1

Gender
• Sex and Gender
• Recurrent Gender Patterns
• Gender Among Foragers
• Gender Among Horticulturalists
• Gender Among Agriculturalists
• Patriarchy and Violence
• Gender and Industrialism
• Sexual Orientation
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Sex and Gender

• Sex – biological differences
• Gender – cultural construction of male
and female characteristics
• Sexual dimorphism – marked
differences in male and female biology
besides the primary and secondary
sexual features

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Sex and Gender

• Gender roles – tasks and activities that
a culture assigns to the sexes
• Gender stereotypes – oversimplified,
strongly held ideas of characteristics of
men and women

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Sex and Gender

• Gender stratification – unequal
distribution of rewards (socially valued
resources, power, prestige, and personal
freedom) between men and women
– Reflects different positions in social hierarchy

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5

Recurrent Gender Patterns

• Subsistence contributions of men and
women are roughly equal cross-
culturally
– In domestic activities, female labor
dominates
– In extradomestic activities, male labor
dominates
– Women are primary caregivers, but men
often play a role
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6

Recurrent Gender Patterns

• Differences in male and female
reproductive strategies
– Men mate, within and outside marriage,
more than women do
– Double standards that restrict women more
than men illustrate gender stratification
– Gender stratification lower when domestic
and public spheres not clearly
distinguished
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Gender Among Foragers

• The Public-Domestic Dichotomy
– Strong differentiation between the home
and the outside world is called the
domestic-public dichotomy, or the private-
public contrast
• The activities of the domestic sphere tend to be
performed by women
• The activities of the public sphere tend to be
restricted to men

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8

Gender Among Foragers

• Public activities tend to have greater
prestige than domestic ones, which
promotes gender stratification
• Sex-Linked Activities
– All cultures have a division of labor based
on gender, but the particular tasks
assigned to men and women vary from
culture to culture.

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9

Gender Among Foragers

• Almost universally, the greater size,
strength, and mobility of men have led
to their exclusive service in the roles of
hunters and warriors
– Lactation and pregnancy also tend to
preclude the possibility of women being the
primary hunters in foraging societies
– !Kung San

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10

Gender among Horticulturalists

• Reduced Gender Stratification –

Matrifocal Societies
– Survey of matrifocal (mother-centered,
often with no resident husband-father)
societies indicates male travel combined
with a prominent female economic role
reduced gender stratification
– Igbo (Nigeria) demonstrated that gender
roles might be filled by members of either
sex
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11

Gender among Horticulturalists

• Increased Gender Stratification-
Patrilineal-Patrilocal Societies
– Spread of patrilineal-patrilocal societies
has been associated with pressure on
resources and increased local warfare
– Patrilineal-patrilocal complex
concentrates related males in villages,
which solidifies their alliances for warfare

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12

Gender Among Horticulturalists

• Patrilineal-patrilocal tends to enhance
male prestige opportunities
– Results in relatively high gender
stratification (e.g., highland Papua-New
Guinea)
– Women do most of the cultivation, cooking,
and raising children, but are isolated from
the public domain
– Males dominate the public domain (politics,
feasts, warfare)
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13

Gender Among Horticulturalists

• Women dominated horticulture in 64%
of the matrilineal societies and in 50%
of the patrilineal societies

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14

Gender among Agriculturalists

• When economy based on agriculture,
women typically lose role as primary
cultivators
– Women were main workers in 50% of
horticultural societies but only 15% in
agricultural societies
– Gender stratification associated with plow
agriculture rather than with intensive
cultivation

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15

Patriarchy and Violence

• Patriarchy – political system ruled by
men in which women have inferior
social and political status
– Societies that feature a full-fledged
patriarchy, replete with warfare and
intervillage raiding, adopt such practices as
dowry murders, female infanticide, and
clitoridectomy

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16

Patriarchy and Violence

• Family violence and domestic abuse of
women worldwide problems
– With spread of women’s rights movement
and human rights movement, attention to
domestic violence and abuse of women
increased
– Patriarchal institutions persist in what
should be a more enlightened world

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17

Cash Employment of American Mothers, Wives, and

Husbands, 1960-2002*

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18

Earnings in the U.S. by Gender and Job Type

for Year-Round Full-Time Workers, 2003*

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Gender and Industrialism

• Gender roles changing rapidly in
North America
– “Traditional” idea that “a woman’s place is
in the home” developed among middle-
and upper-class Americans as
industrialism spread after 1900
– Attitudes about gendered work varied with
class and region
– Woman’s role in the home stressed during
periods of high unemployment
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Gender and Industrialism

• Both men and women constrained by their
cultural training, stereotypes, and
expectations
• The Feminization of Poverty
– Increasing representation of women and
their children among America’s poorest
people
• Consequences in regard to living standards
and health are widespread
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Gender and Industrialism

• The Feminization of Poverty
– Contributing Factors
• Male migration
• Civil strife
• Divorce
• Abandonment
• Widowhood
• Unwed adolescent parenthood

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22

Median Annual Income of U.S. Households by

Household Type, 2001

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Sexual Orientation
• Person’s habitual sexual attraction to,
and sexual activities with
– Persons of the opposite sex,
heterosexuality
– Persons of the same sex, homosexuality
– Both sexes, bisexuality

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Sexual Orientation
• Recently in U.S., tendency has been to
see sexual orientation as fixed and
biologically based
– Culture always plays a role in molding
individual sexual urges to a collective norm
– Sex acts involving people of the same sex
were absent, rare, or secret in only 37% of
76 societies studied by Ford and Beach

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Sexual Orientation
• Various forms of same-sex sexual
activity considered normal and
acceptable
– Sudanese Azande males shifted from sex
with older men (as male brides), to sex
with younger men (as warriors), to sex with
women (as husbands)
– Etoro in Papua New Guinea believed
limited lifetime supply of semen that boys
had to acquire orally from older men
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The Location of the Etoro, Kaluli and Sambia in

Papua New Guinea

The western part

of the Island of
New Guinea is
part of Indonesia.
The eastern part
of the island is the
independent
nation of Papua
New Guinea,
home of the
Etoro, Kaluli, and
Sambia
©2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

© 2008 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.