1. Gender Stratification
Lecture 10
Gender Stratification

2. Gender and Inequality Gender Gender stratification
Personal traits & social positions members of a society attach to being female and male
Gender stratification
Unequal distribution of wealth, power, and privilege between men and women
Male-female biological differences
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

3. Men’s and Women’s Athletic Performance
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

4. Gender in a Global Perspective
Margaret Mead’s research
Culture is key to gender differences
Read Mead’s research, page 249.
Gender and culture
What it means to be male or female is mostly a creation of society

5. Patriarchy and Sexism
Matriarchy–A form of social organization in which females dominate males
Sexism–Belief that one sex or the other is innately inferior or superior
Institutional sexism
The believe that one gender is superior to the other
Found throughout the economy
The costs of sexism
Sexism has a high price for both women and men
Inevitability of patriarchy
Most sociologists believe gender is socially constructed and can be changed

6. Women’s Power in Global Perspective
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

7. Gender and Socialization
Gender roles (sex roles)–Attitudes and activities that a society links to each sex
Gender affects how we think of ourselves and teaches us how to behave.
Research suggests that most young people develop personalities that are
A mix of feminine and masculine traits
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

8. Gender and the Family Is it a boy or girl?
Color-coding gender
Traditional notions of gender identity
Handling of children
Female: passivity and emotion
Male: independence and action
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

9. Gender and Peer Groups Janet Lever (1978) Gilligan (1982) Schooling
Boys favor team sports with complex rules and clear objectives.
Girls’ sports teach interpersonal skills and the value of sharing and cooperation.
Gilligan (1982)
Boys reason according to abstract principles.
Girls consider morality a matter of responsibility to others.
Schooling
Gender shapes interests and beliefs, guides areas of study, and career choices
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

10. Gender and Schooling
Women became well represented in many fields of study that once excluded them
Mathematics, chemistry, and biology
Men still predominate in many fields
Engineering, computer science, and the physical sciences
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

11. Gender and the Mass Media
White males have center stage
Minorities locked out until the early 1970s
Women receive roles based on sex appeal
The “beauty myth”
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

12. Social Stratification
60% of all women work and 72% of working women work full-time
Women hold primary responsibility for housework & parenting – “second shift”
Some work defined as “men’s work”
On average, women earn 78 cents for every dollar earned by men
“Pink-collar” are at the lower end of the pay scale
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

13. © 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

14. Housework: Who Does How Much?
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

15. Education, Politics, and Military
Gender and education
In 2007 women earned 59% of all associate & bachelor degrees, 61% of master’s degrees
And 50% of doctorates
Politics
Nineteenth Amendment (1920)
Women active in local, state politics
Military
14% of US military personnel are women, including positioned troops
Culture influences our views of women in the military
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

16. Women in State Government across the United States
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

17. Are Women a Minority?
A Minority is a category of people distinguished by physical or cultural differences that a society sets apart and subordinates.
Multilayered system of disadvantage for some and privilege for others
every class level, women have less
Income, wealth, education, & power than men
Intersection theory
Interplay of race, class, & gender, resulting in multiple dimensions of disadvantage
Disadvantages linked to gender & race often combine to produce low social standing
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

18. Violence Against Women
In the 19th century, men claimed the right to physically discipline their wives
Sexual assaults, rapes, attempted rapes, and physical assaults
Campus and university gender violence
Gender-linked violence often in the home
Female genital mutilation
Men are more likely to be both the perpetrators and victims of violence.
Our culture tends to define masculinity in terms of aggression and violence.
Men’s lives involve more stress and isolation than women’s lives.
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

19. Female Genital Mutilation in Global Perspective
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

20. Pornography
People take different views of what is and isn’t pornographic
Pornography as a moral issue
The gender-stratification point of view considers pornography a power issue
Promotes violence against women portray- ing them as weak/undeserving of respect
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

21. Feminism
Feminism is an intellectual, consciousness- raising movement based on the idea that women and men should be accorded equal opportunities and respect.
Working to increase equality
Expansion of human choice
Eliminate gender stratification
Ending sexual violence
Promotes sexual freedom
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

22. Types of Feminism Opposition to feminism Liberal feminism
Threat to male status and privilege
Resistance to feminism is strongest among women with lower levels of education
Liberal feminism
Free to develop own talents and interests
Socialist feminism
Family form must change with some collective means of carrying out housework & childcare
Radical feminism
Seek an egalitarian, gender-free society
© Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

23. Sources
Macionis, John J Society: The Basics (Twelfth Edition). Boston, MA: Pearson