Gender Categories Flashcards
How does language apply to gender studies?
It is an important component that shapes our social construction of reality. “Man” has often been a universal category, for instance. “mankind” referring to all people, regardless of gender
What is cisgender?
People whose sex category and gender identity match up
What is the biosocial perspective?
According to sexual characteristics we can categorize all human beings into two categories: male and female. In this thought, sex categories exist universally and objectively. Essentially, biology determines gender
How, in a biosocial perspective, can we divide people between women and men?
Women: vagina, breasts, non-facial hair, XX chromosomes
Men: penis, more muscles, facial hair, XY chromosomes
However: There are instances where these traits exists across the binary understanding
What is sexual dimorphism?
The idea that sex marks a distinction between two physically and genetically discrete categories of people
What is gender assignment?
Certain characteristics that helps to sort people objectively into two categories (male and female)
What is the social constructivists approach?
Gender is dynamic and diverse, there is no only 2 categories of gender. Sexual dimorphism is a claim and not the truth. Social meanings are attached to sex, that is why we have divided the world into to sexes in our world. It is culture that dictates how we understand sex. Gender produces sex through culture
What is intersex?
Some people can have both genetalia. It happens to 1.7% of all births. Often, parents and doctors decide through medical intervention what sex to give the child
What is special about hormones before puberty?
Sex hormones are not differentiated in children prior to puberty
What is transgender?
A broad label that includes a variety of people seeking to change, cross, or go beyond culturally defined gender categories. Transgender can be both people who seek surgery, but also people who don’t allign with their biological sex category
How young can people be when they realise they might be transgender?
Four and five year olds express that their biological sex category does not match their internal sense of who they are
What is the one-sex model?
From the antiquity in Greece. The idea was that female was not completely different than males, but inferior to males in a hierarchy with slaves etc.
What kind of cultures have a third sex?
Hijra in India and Bangladesh
Berdache among native americans
What do we mean by social differences when categorising gender?
Different cultures have different ways to distinquish gender
What do we mean by social differences when categorising gender?
Different cultures have different ways to distinquish gender
