Sociology Homework assignment (due on today 7/22 11:59p.m.)

Answer the following questions in full sentences . Your answers should be 4-6 sentences, depending on the question. Include page numbers in your responses so that you can refer back to the reading during the discussion or when asking questions. 

Questions for West and Zimmerman’s (1987) “Doing Gender”:

1. How do the authors define the concepts of sex and sex category? How are they related and/or distinct?

2. How do the authors define gender? How is it related to and/or distinct from sex category?

3. Interpret the following quote: “Doing gender means creating differences between girls and boys and women and men that are not natural, essential, or biological. Once the differences have been constructed, they are used to reinforce the “essentialness” of gender” (West and Zimmerman 1987, p. 137).

4. How does their theory fit into the broader theoretical distinctions in sociology: macro vs. micro, objective vs. subjective, and agency vs. structure?

Questions for Crenshaw’s (1989) “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex:”

5. Why and how does Crenshaw (1989) critique antidiscrimination law? How does the law ignore the intersection of race and sex?

6. Why and how does Crenshaw (1989) critique feminist theories? How does she think it should be changed?