Madam Teacher

Gender

As Edmund Leach observed, one of the things that marriage does is “Give either or both

spouses rights to the labor of the other.” This is necessary because the gendered division of labor

is one of the basic aspects of all societies. That is, a society in which males and females do

exactly the same things is unknown. Marriage creates a household that encompasses both male

and female tasks, theoretically creating a unit in which everything that needs to be done can be

done, regardless of who does it (which varies by culture).

Male and female, and other genders are subject to the same kinds of hierarchical

distinctions, advantages, and disabilities as classes, castes, ethnic groups, and social races.

Anthropologists approach gender as being culturally constructed, as well as biologically

determined. A person’s sex is determined by chromosomes, hormones and physical

characteristics. Gender, in contrast, is culturally defined and constructed, so that the rights,

duties and responsibilities associated with biological sex vary from group to group. Each culture

has its ‘gender scripts’ which define what it means to be male and female and how men and

women should interact in a variety of social settings. These scripts are learned through

enculturation and are legitimized and sanctioned through gender-related ideologies contained in

creation myths, and by rituals that validate gender role authority and dominance.

Gender Ideologies

In many cultures, males believe that they are spiritually superior to women and that

females are dangerous, weak, and untrustworthy. The male knowledge embraces secret male

initiation rites, male residence in a separate men’s house, from which women are excluded. Any

woman who admits to knowing the secrets of the cult is threatened with rape or death.

In contrast, in west African cultures, women are often portrayed as creative agents; their

mythological charters describe women as progenitors of the people and agents for the fertility of

the soil. Moreover, female deities are often found in societies where women are valued as food

producers – where women are actively engaged in producing crops and are farmers in their own

right. However, there is no ethnographically known case of matriarchy, a society in which

women are dominant.

The myth of matriarchy invariably highlights women’s failure as rulers — because

women did not know how to handle power — and reaffirms the inferiority of their present

position. In the case of the Mundurucu of Brazil, the myth describes the reversal of the social

order, when women controlled the sacred instruments. The women, however, did not know how

to protect the trumpets, and because of their incompetence, men took control of the instruments

and became the dominant sex.

The relativity of gender Hierarchies

How much of the male claim to spiritual superiority do women believe in societies where

it is professed? One must be skeptical that any subjugated group really believes the reasons that

the subjugators give for their differences in status.

One problem is that more ethnographies, until recently, were written by men. This has

led in many cases to underestimating the power of women in traditional societies and the female

view of society. A good example of this bias is accounts of menstruation. In many societies,

menstruating women are secluded in a menstrual hut, where they remain isolated until their

period is over. Among the Yurok of California, the male interpretation of the practice is that it

protects men from being polluted by menstrual blood. The female interpretation, though, is that

it is a privileged time in which women are allowed to be free from chores, to meditate on their

lives, and to gather spiritual strength. Male ethnographers never recorded the female perspective,

and presented the Yurok male explanation as the “Yurok view.”

Gender Hierarchies

The relative status of women and men in a society is difficult to define, because it include

so many viewpoints. Gender roles are affected by setting (public vs. private), by age, by kin

dynamics, class, race, and other dimensions of power and status. In other words, men and

women have multiple identities and perceptions of relative gender status and power relations that

are cross-cut by other hierarchies and ideologies.

The complexity of these features makes it difficult to determine whether women have

‘high status’ or low status. It is also possible for westerners to misinterpret behavior and to

evaluate public displays of politeness as manifestations of gender hierarchy.

For instance when a Machiguenga woman walks behind her husband in the forest it is not

showing subservience to him, but is being protected by him from enemies. Similarly, among the

Yanomamo, a woman will carry all the burdens while travelling. This is not because she is

judged to be inferior, but because it enables her husband to be ready in case they are attacked.

The activity “killing enemies” is gendered male in this case.

To Europeans, the payment of bridewealth may appear that women are treated as a

commodity, being bought and sold by male kinsmen, but African women insist that payment of

bridewealth is a sign of respect for them.

Despite varying definitions of gender roles, males tend in most societies to be assigned

more aggressive and violent roles than females.

Variations in Gender Hierarchies

Changes in gender roles are part of the broader evolutionary changes in the modes of

production and reproduction that have led to population growth, competition for resources,

political complexity, and increased stratification. Women in Prestate societies have in general

fared better in peaceful, noncompetitive environments. Male dominance is more pronounced in

environments where there is environmental stress, competition over resources, and warfare. In

state societies, the intensification of male controlled production has deprived women of access to

productive means and has undermined their status by eroding the economic and political integrity

of women’s kin groups.

Women Among Hunter-Gatherers

In the words of Eleanor Leacock, we cannot go from the proposition that ‘women are

subordinate as regards political authority in most societies’ to ‘women are subordinate in all

respects in all societies’. The very notions ‘equality’ and ‘inequality’ may represent ethnocentric

misunderstandings of the kinds of gender roles that exist in many societies.

For the most part, gender relationships among males and females in foraging societies are

fairly egalitarian. Men and women do different things, but those different things are not unequal.

The stereotype of men hunting and women gathering is generally true, but not always. The Agta

of the Luzon islands of the Philippines are an exception. There, women hunt deer and wild pigs

with knives, bows, and arrows.

The food resources collected by women generally provides more calories to the diet than

does the meat provided by men. That contribution, however, is often discounted by male

perspectives that view meat as more “powerful” or more “prestigious”. That is, men lie a lot.