Gender and Society: the Difference Between Sex and Gender

This is gender and society essay that will address the question: “Drawing on the academic theory and literature, examine the differences between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’.' This short academic essay aims to explore the difference between sex and gender using a variety of academic theories. Concepts surrounding stereotypes and cultural social norms will be explored to offer a comprehensive understanding of sex and gender.

Sociologists and social scientists see sex and gender as distinctly different concepts. Sex applies to the physiological distinctions between females and males, such as both primary sex reproduction features as well as secondary attributes like those of muscularity and height. Gender is a concept used to refer to the social or cultural differentiation of being male or female. Gender specification is the degree in which someone identifies as being either female or male. An individual’s sex, which is determined by their biology, sometimes does not correspond with their gender. Consequently, the concepts of sex and gender are not interchangeable, with example of a baby born with male genitals will be classified as male but may later in life associate himself with the feminine aspects of his culture. The concept of an individual’s ‘sex’ applies to biological or physical differences, the attributes of sex within different human cultures will not vary significantly.

In regard to gender, it can be separated in to two subcategories, identity and stereotype. Gender identity is the idea that an individual’s sex and gender do not have to be the same but can be specific. Such conceptions of appropriate behaviour set by society establish gender stereotypes for both females and males, which can lead an individual to deny their gender identity because they don’t adhere to the societal ‘norms’ of gender. ‘Gender socialisation’ or ‘gender roles’ “are society’s expectations of the proper behaviour, attitudes and activities of males and females, that must be taught”. Simone de Beauvoir, discuses in her book the second sex, ‘One is not born but becomes a woman’. While this quotation indicates a break between the genetic 'to be born' and the social 'to become', Beauvoir 1953 did not always have the conceptual synthesis of sex versus gender. However, this research has profoundly influenced the major feminist philosophy and gender theories that would follow. The sex and gender differentiation were not established until the late 1960s, when Stoller's psychological dissertation was first published in 1968, written by a psychologist and a leader in the advancement of the concept of gender identification. Together with psychologists like Stoller, feminists have found it helpful to differentiate between sex and gender. This helped them to claim that many discrepancies between males and females were socially generated and therefore changeable. Kane also discussed that children aged four to five are firmly entrenched in culturally appropriate gender roles. However, it is seen by some that “Masculinities (and femininities) come into existence at particular times and are always subject to change”.

Society is a struggle for supremacy within groups like men versus women, competing for resources according to the conflict theory. When dominant group leaders set the guidelines for performance and advancement in culture, it is hard for women to rise above men. Gender stratification is not exclusive to certain countries by division of labour. The concept of stratification applies to a framework where groups of people have differential exposure to basic, valuable social resources. All communities identify work by gender, according to George Murdock’s classic study, Overview of World Cultures. Within Murdock’s study of the division of labour within the societies globally, he notices that the greater respect was provided in almost every case to the occupations allocated to men.

To sum up gender and society subject expectation essay, it is acknowledged that gender is socially constructed. The social construction of gender refers to the way in which societal meanings of the cultural appropriateness of sexual behaviour influence people’s perceptions of both gender and sexuality. This is in contrast to race, class and orientation hypotheses that connect male and female actions to biological determinism that men and women can’t act differently due to the difference in their anatomy.

Reference

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