SOCIOLOGY ESSAY

Evaluate how gender is no longer a major

division in modern society nor in
establishing ones identity (20 Marks)

Within society today, gender is not as important a role as it once was

many years ago. Gender was defined by our norms and expectations of
what we thought a man or woman should do, and not rather who they
actually were. Biologically, man and women are different, but gender has
been created over time though the medias constructed view of positions
in society. Due to the patriarchal society that we live in, we have been
conditioned into accepting the role of women as being less important than
men. However, due to gradual changes both consciously and
subconsciously within our society we have become more tolerant and
accepting of the role men and women play, and that some might want to
go against the typical stereotype we are meant to believe.

The media is perhaps one of the most influential factors when it comes to
the views of the genders. The term gender was exclusively created by
the media as a way of classifying the roles of men and women. Women
are more commonly targeted however, as theorists McRobbie (1978) and
Ferguson (1984) discovered that magazines such as FHM objectify women
and treat them as commodities, the complete opposite to how men were
seen as having more worth due to the patriarchal society. An unknown
liberal feminist showed through a study that women subconsciously act
towards how they are expected to be viewed by the media. This can show
us that even from a young age, girls and women are told by the media
how they should act and behave, and so are formed by pre-existing views
into who they are, instead of developing their own opinions and views.
The theorist Simone de Beauvoir stated one is not born a woman, one
becomes one. This can show us that over time a women cannot be
identified as being a woman due to her biological features but due to the
expectations that our society has set up for her. Therefore if she does not
follow these rules as it were, her identity is severely jeopardised. Simply
being a woman is not good enough for society, but unless she proves
herself to be one, then she cannot be one. This can be linked to the
Symbolic Interation theory, which claims that the symbolic nature of a
certain person or event is more important than the person/object itself.
Although physically, her sex is defined as being that of a woman, the more
symbolic and actions/gender of the woman have a bigger influence on
how she is viewed.

The same can in some ways be shown for men, but rather the reverse.
Whereas woman are seen as being typically feminine, the idea of men
being typically masculine may be at risk, says the sociology theorist
Stephen M. Whitehead, who writes that over the years, men are just as
much as risk as women. Due to the stereotypcial view of men originally
being that of an extremely muscular, unemotional man, from the turn of
the 1990s and even before, some theorists argue, men have seen a crisis
to their masculinity. Due to many views such as radical feminism and to
some extent, feminism itself, which state that the equal rights for both
men and women should be equalised, men can feel as though the
preconceived image of themselves being the stronger and dominant
gender may be waning. An image of camp men and gay men has also
become strong within the media, and although we live in a patriarchal
society, those at the metaphorical bottom (in this case WOMEN) will
always try to subvert the views and power of those at the top (here it
being MEN.) We can associate this idea with marxist views, which state
that due to capitalism, stronger more powerful corporations have more
control over the majority of society. In this way, men also have more
control over women, and so women will try to equalise the field. Men
therefore are maybe seen as being sexist if the identity that they want to
ascertain for themselves is that of being strong and in control. This goes
against the ideas presented by Judith Butler and the Queer Theory idea,
which states that we are free to create our own gender. We are not, if our
identity is stigmatised before we have even adopted it.

Rudiford (1994) claims that due to the changing industry and the fact that
more women have become the breadwinners in households, women have
become more socialized at work, and so have more of a presence then
men at the moment within society. In this respect, gender still has an
effect on who / what your identity is shown as, due to the fact that women
and feminisms are trying to reverse the stereotypes imposed on them,
while at the same time inadvertently crushing the image of men. It is
almost as though for one gender to have an image that is not
discriminated or stereotyped by the other gender, the other gender must
themselves drop their identity! And so a vicious cycle is established, in
which as one gender ascertains their place within society, they make the
other gender feel left out so they try to ascertain themselves and the
cycle continues.
Oakley explored a different avenue, in which he claimed that the parents
of the children are at blame when we try to discover who gives people the
stereotypical views that they grow up believing subconsciously. He
showed that as the child grows up, it is their sex not their gender that
determines what the parent feeds the child. Because the parent will
always mediate what the child sees, they have the power to say only show
Barbie play sets to girls and Ken play sets to men. The parent gives the
child what they think they want, when in actuality they are feed the child
what they have already been conditioned to give them by their parents,
and so the argument then falls to who is to blame for the constant.