Ch 10. Gender Stratification

Question 1

Gender

Answer 1

Personal traits and social positions that members of a society attach to being male or female

Question 2

Gender Stratification

Answer 2

The unequal distribution of wealth, power, and privilege between men and women

Question 3

• Margaret Mead’s research (Gender in Global Perspective)

Answer 3

Men and women behaved very differently in different societies (some men had female roles, and some women had male roles)

Question 4

• George Murdoch’s research (Gender in Global Perspective)

Answer 4

In most pre-industrial societies, hunting and warfare fall to men and domestic duties to women, but beyond this pattern, societies showed variation in tasks

Question 5

The socially constructed nature of gender identities means gender identities are…

Answer 5

• Are not stable or fixed
• Do not need to be congruent with sex assigned at birth
• Are not polar opposites
• Gender inequality is reinforced by gender stereotypes
• One stereotype that prevails is the beauty myth (the idea that women are overwhelmingly required to exhibit a certain physical appearance)

Question 6

Stats regarding Working Men and Women

Answer 6

• Women are 47.7% of the labour force (2022)
• In 2020, 63.4% of women were in the labour force compared to 71.9% of men
• Women dominate helping professions (pink collared jobs), and men dominate most senior positions and trades
• Pipeline theory (as we see more women to enter the workplace, we should see representation of women in STEM or men dominated careers. In reality, we haven’t seen this played out.)

Question 7

Examples of Pink Collar Jobs

Answer 7

• School teachers, counsellors
• Paraprofessionals, in legal, social, community, and educational services
• Administrative positions and office workers
• Nursing
• Health care support staff
• Administration in financial services
• Human resources and business services
• Customer and information services
• Social and community service professionals
• Cashiers
• Food and beverage services
• Policy, program researchers, consultants and officers

Question 8

Stats about Gender, Income, and Wealth

Answer 8

• Women earn about 89 cents for every $1 men earn (2022) (same education, same task)
• The average income for women in 2022 was $36,250 and for men was $46,210
• Kind of jobs: sales and service
• Women still bear more responsibility for parenting
• Discrimination: a glass ceiling

Question 9

Housework: Women’s “second shift”

Answer 9

• Women work full-time and do most of the housework and childcare
• Men support the idea of women entering workforce but resist taking on an equal share of household duties

Question 10

Stats regarding Gender and Education

Answer 10

• Women now earn more than half of under- and postgraduate degrees
• Enrolment in math and physical science has increased
• Women accounted for 57.3% of all graduates in 2017, and they outnumbered male graduates at every level of education except at the doctoral level, where they accounted for 45.6% of all graduates. (Statistics Canada)

Question 11

Gender and Politics

Answer 11

• Women are underrepresented globally
• Just under 23% of seats in the world’s 193 parliaments

Question 12

Violence Against Women

Answer 12

• Violence against women is 1.8% higher than the rate of violent crimes against men
• Men are more likely to be the perpetrators, being responsible for 83% of violent crimes committed against women
• Indigenous women are more likely than non-Indigenous women to report harsh violence, as well as a higher likelihood of fearing for their lives
• Our culture tends to define “real men” in ways that result in a higher crime rate, with a high number of male perpetrators (men also tend to not report violence done against them, especially if done by a female)
• Men’s lives involve more stress and isolation than women’s lives; the suicide rate for men is three times higher than for women

Question 13

Talcott Parsons’ (Structural-Functional Analysis)

Answer 13

Men and women have complementary traits in socialization:
- Instrumental roles (rational, competitive for boys)
- Expressive roles (emotional responsiveness for girls)

Criticism: is it a correlation or causation? Theoretically, we can have complementary traits, but that doesn’t justify stratification.

Question 14

Symbolic-Interaction Analysis

Answer 14

• Gender affects everyday interaction in a number of ways
• Women typically engage in more eye contact than men do
• Men more power socially than women; women expected to be more deferential towards others holding more social power
• Individuals socially construct the reality they experience as they interact every day
• Gender is an element of personal “performances”

Question 15

Frederich Engels: (Social-Conflict Analysis)

Answer 15

• Men gained power over women in the past
• Capitalism depends on women consuming
• Capitalism needs men to be the workers

Question 16

Basic Ideas of Feminism

Answer 16

• Working to increase equality
• Expanding human choice
• Eliminating gender stratification
• Ending sexual violence
• Promoting sexual freedom

Question 17

Liberal feminism

Answer 17

Freedom to develop own talents and interests

Question 18

Radical feminism

Answer 18

Eliminate the idea of gender
Revolution for an egalitarian, gender-free society

Question 19

Socialist feminism

Answer 19

Capitalism increases patriarchy by concentrating wealth and power in the hands of a small number of men

Question 20

Intersection Theory

Answer 20

The study of the interaction of race, class and gender, often leading to multiple dimensions of disadvantage