Gender Analysis

Gender Analysis

Thesis Statement

Gender is never constant or fixed; it is not a role or set of roles that an individual learns and then has, nor is it a characteristic or an attribute of a person's identity, but rather, gender is an active construction.

Discussion

According to prevailing lay understandings of gender, individuals are born with a sex (i.e., female or male), but they must learn their gender (i.e., what it means to be a woman or a man). Through the process of gender socialization, individuals develop their gender identity, or their definition of themselves within this dichotomy—as either a woman or a man. Although most gender socialization takes place during childhood, socialization does not end there. Because gender is a social construction that pervades all social institutions, throughout the life course and in day-today interactions, individuals routinely navigate social expectations of girl/boy and woman/man and revise and maintain their gender identities as necessary.

“The family is the primary source of gender socialization because it is the first institution that individuals enter and, immediately upon entering it, individuals are socialized into gender appropriate norms and behaviors” (Anonymous, 1955).

After thoroughly reading the attached articles, I have come to a point that in contrast to the psychoanalytic theories posed, the “doing gender” perspective is a decidedly sociological way of understanding gender and the formation of gender identities.

Carol has, in her article, positively highlighted the statistical comparison of the spending data between Quebec and the entire Canadian population, with Quebec leading the way in all forms of spending on average - let it be GDP, child upbringing or insurance.

(3.2% vs 1.2% on GDP)

(34.8% vs 12.3% on child-care spaces)

($41,432 in benefits for Quebec; while the amount is negligible in overall Canada)

According to the second article, “women spend more time at home and invest more ...