Women Gender Study Writing Intensive Essay

The Social Construction of 
 Gender & Race

WGS 101 Fall 2018

The Social Construction of Gender

✤ To say that gender is socially constructed is not to suggest that gender meaningless

✤ Gender is real to the extent that it is felt as being real

✤ Violations of gender norms can result in sanctions that range of disapproval to violence or threats thereof

✤ Gender organizes social life

✤ Gender is part of a system of stratification — values/rewards masculinity

✤ Violations of gender norms can result in sanctions that range of disapproval to violence or threats thereof

Gender Organization of Social Life

✤ Socially created meanings, relationships & identities organized around reproductive differences

✤ Gender as structure: organizes a gender division of labor

✤ Work done in the home is devalued as women’s work; not regarded as economically productive

✤ At the individual level, gender norms impose sameness

✤ Suppresses variation within; exaggerates differences between

✤ Gender as process creates social differences that define male & female

✤ A process of ‘doing gender’ that we participate in

✤ A system of stratification that devalues women & defines the work women do as inferior to the work that men do

Multiracial Feminism

✤ Not a singular or unified version of feminism

✤ Gender is constructed by a range of interlocking inequalities

✤ Emphasizes intersectional nature of hierarchies

✤ Highlights relational nature of dominance and subordination

✤ Explores the interplay between structure and agency

✤ Comparatively analyzes the lived experiences of diverse groups of women’s