Indira Singh, Week 1

The Gender Trap

By: Emily W. Kane

Summary

The author defines “the gender trap” as a set of expectations and structures that inhibit social change which in turn creates this gender inequality, which is prevalent in today’s world. In this article, she talks about how parents’ acts are not just the only factor in shaping their children’s gender. The children themselves, plus a host of other factors including schools, peers influence the process and do so in ways inextricably linked to the construction and constraints of race, class and sexuality.  Parents find themselves in the middle of a dynamic process of reproducing and resisting gendered patterns. They engage in dialogue with powerful social institutions, in everyday interactions with those around them, and carrying the baggage of their own beliefs about gender. They re-create gendered structures enthusiastically and hesitantly, directly and indirectly. They provide opportunities, reinforce or discourage outcomes, and model behavior in ways that shape gendered paths for their children. The author further gave an example saying that there’s a variety of attributes that parents consider unusual for girls but still encourage and want their daughters to pursue male oriented careers, which is a good sign of social change but at the same time, many parents see attributes such as nurturing and empathy towards others and fields like fashion to be the ideal type for their daughters. This combination of typical and atypical patterns leads them back into the gender gap, thwarting the very opportunities they seek to build. This also affects both the mental and physical health, restricts individual potential of both men and women. But it these disparities are more women centric than men.

The author talks about “Motherhood penalty”, a term gave by Michelle Budig and Paula England - Inequalities in domestic responsibility and the gendered wage gap are connected as well, with even larger wage gaps evident among parents. This pattern has been referred as Motherhood Penalty as parenthood is associated with higher earnings among men but lower earnings among women. Both the gender wage gap and the motherhood penalty foster women’s economic dependence on men, and shape a particularly harsh economic reality for single mothers and their children. This also shape the negative impact of divorce on the economic security of women and children.

The author further discusses that about the two tensions that rang through clearly were between biological and social explanations for childhood gender patterns, and between actions that reproduced versus those that resisted gendered expectations. In this article, it has been discussed that there are 5 types of people, in relation to gender inequality. These are:

·         “Naturalizers” interpret gendered childhoods as biological in origin and, though occasionally acting to adjust gendered structures, primarily reproduce them. Their concern about others’ judgment partly depends on whether their children display any gender nonconformity that makes the parents uncomfortable.

·         “Cultivators” act in a way that promotes gendered childhoods for their sons and daughters. They interpret the origins of gender patterns as largely social and express little concern about the judgments of others. For them, reproducing gender is a routine part of parenting, not something that evokes anxiety or concern.

·         “Refiners” highlight both biological and social forces in explaining gendered outcomes and act with roughly equal measures of resistance and conformity, always attentive to the actual and potential judgments of others.

·         “Innovators” resist gendered structures for their children and are unconcerned about the judgment of others.

·         “Resisters,” while even more opposed to gendered patterns for their children, display significant concern about being judged by others.

Further, the author says gender is socially constructed rather than biologically determined, and that gender relations are organized around power and the unequal distribution of social resources. In the words of sociologist Judith Lorber, gender is “a binary system of social organization that creates inequality. MacKinnon’s approach captures the fundamental assumptions of a power-oriented analysis of gender. The list of examples includes, at least, domestic violence, wage gaps, glass ceilings, occupational gender segregation and political power imbalances, divisions of household labor, constraints of body image and gendered patterns of self-esteem, sexual assault and violence against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered people, the feminization of poverty, eating disorders, steroid abuse, and gay youth suicide. These examples, which highlight power differences and inequalities, favor boys and men. The author identifies that there are three levels at which the social construction of gender takes place: individual, interactional, and institutional. 

The final argument made by the author was that a foundational idea that shapes her approach is intersectionality, the argument that gender, as a social construct, is inseparable from other social categories, including race, class, and sexuality.