Anthropology
Appreciating Human Diversity
Fifteenth Edition
Conrad Phillip Kottak
University of Michigan
McGraw-Hill
© 2013 McGraw-Hill Companies. All Rights Reserved.
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GENDER
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GENDER
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Sex and Gender
Recurrent Gender Patterns
Gender Roles and Gender Stratification
Gender in Industrial Societies
Beyond Male and Female
Sexual Orientation
18-3
GENDER
• How are biology and culture expressed in
human sex/gender systems?
• How do gender, gender roles, and gender
stratification correlate with other social,
economic, and political variables?
• What is sexual orientation, and how do
sexual practices vary cross-culturally?
18-4
SEX AND GENDER
Our attributes as adults are determined both by our genes and by our environment during growth and
development
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Issues of nature versus nurture
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Women and men differ genetically
• Women – XX chromosomes; Men – XY chromosomes
• Father determines baby’s sex
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Chromosomal differences – expressed in hormonal and physiological contrasts
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Sexual dimorphism: marked differences in male and female biology besides the primary and
secondary sexual feature; reduction in sexual dimorphism during human evolution
• Differences in height, weight, strength, and longevity
• Height – men tend to be taller
• Weight – men tend to weigh more
• Strength – men tend to be stronger
• Considerable overlap between the sexes in height, weight, and strength
• Longevity – women tend to live longer
• Sex differences are biological
• Gender refers to the cultural construction of whether someone is male, female, or something
else
18-5
SEX AND GENDER
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Traditional images of masculinity and femininity do not always apply
Gender roles: tasks and activities that a culture assigns to the sexes
Gender stereotypes: oversimplified, strongly held ideas of characteristics of men and women
Gender stratification: unequal distribution of rewards between men and women, reflecting
different positions in a social hierarchy
• Margaret Mead studied three societies: the Arapesh, Mundugumor, and Tchambulie (all on
the same island)
• Mundugumor and Tchambulie challenged traditional ideas of gender roles
• Rosaldo studied Ilongots – gender differences are related to positive cultural value placed on
adventure, travel, and knowledge for the external world
• Men visit different places and women stay home
• Men receive acclaim as a result; women have inferior prestige because they lack external
experiences
• High male prestige does not necessarily entail economic or political power held by men over
their families; in stateless societies, gender stratification is more obvious with regard to
prestige than wealth
Ann Stoler – the economic determinants of gender status include freedom or autonomy (in
disposing of one’s labor and its fruits) and social power (control over the lives, labor, and
produce of others)
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Figure 18.1: Location of Ilongots in the Philippines
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RECURRENT GENDER
PATTERNS
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Ethnologists compare ethnographic data from several cultures (crosscultural) to discover and explain similarities and differences
Cross culturally – certain activities can be done by men, women, or both
(such as planting and harvesting)
These are cultural generalities, not universals (Table 18.1)
• Most societies, men build boats, work with wood, and hunt; women
gather firewood, gather plants/vegetables, and prepare food. However,
there are exceptions:
• Hidatsa women build boats
• Pawnee women worked wood
• Mbuti pygmy women hunted small, slow animals
• Exceptions involve societies or individuals
18-8
Recurrent Gender Patterns
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Swing activities (Table 18.1)
• Assigned to either or both men and women
• Most important – planting, tending, and harvesting crops
• Table 18.1 leaves out trade and market activity, which are swing activities
Table 18.1 also leaves out child care (primarily done by women)
Subsistence contributions - the subsistence contributions of men and women are
roughly equal cross-culturally
• In domestic activities and child care, female labor dominates (even in societies
where men help out domestically)
• Women tend to work more hours than men do (when combining subsistence
hours with domestic work hours)
• Women are primary caregivers in 2/3 of societies
• In U.S. and Canada, some men are primary caregivers
• It makes sense for mother to be primary caregiver because of breastfeeding
(ensures infant survival)
18-9
RECURRENT GENDER
PATTERNS
• Differences in male and female reproductive strategies
• Women can have only so many babies; men can keep on
reproducing
• Men mate, within and outside marriage, more than women do
(increases reproductive fitness)
• Polygyny- multiple wives; more common than polyandry
(multiple husbands)
• Men less restricted than women are, although restrictions are
equal in about half the societies studied
• Double standards that restrict women more than men are one
example of gender stratification (unequal distribution of socially
valued resources, power, prestige, human rights, and personal
freedom)
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Table 18.1: Generalities in the Division of Labor
by Gender, Based on Data from 185 Societies
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Table 18.2: Time and Effort Expended
on Subsistence Activities by Men and Women
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Table 18.3: Who Does the Domestic Work?
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Table 18.4: Who Has Final Authority over the Care,
Handling, and Discipline of Infant Children
(Under Four Years Old)?
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Table 18.5: Does the Society Allow Multiple Spouses?
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Table 18.6: Is There a Double
Standard with Respect to PREMARITAL Sex?
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Table 18.7: Is There a Double
Standard with Respect to EXTRAMARITAL Sex?
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GENDER ROLES AND GENDER
STRATIFICATION
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Sanday:
• Economic roles affect gender stratification
• Tends to disadvantage women by limiting them sexually, economically,
and politically
• gender stratification decreased when men and women made roughly
equal contributions to subsistence
• Foraging societies – less gender stratification
• Stratification in most marked when men contributed much more
to diet than women
• In some societies, gathering (done by women) provides more
food than hunting and fishing
• When gathering is prominent, gender status tends to be more
equal
18-18
GENDER ROLES AND GENDER STRATIFICATION
• Domestic-public dichotomy:
• Domestic – pertaining to the home
• Public – outside world; politics, trade, warfare, or work
• Domestic-public dichotomy: strong differentiation between home
and the outside world
• When domestic and public spheres are clearly separated, public
activities have greater prestige than domestic ones
• Dichotomy promoted gender stratification because men are
usually the ones active in the public domain; women’s activities
tend to be closer to home (due to pregnancy, lactation, and child
care)
• Domestic-public dichotomy is less developed among foragers,
so less gender stratification
18-19
GENDER ROLES AND GENDER
STRATIFICATION
• Greater size, strength,
and mobility of men led
to exclusive service in roles
of hunters and warriors; leads to gender stratification
• Pregnancy and lactation
keep women from
being primary hunters
in foraging societies
• The Agta (exception)
• Women gather and hunt with dogs
• Carry children with them
18-20
REDUCED GENDER STRATIFICATION—
MATRILINEAL, MATRILOCAL SOCIETIES
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Cross-cultural variation in gender status related to rules of descent and
postmarital residence
• Matrilineal descent:
• Common among horticulturalists (grow plants)
• Descent traced through females
• Matrilocal – residence with a wife’s relatives after marriage
• people join mother’s group at birth
• Patriliny and patrilocality:
• Keeps male relatives together; advantageous in times of warfare
• Alliances between men have grown throughout their lives
• Matrilineal/matrilocal systems tend to occur where population pressure
on strategic resources is minimal and warfare is infrequent
18-21
REDUCED GENDER STRATIFICATION
• Women tend to have high status in matrilineal, matrilocal
societies
• Due to: descent group membership, succession to political
positions, allocation of land, and social identity all come from
the female line
• Matrilocality created solidarity clusters of female kin
• Women had considerable influence beyond the household
• Women are basis of entire social structure
• Although public authority may be (or appear to be) assigned
to men, much of the power and decision making may actually
belong to the senior women
18-22
MATRIARCHY
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If patriarchy is political system ruled by men, the is matriarchy a political system run by women?
• Matriarchy – women play a more prominent role than men do in political and social
organization
• Not mirror image of patriarchy; not “run by women”
Peggy Sanday (2002): Minangkabau of Indonesia
• a matriarchy because women are the center, origin, and foundation of the social order
• Women are not disproportionately more powerful than men
• Women:
• Associated with central pillar of the traditional house (oldest house in village)
• Ceremonies – women are addressed by term meaning “Queen Mother”
• Control land inheritance
• Matrilocal
• Wedding ceremony – wife and kin collect husband and escort him to wife’s home
• Divorce – man takes his things and leaves
Despite special position of women, matriarchy is not the equivalent of female rule; all decision
making should be done by consensus
18-23
INCREASED GENDER STRATIFICATION—
PATRILINEAL-PATRILOCAL SOCIETIES
• Patrilineal-patrilocal complex:
• male supremacy is based on patrilineality, patrilocality, and
warfare
• Patrilineal descent: descent traced through men
• Patrilocality – woman moves to her husband’s village after
marriage
• Spread of patrilineal-patrilocal complex is linked to pressure on
resources
• As resources become more scarce, warfare often increases
• Warfare favors patrilineal-patrilocal complex
• Keeps related me together where they make strong allies in
battle
18-24
INCREASED GENDER STRATIFICATION
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Patrilineal-patrilocal complex tends to have sharp domestic-public dichotomy
• Many men use public roles in warfare and trade and greater prestige to symbolize and
reinforce devaluation or oppression of women
P-p complex tends to enhance male prestige opportunities and result in relatively high gender
stratification
Characterizes many societies in highland Papua, New Guinea
• Women do most of cultivation of subsistence crops, cooking, and raising pigs (main
domesticated animal); largely excluded from more prestigious roles in pubic domain
• Men dominate public domain by growing and distributing prestige crops, preparing food for
feasts, arranging marriages, trading pigs, and overseeing their use in ritual (sells the pigs
that women raised)
Densely populated areas (Papua, New Guinea) – Men associate women with danger and pollution
• fear female contact, including sexual (it weakens the man)
• Men segregate themselves in men’s houses
• Hide ritual objects
• Delay marriage; some never marry
Sparsely populated areas (recently settled areas) – lacks taboos on male-female contacts;
reproductive rates are higher
18-25
PATRIARCHY AND VIOLENCE
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Patriarchy: political system ruled by men in which women have inferior
social and political status, including basic human rights
• Barbara Miller describes rural Northeastern India women as “the
endangered sex”
• From tribal societies to state societies
Societies that feature full-fledged patrilineal-patrilocal complex, replete with
warfare and intervillage raiding, also typify patriarchy
Violent practices toward females such as dowry murders, female infanticide,
and clitoridectomy
Although domestic abuse exists all over the world, abuse is more common
when women are separated form their supportive kin ties and are thus,
more isolated
18-26
PATRIARCHY AND VIOLENCE
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Gender stratification typically reduced in societies in which women have
prominent roles in the economy and social life
Spread of women’s rights and human rights movements:
• Attention to domestic violence and abuse of women has increased
• Laws have been passed
• Mediating institutions have been established
• U.S. and Canada:
• Shelters for victims of domestic abuse have been developed
• Brazil:
• Female run police stations for battered women
• India:
• A series of “Ladies only” facilities, including trains and entry lines for
women who had experienced harassment or violence
18-27
GENDER IN INDUSTRIAL
SOCIETIES
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Domestic-public dichotomy influences
gender stratification in industrial societies (i.e. United States, Canada…) where
gender roles are changing rapidly
The “traditional” idea that a “woman’s place is in the home” developed among middle
and upper class Americans as industrialism spread after 1900
Before 1900s, pioneer women were recognized as fully productive workers in farming
and home industry
1890s – over one million women workers held menial, repetitious, and unskilled
factory positions
• Men, women, children, freed slaves – flocked to factories as wage workers
Early 1900s, wave of European immigrants
• Willing to work for lower wages than American born men so they got factory jobs
that would have gone to women
• Machine tools and mass production further reduced need for female labor
Idea that women were biologically unfit for factory work gained ground; lowered
women’s status
18-28
Gender in Industrial Societies
• Maxine Margolis (2000) - Gendered work, attitudes, and beliefs have
varied in response to American economic needs
• Examples
• : Wartime
• Shortages of men
• Patriotic duty of women to work outside the home
• Idea that women are biologically unfit for physical work
faded
• Inflation and culture of consumption have spurred female
employment (families need two paychecks)
• Changes in economy led to changes in attitudes toward and about
women
18-29
GENDER IN INDUSTRIAL
SOCIETIES
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Since WWII – baby boom, industrial expansion, and increase in female workers
• Female occupations – clerical work, teacher, nursing; pays less than male
dominated fields
• Employers found they could increase profits by paying women lower wages than
they would have to pay returning male veterans
• Economic changes paved way for women’s movement
• National Organization for Women – 1966
• Movement promoted expanded work opportunities, including goal of equal
pay for equal work
• Between 1970 and 2010, female percentage of American workforce rose
from 38% to 47%
• Not only single women; many are wives
• Dramatic change in behavior and attitude
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As women increasingly work outside the home, ideas about gender roles of
males and females changed
18-30
Table 18.8: Cash Employment of
U.S. Mothers, Wives, and Husbands, 1960–2010
18-31
THE FEMINIZATION OF
POVERTY
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Increasing representation of women and their children among America’s poorest
people
• Percentage of single-parent (usually female-headed) households increasing
worldwide
• Median income for single mother household $32,031
• Median income for married couple household is $72,751
• Married couple households earn more than twice as much as single mother
• Households headed by single mom have less income than those headed by
single dad
• Globally, female headed households are poorer than are those headed by men
• U.S. has highest percentage of single parent households
• More than half the poor children in the U.S. live in families headed by women;
becomes cycle of poverty (poor living standards and poor health)
One way to improve situation of poor women is to encourage them to organize
• Helps women mobilize resources, increase confidence, and decrease
dependence; helps to improve their social and economic situation
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Table 18.9: Median Annual
Income of U.S. Households by Household Type, 2009
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Table 18.10: Percentage of Single-Parent
Households, Selected Countries, 1980–81 and 2008
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WORK AND HAPPINESS
• Correlation between rankings of happiness and of women’s work
outside the home
• Of 13 countries with greatest female labor force participation, 10
ranked among world’s happiest
• Denmark – ranked first (75% of women worked)
• Turkey – ranked lowest (31% of women worked)
• U.S. – ranked 12th
• Positive correlation between women working and happiness
• Most countries listed among happiest also have higher standard
of living and more secure government safety net
18-35
Table 18.11: Female Labor Force Participation by Country,
2008
18-36
BEYOND MALE AND FEMALE
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Contemporary U.S. categories includes individuals who self-identify using such labels
as transgender, intersex, third gender, and transsexual; many societies recognize
more than two genders
• Transgender: social category that includes individuals who may or may not
contrast biologically with ordinary males and females
• Contradict dominant male/female gender distinctions by being part male and
part female, or neither male nor female
• Must expand beyond binary categories
• Sex – biological aspect
• Gender – socially constructed
• Transgender – includes those with no apparent biological roots as well as those
with biological basis
• Intersex: conditions involving discrepancy between external and internal
genitals; hermaphrodite
• Klinefelter’s syndrome – XXY; extra chromosome
• Turner syndrome – OX; absence of a sex chromosome (girls are sterile)
18-37
BEYOND MALE AND FEMALE
• People construct their identities in society
• Many individuals with and without biological conditions see
themselves as male or female
• Self-identified transgender people tend to be individuals whose
gender identity contradicts their biological sex at birth and the
gender identity that society assigned to them in infancy
• Fear and ignorance related to diversity in gender fuels
discrimination
• Gender diversity exists in many societies and has taken many forms
across cultures throughout history (i.e. hijras in Indian)
• Transvestites – men dressed as women; represent the most
common alternative gender category
18-38
SEXUAL ORIENTATION
• Sexual orientation refers to person’s habitual sexual attraction to,
and sexual activities with, persons of the opposite sex
(heterosexuality), same sex (homosexuality), and both sexes
(bisexuality).
• Asexuality – refers to indifference toward members of either sex
• One’s gender identity does not dictate one’s sexual orientation
• All four forms are found throughout world
• Each holds different meanings for individuals and groups
• Example: male/male relationships may be a private affair or a
public, socially sanctioned event
• In U.S., tendency to see sexual orientation as fixed and
biologically based
• Sexual norms vary from culture to culture and through time
18-39
Sexual Orientation
• All human activities, including sexual preferences, are so
some extent learned, malleable, and at least partly
culturally constructed
• No one knows for sure why sexual differences exist
• Part appears to be biological, reflecting genes and
hormones
• Part may have to do with experiences during growth
and development
• Whatever the reason, culture plays a role in molding
sexual urges toward a collective norm
• Sexual norms vary considerably cross-culturally and
through time
18-40
SEXUAL ORIENTATION
• In 1/3 of the societies studied (37 out of 76), sex acts
involving people of the same sex were absent, rare, or
secret (Ford and Beach, 1951)
• In others, various forms of same-sex sexual activity
considered normal and acceptable (2/3 of those
societies)
• Sudanese Azande
• Etoro of Papua New Guinea
• Flexibility in sexual expression seems to be an aspect of
our primate heritage
• Chimps and other primates participate in
masturbation and same sex relations
18-41
Figure 18.2: The Location of the
Etoro, Kaluli, and Sambia in Papua New Guinea
18-42