SOC275 - Sociology of Gender

Main Questions Does gender difference produce gender inequality? What is Sex? What is Gender? What is hegemonic masculinity, subordinated masculinity, and emphasized femininity? The Politics of Gender Inequality Two cases of gender inequality: The labour market and politics The gender Wage Cap: The difference between men’s wage and women’s wage. Women tend to work part-time Men earn a dollar for example. Gender wage cap in Ontario in 2011 is 26%. This means that when men earn a dollar, women ea

Summary Review of the key concepts: Hegemonic and subordinate masculinity and femininity A Social Constructionist Perspective: Difference, power, and the social institutions Varieties of feminisms Hegemonic Masculinity More of relational terms, instead of being fixed. These masculinities are plural, within different types of masculinity IN RELATION TO ONE ANOTHER. One masculinity is hierarchy of another Masculinity is not fixed, but instead created by society based on standards A particular form

Families in Crisis? We are losing the traditional nuclear family, heterosexual family, middle-class family, less-divorce or no divorce family The nuclear family in the 1950s is in fact not traditional, but is a particular family form in the historical period in North America. It has never been a traditional family. It is a modern form of family Although we think of the family as a private sphere apart from the competitive world of the economic and political life, the family has never been a worl

Second Shift and the Sleepover Common household formation in Canada: Both husband and wife work outside home. Once both men and women come back home, it is mostly women who take on the responsibility of productive labour at home The issue is that women are extremely fatigue because they are handling both paid work and housework There are many households where division of labor is common In a single-parent household, when it comes to siblings, it’s usually the daughter that takes on the household

The Modern Divide Between the Public and Private Sphere Virtually every society has a gendered division of labour that must be done in order for the society as a whole to survive Along with industrialization, there was a huge shift in how work was understood. The place of work became outside the home, which is a public sphere where work happened, and home as private sphere where reproduction, domestic responsibilities happened In the twentieth century, the rate of women entering the labour forc

The Case of Audi Commercial (2013 Superbowl) The mother gives emotional support to the boy, with flowers. The father gives him car keys. The prom girl is depicted as emphasized feminity, as she is used as a prop (sexual object) The male is shown as being brave, doing something outrageous by kissing the girl. Her boyfriend beats him Another stereotype depicted is men being reckless, breaking the rules (going over speed limit) The Media as a Primary Institution of Socialization Five primary instit

19th Century / The invention of Companionate Marriage Men’s friendship as the noble virtues of bravery and loyalty: Greek and Roman myths to Renaissance Women’s friendship was considered inferior and shallow in comparison. They were considered not good at forming deep bonds among themselves Men before were the owners and subjects of intimacy. The intimacy among men (deep friendship) during the Greek and Roman times. Friendship was celebrated as the highest expression of the noblest virtues (brav

Can be more gendered than this most individual, private organism We dress, pose, style, tattoo, pierce, shape our bodies with a wide range of cultural signs and symbols. Our bodies become social texts that we construct to be ‘read’ by others Our bodies are then neither private property nor simple biological entities. They are shaped, made meaningful, and examined by our relations with the gendered society Gender and Disability In our culture, disability is often ignored or rendered invisible, se

Summary Gender alone is a highly significant predictor of violent behaviour All over the world, men constitute 98% of all persons arrested for rape and vast majority of those arrested for murder, robbery, assault, family violence, and disorderly conduct. Men are more violent than women Masculinity and Violence Male tendency to violence is related to men’s greater tendency toward risk-taking behaviours and rule-breaking in general In popular media, there are tons of examples of violent expression