Many of us seem to be familiar with the notions of sex, gender, and sexuality, and how those three connect in our own lives. But this weeks readings said “Hold up there! Do you really think you know everything?” The answer is no…no we don’t. Or at least, I don’t. So I’ll do my best to explore some of the topics from the readings this week, and how they all basically say everything is made up by society.
“The Prism of Gender” by Katherine Valentine
“What seemed so obvious-two opposite sexes- turns out to be a gross oversimplification” (Valentine, 6)
Keywords: biology, man/woman, gender differences, sex/gender, intersex, sexuality, change.
When I think of Prism, I immediately think of that banger album by Katy Perry. I don’t think any of the songs have to do with gender, but you all should still give it a listen. But that’s not the point here.
In her article “The Prism of Gender”, Catherine Valentine explores the notion of two sexes/ two genders, and how the Western world is quite obsessed with fitting everyone in these neat little boxes. However, it’s not really that well organized. One of the best examples of this that she uses is the ever present idea of something called “pink and blue syndrome” in which things in our world from clothing to school supplies seems to be color coded for girls and boys (Valentine, 4). It’s something I think about a lot working in retail. I am constantly asked “Well do you have this in a boys color?” or “She’s a girl, I don’t think she’ll like Mario”. Its extremely frustrating to deal with when I personally don’t believe that material things can be gendered, much less something as basic as colors.
And when Catherine moved on to explain this idea of sex not even really being biologically just two sexes, with the mention of intersex among other genetic things, I was thrown for a loop. She states “Joan H. Fujimora (2006) examined recent research on sex genes and concluded that “there is no single pathway through which sex is genetically determined”” (6). I mean, I knew that there were more than 2 genders. But the idea of more than two sexes and those two sexes not even really being that different? That was a lot for me. I hope we can discuss this concept more during the semester.
Besides realizing that nothing fits in binaries, Catherine poses one question towards the end of her article that I want to pose to all of you. On page 7 when discussing how one never really changes their gender in different situations, she says “Could you leave gender at the office? What would that look like, and what would it take to make it happen?” (7) Is there every a situation where you felt like you had to “leave your gender at the office”? Is it possible? One situation that I can possibly think of is someone who might be trans and express it in their day to day life, but perhaps not to their family. Maybe they sort of discard their preferred gender at the door. I know I have had a friend do this before, and it broke my heart. Do you think that example is relevant in this situation? Or would you consider that not the same?
Theorizing Difference From Multiracial Feminism by Maxine Baca Zinn and Bonnie Thornton Dill
Keywords: Feminist theory, difference, exoticism, multiracial.
This article was extremely long and to be honest, a bit dense for me. I kind of struggled with the major concepts here and hope that my classmates might be able to fill me in on some things. Nevertheless, I will still do my best to lay out what I gathered from the reading.
It seems like one of the obvious major themes in this reading is race and how that directly plays into gender. There is a lot of discussion on how ones place in society is not based just on gender, but on many factors like race, class, and sexuality. Zinn and Dill work hard to outline the major concepts of multiracial feminism is, what it does, and how it can help. They state that “multiracial feminism brings together understandings drawn from the lived experiences of diverse and continuously changing groups of women” (Zinn and Dill, 328). It’s important that we as a society not only look at the struggles of women, but that we look at the struggles of women from different racial backgrounds, class backgrounds, etc. We need to hear these experiences in order to better understand our fellow women and how we can help make things better for everyone.
One thing I found really interesting from this reading was when Zinn and Dill quoted Maria C. Lugones who, I believe, basically said that when the differences among women are removed, there’s really no essential woman (323). That over all there is no sort of truth about what makes a woman a woman. Please correct me if I am wrong in my understanding of that, but if I am right, then I agree entirely. It doesn’t matter where we come from or how different we are. There doesn’t seem to be anything innate that ties all women together as women. It kind of links back to Valentine and how there’s not really some sort of consensus on sex.
Final Thoughts?
I felt like both readings were quite challenging. The song, although I didn’t talk about it much, touched on the idea of androgyny and people dressing and acting however they want despite their so called sex. Overall, the articles were thought-provoking. I’m excited to see what everyone else thought about the readings and hope that I can gain more understanding through others’ posts. Because after all, the only way you learn is by listening and reading.
-Adriana Green
side note: my question for the class is in bold and italics towards the middle of my blog post. I also am not sure I can really think of a piece of media that these ideas remind me of unless you count that really good Katy Perry album. And maybe Demi Lovato.
Great post! I love your writing style and your question choice, that part of Valentine’s paper really stuck out to me as well. My answer is no but, I think the answer to the question is much less important than the question itself because it really gives you a new, thought-provoking idea of gender.
Great post! I’ll be honest, I looked at your post first and got super intimidated because it looks so professional and good! It was interesting to hear that you had never heard of there being other sexes before. Though I was personally familiar with that, I agree, I hope we dive into that a little bit more so more people can understand.
I like the example you came up with about “leaving your gender at the door”. I completely agree with your statement it IS like presenting in traditional roles to please family members. I have experienced this first hand but your example put the quote into a nice perspective.
I haven’t had a situation where I have had to leave my gender at the door but I do feel that this is something that people in the military may have had to do. Awesome job on your blog!
Fantastic job on the blog! I agree that transgender people might be in a situation where they cannot be who they truly are and have to hide their true selves away behind closed doors. I have left my gender at the door for multitudes of reasons before, and many people have done this as well, just as you said. To fit in with society and avoid being hurt, it takes the power to deny who you are. People must strip what they know about themselves down to the bone and essentially put on a mask to fit in with society. However, I believe one day, there won’t be any more situations where people have to leave their genders at the door to be safe and comfortable.
Just wanted to pop in to say that if you’re interested in the diversity of biological sex, you might like the reading we have on our schedule for week 6: Anne Fausto-Sterling’s “The Five Sexes, Revisited.” So stay tuned for more! 🙂
Interesting blog and very well on it ! The main thing that grabbed my attention the most from this blog is the part about the pink and blue syndrome because, that how I went throughout life thinking, and it is something how society really shaped our minds so differently to think like that oh blue is automatic color for guys and etc. I agree on the on the feminism part you said to because we do need to understand each other from other perspectives so things can be way much easier.