The Impact Of Gender And Cultural Differences On Children And Child Welfare
Introduction
In order for children to grow up mentally and physically well, agencies of socialization are needed as during this process, they will learn the basic values and norms that will help them in their later life. A family is the most important socio-economic institutions of our society as it ensures the continuity of the society by not only reproducing new members or future members of the society to help them in the transition to adulthood but also help them to deal with the ageing population. Children are humans who are not physically mature enough to live or survive on their own. A child is not only social but also biological because childhood is socially constructed that is it varies from cultures and at different times in history. Here, are some examples of rights and responsibilities of a child. Firstly; Compulsory schooling begins that is each child has the right to go to school at the age of 5 and secondly, you have to pay child’s fare on buses.
Gender Socialization and Its Importance
According to Bandura’s Social Learning Theory, we learn by imitation and modeling. When giving birth to a newborn baby, the first thing that we think about is to know the gender of the child whether it is a boy or girl and by knowing the baby’s sex, we can predict things such as for example, a girl is likely to live more than a boy, boys are considered to be strong and brave whereas girls are meant to be pretty and good-looking. Gender is a very important aspect of a person identity as it defines who we are and who we will become in the future even if at some proportions our sex has also a role to play with it. Gender differ from society to society as we have different cultures. For example, in the past, women’s place was considered to be at home looking after children, doing the household chores and providing support to their husband but nowadays, women has also got the same right as men such as to work and provide the basic needs to their family. But even with this dramatical change, there are some stereotypes between men’s and women’s gender roles. “Parental attitudes toward their children have a strong impact on the child’s developing sense of self and self-esteem, with parental warmth and support being key factors for the child,” says Witt.
One method to stop ‘Gender Stereotyping’ is the Gender-neutral socialization that is avoiding to paint the child’s bedroom according to his or her sex(pink or blue)or even allowing the child to choose his or her clothes. In 2011, ‘’a child named Storm Stocker-Witterick drew national media attention because her parents, Kathy Witterick and David Stocker, decided not to publicly reveal the child’s gender. According to their profile in The Star, the parents did not want the sex designated by the doctor to influence the gender their child would later identify with. “Sex is what is between your legs, and gender is what you think of yourself as a person,” says Jazz, 10, the couple’s eldest child. At the age of five, Storm officially declared her preferred pronoun as “she’’ [ The Northwest Primary Care Blog]. This couple decided to raise their child as ‘’genderless’’.
Parents may encourage their sons and daughters to take similar sports like playing the drums, do housework and wear clothes without strong gender connotations. Fashion somehow represent the identity that is it enable us to know the social standing meaning friends we spent time with. Peer pressure contributes to gender stereotypes especially among boys who tend to discriminate those who show feminine traits. (Morrow,2006)
Ann Oakley, a feminist psychologist, propose four ways in which gender socialization takes place in early childhood. She talks about Manipulation that is parents encourage behavior that is seen as ‘normal’ for example, the father may encourage the boys to come and watch him repairing the car. Secondly, we have canalization that is, children are guided by their parents to choose their toys and activities seen as appropriate for their sex such as miniature kitchen for girls and boys get car toys for example. Thirdly, we have the verbal appellations that is the way parents addresses themselves to their children such as ‘good girl’ or ‘naughty boy’. And lastly, we have different activities, for example girls are expected to help their mom with the household chores whereas the boys can go out and play with their friends.
Gender and Education
In the 1970s and 1980s, girls were not given the opportunity to take the same subjects as the boys and they also get lower paid jobs and statuses. Feminists tend to justify these discriminations by saying that for men, girls have no right to get good education because eventually in the future they will be mothers and housewives. Secondly, they suggest that for men, if females were given to much education this will spoil their feminine nature. Fortunately, for us, with the awareness of gender issues, we have been able to rise up the level of achievements and therefore making a change to ensure that both males and females get the same ‘equal’ opportunities and thus breaking this vicious circle that women are created to do the households chores and stay indoors. During the past few years, girl’s performance in schools has risen whereas boy’s achievement has declined as girls work more consistently rather than boys who are easily distracted and they are willing to spend time doing their homework.
Cultural Diversity and Gender
Culture refers to the things that are shared commonly by the members of the society. For example, in some cultures it is normally accepted to eat with your hands whereas in others, chopsticks are used. The way we speak, we dress ourselves make us different from other cultures. The early lives of a child are vital because through the process of socialization, they will learn how to behave in the society. Hence very occasionally, children are not socialized and therefore do not learn a culture. One case is the ‘’The Wild Boy of Aveyron’’ a boy found in France in 1800. They found him at the age of 11. They described him as more animal than a human being as he spoke only in strange-sounding cries. He also refused to put on clothes and they tried to change him but the attempt was partly successful as he could master only a few words. The lack of culture shared with others has made him missed out the important things that make us human. Our social life defines our progress as it is built on the interconnectedness with have with others.
Nature v/s Nurture
The ‘nature versus nurture debate’, nature refers to the biological differences and nurture refers to the differences arising culture and socialization. Some people think that behavior is biological nor social such as Lombroso who believed that ‘’criminals were throwbacks to an earlier, primitive, type of human, and that they could be recognized by their appearance’’. Others believed that they were the superior races. G. P. Murdock argued that in most societies that he has gathered information, men and women had different roles that were based on their biological differences.
Rodrigues
Still in Rodrigues, we find this difference in the roles even if we are now living in the modern society. Girls who have been born in middle class families are able to go to school and have greater chance of achieving the best performance at school as facilities such as tuitions and internet connection are available at their place, therefore they can make research whereas those in the low income families most of time, they left school at young age either because of teenage pregnancy or financially they cannot afford material expenses needed at school. We can also see women doing the man’s job that is looking after the animals, and are doing agriculture maybe because of the lack of education or they been raised like this. in Rodrigues there are mainly farmers and fishermen and I have observed that most of the boys left school at the age of 16 to go fishing with their fathers as they can make money easily in this sector or searching for mechanical jobs and most of the girls who are younger than me (under 21) are already mothers and therefore unlike the boys, they are not able to work and this results in thinking that Rodrigues is still ruling under the traditional societies where women carry fetuses, giving birth and breastfeed at a very young age. Although it is a taboo to get pregnant at a younger age, girls nowadays are just repeating the circle that our parents did before that is early marriage.
Unemployment and Lack of Education
Unemployment and lack of education the parents may result in problems in families such as violence against women; Rodrigues is still under the patriarchal system where the husband is the only breadwinner but still some women are willing to get out of this kind of oppression for them to be valued or to prove that ‘they can’. Marital conflict or separation may impact on the emotional state of the child as they are experiencing violence and neglect in their home itself. Later they may reproduce the same act with their partner and their future kids also.
Convention Act for the Rights of the Child
The Convention Act for the rights of the child is about the right and welfare of the child in which the Ministry of Gender Equality, Child Development and Family Welfare with the help of NGOs and the civil society are involved for them to work together on a ‘’comprehensive Children’s Bill’’. Relevant stakeholders such as the Attorney General’s Office, the family, Counselors, NEF, Ministry of education, Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Social Security are joining hands with a high-powered committee under the chairpersonship of the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Gender Equality, Child Development and Family Welfare to deal with the problems affecting the well-being, the protection, development and welfare of children. Each and every party has a specific role and responsibility to play for them to maintain coherence and objectivity when dealing with such cases.
The Ministry of Gender Equality, Child Development and Family Welfare has set up the National Parental Program on 30 May 2007 which provides guidance to parents about the protection of the child against any kind of abuse. ‘’The National Children’s Council ensures coordination of workshops and training sessions for teachers, resource persons working with children in Children’s Clubs, Pre-Primary Schools and other groups like Scout Associations’’.
The State Party pays attention to all and every Mauritian citizen regarding the regional disparities whether they live in Mauritius, Rodrigues or Agalega. ‘’In Rodrigues, all children in the Zone Education Prioritaire (ZEP) school benefit from a balanced meal each day in addition to the School Feeding Project from which all pupils attending the other thirteen primary schools’ benefit. The aim is to combat absenteeism, especially among pupils from low income families’’.
The Child Development Unit
It was setup in 1995 and is about the protection of the child of any kind of abuse whether physical or emotional regardless on their sex, age, race or region. It ensures the survival, development and participation of the Mauritian child as per the convention on the rights of children.
Service Provided by Professionals
Grants are provided to relief the parents coming from low income families that is social benefits (in terms of disabilities). For example, we have the post-natal surgery which is free, also the Education, Food Aid in schools, psychologists provided in schools to help those showing behavioral problems.
Conclusion
We have the responsibility to reduce acts of child abuse and neglect that are serious threats to a child’s healthy development by providing support and offering protection to all children within their family by guiding them into the right path for them to be a functional member of the society as they represents the future. For Children to be productive, we must help each other if we want the good society we envision for our children. And we see that the Ministry of Gender Equality, Child development and Family Welfare are willing to cope with the parents by addressing them different aspects of child maltreatment and its impact on their child emotional state. Small or innovative programs need to be provided to raise the awareness of child welfare.
Yoder. “Socialization Practices: Learning to Be Ourselves in a Gender Polarized World. ” (1995): 51-79. Web. 25 Jan. 2016.
Sociology by A. Giddens,3rd edition,Policy,1999.
