Media Formation of gender ideologies (ideas about what it means to be male or female, how males and females ought to behave, feel and think, etc.) Gender and Sexuality Heterosexuality and heteronormativity The causes of Homosexuality/ the causes of Heterosexuality The history of homosexuality and of heterosexuality Homophobia - sanctions and violence against homosexuals Scientific and political/activist origins of gay liberation movement. Combined to work towards a cultural and social situation in which homosexuality is recognised/portrayed as a normal variant of human sexuality. 2
Gender Inequality Types of inequality between men and women: Work and income Public freedoms Social positions and status Male Aggression against women: Rape Sexual harassment Feminism Origins in Europe: Exceptional female voices in literature and the arts, in positions of authority prior to modernity - Julian of Norwich, Hildegard of Bingen, Christine de Pizan (author of The Book of the City of Ladies), Aphra Behn, etc. In early modern times: Mary Wollstonecraft - A Vindication of the Rights of Women, J.S. Mill - The Subjection of Women. First Wave Feminism, late 19th and early 20th centuries - the Suffragettes and the struggle for the right to vote Second Wave Feminism, post second world war, at its height in 60s and 70s - Key texts: Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex; Betty Freidan, The Feminine 3