Category: Gender

• Abstract
• Introduction
• Literature review
  • Gender Wage inequalities
  • Neoclassical Explanation of Segregation
  • Theory and Measurement of Authority
  • Race and Gender Differences in Job Authority.
  • Micro theories
  • Macro Structural Theories
  • Meso-Level Theories of Discrimination
• Conclusion
• References

Abstract

This essay surveys the sociological approaches and Neo-Marxian theory in relation to gender inequalities in the work place. In sociological aspect, we look at the how theoretical foundations, measurements, job authority and social inequality affects gender inequalities in the work place. The focus of this study is to examine how race and gender are the determinant factors in selection of workers, their consequences on income levels and job classes and how their stimulated gender inequalities in work places.

Introduction

The conceptualization of job authority as traced back in the early theoretical treaties of Max Weber and Karl Mark critically examined social inequalities in the work places. Marx’s theory examines the quantitative assessment of work inequality as rooted in class relations and class conflicts. In this research, we explore the working of these two pre-hire techniques; sociological theory and neo-marxian theory in relation to how they sought men and women into different jobs. The research settings are suitable for identifying and empirically isolate the social theory process alleged to sort men and women into different jobs. The research therefore analyzes unique data obtained in recruitment during process starting with a number of applicants who were undergoing job placement at a customer service center of a bank.

Literature review

The term segregation denotes to the fundamental process in social inequality. The groups to which individuals are sorted become the dominating factor for differential treatment. Segregation therefore facilitates the unequal treatment by divided groups into different reward systems.

Fernandez and Sosa (2003, p.3), examines the gender segregation in work places and labor markets. In their study they conclude that men earn more than women despite control of human factors. In socialization theory argues that man and women undertake different jobs because of gender differences or stereotypes which make them self-select into gender-typical jobs during job hunting. You will find that men will go for more masculine jobs and women to feminist kind of jobs. Sociologist theory also suggest that the disparity in gender segregation is the employers’ preferences and biases during pre-hiring screening since women and men specialize in different areas. Social network also directs men and women to different job openings.

On sociological aspects, findings from the research carried out at a call center reveals that women applicants in the work force choose jobs whose skills do not retrograde over time. Another disparity occurring in social networks is where gender segregation of jobs is displayed by gender differences in supply side process. Social network is the tendency of people to associate comfortably with people of the same sex which has led to classification of men and women into different jobs during job search. In this context, we see that social networks lead applicants to be more gender biased than even the employers themselves (Fernandez & Sosa 2003, p.10).

While there are a number of jobs sexes can choose from, the call center as a whole attracts mostly female applicants. Gendering is evident here at the first step of signing up where about 62.0 female applicants were seen queuing then after 65.8 female applicants successfully matched the requisition. Therefore the high percentage of job requisition contributes to the feminization of the call center.

Another model that segregates gender in work places is that of pattern of assignment to job requisition in relation to sociological theories. In a study conducted to predict assignment to a job requisition in the social network, the sexes of the applicants were coded as a dummy variable on measurable values of 1 representing female applicants and 0 for male. The applicants were screened for the number of times they had applied for the same position. The people who had applied only once were coded 0 while people who applied more than once were coded 1. The research also included two variables to record how much competition the applicants were exposed to in the day of application. Another variable was employed to measure the demands the total number of jobs opens on requisition day.

These variables were used to address the role of social networks in gender inequalities in work places. Dummy variables were used to determine whether applicants were referred by employees. Results were classified in three models; 1,2 and 3. In model 1, 52 percent of female applicants were more likely to be placed on queues than their male counterparts. The co-efficiency on repeat applicants showed that persistence is rewarded because applicants who applied more than once were more likely to be assigned to a queue.

This model also revealed that competition was an important factor as the more applicants that applied that day, the less likely they were to the queue assignment. This meant that applicants had only 2% chances of being assigned to a queue. The results also revealed that employee referrals cases were most likely to be placed than non-referral cases (Fernendez & Mors, 2008, p.8).

Model 2 explores the effect of steering by different sexes. The results showed disparities in both sexes in interaction of steering in a way that women were more likely to be placed on the queue than men. Models 2 and 3 gathers evidence of steering among external applicants, as reports indicated, female applicants were less likely to be placed on the queue as compared to male applicants. These results show us the effects of sex and recruitment among external applicants. Looking within the set of applicants assigned to a queue, it is evident that male and female applicants are not assigned to the same queues in the same proportion as they first applied. In sociological theory, we see that there is a significant relationship between sex and the requisition to which applicants are assigned (Fernendez & Mors, 2008, p.9).

Actually, sorting applicants among queues has significant impacts for gender stratifications. Queues vary from organizational level to remunerations. Among these job requisitions, 78% of them were grouped under salaried classification while 22 percent on job performed on hourly basis. While most of the salaried jobs were on requisition, majority of the applicants were on hourly jobs. Also, male and female applicants were not assigned salaried and hourly queues in equal percentages.

The results revealed that about 7.5 percent of applicants for salaried exempt jobs were females and male percentages double at 14.3 percent. In external applicants, the sex skews showed greater disparities where the percent of male applicants to exempt job was three times more that female applicants. Job requisitions also define the pay grades since applicants on hourly basis were classified into 9 grades while salaried applicants were grouped on six levels.

This call center had drawn out company goals that enabled equal compensation program. In keeping with their stated goals, the company sought to offer competitive compensation package according to the market rates. The salaries assigned to this employment grades were determined by periodic wage surveys in accordance with the local area. According this evidence, applicants for exempts jobs are usefully assigned requisition with the lowest job grades and the top level (1-4) of the range a well (Fernendez & Mors, 2008, p.10).

In exempt job classifications, there is evidence of gender inequality as supported from the decreasing percentages of female applicants as the queue increases. Women applicants were placed on the bottom of the requisition state range of levels 1 representing 72.1 percent, levels 2; 50.9 percent, level 3; 46.4 percent and levels 4; 36.4 percent while men received the higher corresponding figures.

This pattern shows that female employees receive discrimination for hourly, non-exempt jobs. Across the 9 hourly job levels without considering the top or the bottom of the stated job requisition, women applicants were more likely to be placed at the lower salary levels than on the higher tier jobs. The disparities in the pattern of disproportional allocation of male applicants to higher status and salaried jobs compared to female candidates to lower status, paid on hourly basis have clearly distinguished the consequences of gender stratification (Fernendez & Mors, 2008, p.10).

Gender wage inequality

In gender wage inequalities, reports indicate that males and females are grouped into distinct jobs at the time of queue assignment. And as the candidates pass through the screening process, interviewers additionally sort candidates resulting to further gender bifurcation which favors male over females in allocation of job status such that men are more likely to be hired in the higher status while women on the lower status positions.

On further analysis, we examine the actual wages as reported by Fernendez & Mors (2008, p.17) which indicated that female employees were paid $3101 less than the male hires. In model 1 we examine the impacts of actual wages to hires on sex, recruitment and application of behavior. Evidence from the survey indicated that female hires were being paid lower than their male counterparts after the other variables are controlled. Model 1results showed that the magnitude of gender wage inequality at the hire stage is very high.

On statistical segregation, employers reservations about sexes is based on assumed differences in strength or their ability tolerate in adverse working conditions or the belief that women are likely to be absent from work and affect turn over rates due to their nature of domestic roles. These reservations have made employers assign men and women different jobs which are discriminating statistically. For example, employers assign male individuals more physical demanding jobs than women to jobs that demand social skills.

Both socialization and neoclassical-economic perception on gender segregation reveals that workers occupation outcomes are connected to their preferences. Socialization theory shows us the different preferences workers develop before reaching adulthood, while neo-classical economics (neo-maxis) assume that in order for sexes to maximize their lifetime earnings, their select themselves into different occupations, awarding themselves the differing adult roles (Reskin, 1993, p.17).

Neoclassical explanation of segregation

Neo-maxims theory traces sex segregation to women expectations to that of family which restricts them to labor markets. In educational level, men are more likely to finish post graduate study as compared to women although job requirements require similar skills. In labor markets, women median of education is negatively associated with divisions in the work places. The theory goes on to argue that women attending college have increased chances of entering male dominated occupations and females in high school were not affected by the movement between sex-typical and sex-atypical jobs.

These results reveals that neoclassical theory tend to assume women involvement in family responsibilities such as child bearing that explaining what causes gender segregation. The theory goes on to argue that women underrepresentation in occupations that call for advance education requires them to acquire over-qualification status in order to compete successfully for male domineering jobs (Reskin, 1993, p.18).

Neoclassical theory argues that women are more likely to be attached to a job that pay higher and which does not penalize intermittency which leads to gender segregation. Women opt to work fewer workers per year than men and they are more likely to be employed on part time basis. So women seeking jobs are more likely to be drawn to jobs that offer that kind of a package. Also, women with children are more likely to do paid work at home (Reskin, 1993, p.19).

Neo-Marxian theory argues that job authority is a division of discreet phenomena that lends itself to the study of class analysis. He also argues that job authority to be gradational and is categorized into status group that divides sexes into different categories. Marx theory defines authority as the “probability that a command with a given specific content will be obeyed by a given group of persons”. He distinguished power and authority where he explains that power is tied to the individual personality and authority associated with social roles. In sociological aspect, job authority is associated with income.

Therefore its this disparities in income levels that brought about inequalities in the work place. Job authority coveted work place resources. Race and gender majorly contribute to income inequalities in American Society and cross-nationally (Smith, 2002, p.3).

Under sociological theory, job classes are categorized into two resources categories namely; control over human resources and control over organization resources. These two categories brought about the several types of organization theory including ownership, suctioning authority/ span of responsibility, managerial authority and supervisory authority. In ownership, the control takes over in form of control over means of production or control over labor power of others.

Researchers argue that ownership is separate from authority as seen in post-industrial societies. Sanctioning authority includes the ability to influence the pay or promotion of others whereas span control represents the number of people under direct supervision. Managerial authority explains organizational policy decisions, purchases, budgets or services. And hierarchical authority position refers to individual’s form location within the organizational structure hierarchies.

Finally, the supervisory authority determines whether an individual supervises any one of his employees. This authority however fails to distinguish between nominal supervisory status and the exercise of real authority although we have numerous types and various dimensions of authority. Because of these contradictory explanations, researchers have approached this study from different angles in trying to examine the rise of race and gender disparities in authority (Smith, 2002, p.4).

Theory and measurement of Authority

Darhrendorf argues that the differences in job authority in terms of dynamics of class relations and conflicts in modern society in contrast to Marx theory. Marx theory explains the relationship between class formation and class conflicts where disparity is evident between those who own the means of production with those who don’t. Dahrendorf, a sociologist researcher opposes Marx theory by explaining that class conflicts were brought about societal changes arising from the development of industrialization.

He argues post-modernization led to the separation of those who own the means of production with those who exercise control over the means of production inform of legitimate authority in both organizational resources and human resources. In his argument he continues to explain authority to be the determinant factor of class divisions in industrialized society where conflicts determines the manner in which authority is spread unequally in our society. Since conflicts represent two opposing groups, authority is further divided into two dichotomous terms; those who exercise authority (employers) and those who are subjected to it (workers).

These categories are important in explaining the manner in which authority is measured in quantitative analysis of job inequality. This construction explanation has important implication in the manner in which authority is measured in quantitative analysis of inequality in job classification. Sociological theory predicted that post-industrialization in work places would increases conceptualization of authority in terms of various dimensions of hierarchies and multidimensional configurations (Smith, 2002, p.4).

Race and Gender Differences in Job Authority

Job authority is categorized in either supply side or demand side. Demand side explains the level of individuals what is known as micro-level theories, the society (macro structural level theories), industrial levels (meso level theories, occupations, organizations and job levels (Ritzer, 2007, p.351).

Micro Theories

Macro theory explains how race and gender affects individuals in job authority levels in relation to occupational segregation and wage discrimination. Human capital and status attainment were drawn from classical economics which seeks to explain the behavior and characteristic of individuals in the form of investment that were believed to lead to authority. According to this theory, women and minorities were given less authority compared to their male counterparts.

Women were believed to have less training, experience and education or they were discriminated for the reason that they had less seniority or intermittent labor force attachment. These reasons have increased the likelihood of attaining authority in work places. This theory assumes that human capital and status attainment were determined by strategic decisions or aspirations that drive career choices of individuals.

Within the context of authority, these approaches explain why women drop out of contention positions as compared to men because they don’t value workforce authority as men do. Further, phrases such compensation differentials and mommy track explains that women are most likely to assume family responsibilities and opt out of jobs so easily. This phrase explains the idea that women’s preference as denoted from gender-role socialization and rational choices they make which may drive them to self-select themselves out of contention for positions of authority because of the attached family responsibilities (Smith, 2002, p.10).

Macro Structural Theories

Structural theory explains the inequality in the distribution of authority and in earnings return to individual attainment model levels. This theory argues that the unequal distribution of human capital affect women and minorities since they had differential access to positions of authority in work places since they were located in the most marginalized structures of the economy. This structure typically explains the reason to authority differences are regions. Regionally, women and minorities are more likely to have authority in economic structures where they exist in large numbers (Ritzer, 2007, p.351; Smith, 2002, p.10).

Meso-Level Theories of Discrimination

Meso-level theory of discrimination explains the idea that group members who occupy certain positions of authority at work have concentrated their interest in maintaining their hegemony over such positions and they do so by discriminating candidates who differ from their gender identity and racial grounds. On the sociological level, the theory explains the idea that political and social elites maintain power and privileges by keeping opportunities to themselves or similar others.

This structure classifies social disclosure into two categories of exclusion; women and minorities were grouped into the kind of industries they work in, jobs they do and work settings. The results revealed that even if women were exposed to most powerful positions, they were still not likely to exercise power as compared to their white male counterparts. Statistical evidence in relation to discrimination reveals that gatekeepers and use race and gender in discriminating against whom they hire and promote in their organization (Smith, 2002, p.13).

Conclusion

Several theories examined in the literature review above reveal several implications for understanding of gender segregation. It distinguished between sociological factors and neo-marxis theory among various gender segregation processes that are said to occur during recruitment.

In Sociological theory for instance, we examined social network which explained that networks strongly link workers to serve on discriminatory grounds which groups men and women into different job categories regardless of their educational grounds. Networks play important roles in labor queues to which candidates are assigned, with referral individuals being more likely to be assigned to labor queues as compared to non-referral candidates. The process of sorting candidates into labor queues of people in competition have contributed majorly to the gender wage stratification in companies. Gender inequalities in work places has been over the years been the major obstacles in attainment of authority.

References

Fernandez, M. Roberto., & Sosa, L. (2003). Gendering the Job: Networks and Recruitment at a Call Center. MIT Sloan School of Management, p.1-31.

Fernandez, M. Robert., & Mors, M. louise. (2008). Competing for jobs: Labor queues and gender sorting in the hiring process. MIT Sloan School of Management, vol. 37, pp. 1-20.

Reskin, B. (1993). Sex Segregation in the Workplace. Annual Review sociology,. vol. 19, pp. 1-32.

Ritzer, G. (2007) (7 ed.). Modern Sociological Theory. McGraw -Hill.

Smith, R. A. (2002). Race, Gender, and Authority in the Workplace: Theory and Research. Annual reviews Sociology, vol. 28, pp. 1-36.

Issue: There is an ongoing debate on whether educational buildings should be required to have gender-neutral bathrooms for students.

Position: Educational buildings should be required to provide gender-neutral bathrooms for students.

• Premise 1. Transgender students are entitled to be able to use a bathroom without being assaulted or harassed.
• Premise 2. Dividing bathrooms into ones for men and ones for women is an obsolete and outdated concept.
• Premise 3. Gender-neutral bathrooms are more inclusive than gender-specific ones.

The First Argument

It is necessary for a student to be in a good mental state to succeed in their education. Being under pressure or stress may negatively affect a student’s concentration and comprehension. When stress levels are constantly high, it can become a basis for developing mental disorders, which may require long years of therapy to recover from. That is why, it is vital for a person that is receiving an education to not be put under too much stress – otherwise, they are likely to experience serious problems in their learning.

There are many factors that influence the mental health of a student – basically anything might have an impact, big or small, on one’s well-being. One of the biggest factors (and one controllable by campus administration, even though not directly) is the presence of discrimination against the student and their close ones. There are many possible ways for a student to be discriminated against, one of which is being denied their access to basic utilities, such as on-campus bathrooms.

Transgender students are especially vulnerable against discrimination and are often targeted by bigoted individuals when trying to use the bathroom. They cannot use the bathrooms dedicated to students of their assigned gender at birth because of severe discomfort and, in many cases, gender dysphoria. Such students are excluded from bathrooms which align with their gender identity by bigoted students and even staff. When using any gendered bathroom, a transgender person is at a high risk of getting assaulted. The only option left for transgender students is to not use on-campus bathrooms at all. The resulting stress might discourage such students from studying, negatively affect their mental health, and even put them at risk of attempting suicide.

All students are entitled to being included in the educational process, but today, many campuses exclude the most vulnerable of students from utilizing their basic needs. The solution for that problem would be requiring every campus to provide gender-neutral bathrooms for the students. That would greatly reduce the toll on the mental health of transgender students and allow them to focus on receiving an education rather than dodging discrimination.

The Second Argument

Firstly, gender-neutral bathrooms are safer for everyone, including cisgender people. People are able to take their friends or family members of other gender with them to a gender-neutral bathroom, which significantly lowers the risks of getting assaulted or harassed. Also, generally there would be more different people in one bigger gender-neutral bathroom than in a gendered one, which would also decrease chances of a crime being committed there.

Secondly, gender-neutral bathrooms are more effective than ones that are gender-specific. Building one bigger gender-neutral bathroom is cheaper than building two smaller gender-specific ones. Gender-neutral bathrooms are also more effective and reduce wait times for people of all genders. Even more so, they basically erase the wait time gap between men and women that currently exists in gendered bathrooms. Already built bathrooms generally need little to no modification to be transformed into gender-neutral ones. It’s almost effortless to convert existing bathrooms, cheaper to build new ones, and, with all those benefits, it seems strange that gender-neutral bathrooms are still not the norm.

Thirdly, gender-neutral bathrooms better align with today’s scientific knowledge about gender than gender-specific ones. The point of receiving an education is to become not only skillful, but knowledgeable about the modern world, its people and technology. That is why, educational institutions should be ahead of the world, not lagging behind. Gender-specific schools are no longer the norm, and humanity’s knowledge about the nature of gender has expanded dramatically in the last 10-20 years. Right now, sixteen countries and several US states allow voluntarily change the gender marker in documents to a third option. Incredibly enough, the people who now can do that, still struggle with finding a bathroom that does not exclude them, especially on campus.

Lastly, gender-specific bathrooms were not always the norm. Dividing restrooms into ones for men and ones for women actually became a popular concept in the early twentieth century, and for no scientific reason. The theories that drove the US states then to pass laws, requiring all bathrooms to be gender-specific, were disproven a long time ago. Since then, people just grew familiar with the idea of gender-based segregation of bathrooms and paid no attention to it. But we can no longer ignore all the problems that segregation causes. It is time to change our restrooms for the better.

The Third Argument

Educational institutions should strive to be as inclusive as possible. After all, all people equally have a right to receive an education. Gender-specific bathrooms are not inclusive at all, and even those people who are not excluded are not equal in their inclusion. Women’s wait times are generally substantially longer than men’s wait times in gendered bathrooms. But men and women are not the only types of persons that might need to use the bathroom. As described earlier, the binary view on gender is not based on scientific evidence and actually goes against it. But it is not only wrong: it is also harmful. People, whose gender identity does not conform to the binary system, are even more likely to get assaulted than binary transgender people. The absence of gender-neutral bathrooms perpetuates discrimination against non-binary and gender-nonconforming people. No gender-specific bathroom includes them, and the only option left is to not use public bathrooms at all when there are no gender-neutral ones available.

The issue of inclusivity, however, is not limited to transgender people, despite popular belief. Disabled people also struggle with using public bathrooms that are gender-specific. Such bathrooms often do not meet the requirements for being usable by disabled people, and caretakers of other gender cannot accompany disabled people in gender-specific bathrooms. Elderly people who might need assistance from another person are also often excluded from using the bathroom. People with children of the other gender also have difficulties with using gender-specific bathrooms. Parents are left to either worry for the safety of their child, or to endure the discomfort of visiting a bathroom that is dedicated to the people of the other gender. Better availability of gender-neutral bathrooms would solve these problems.

There is a significant lack of women in top management positions and on boards of directors in the hospitality industry. The purpose of the study conducted by Segovia-Pérez et al. (2019) is to gain an understanding of the development of women’s careers from a gender approach. There are three questions the authors are trying to answer. First, how can a gender approach increase the perception of women’s position in the hospitality industry? Next, what social and individual factors can affect females’ progress in career? Finally, which industry-specific factors have an effect on their progress?

It is qualitative research, though the authors admit that using a mixture of methods would enhance “both the research process and the reliability and generalizability of the findings” (Segovia-Pérez et al., 2019, p. 191). The conceptual framework of this research is “Gender as a Social Structure in the Hospitality Industry” (Segovia-Pérez et al., 2019, p. 188). The authors analyze the data they managed to gather and offer their ideas and several suggestions for future research. The methodology of the study is based on “thirty semi-structured in-depth interviews with female executives in the Spanish hospitality industry” and their analysis (Segovia-Pérez et al., 2019, p. 184).

As a conclusion, the authors claim that the key factors that hinder achieving gender equality are the problems related to gendered organizations, issues associated with work-life conciliation, gender roles, and self-imposed barriers (Segovia-Pérez et al., 2019). Though this is a thorough study that contributes greatly to the solution of the problem, its limitation is the fact that the researchers did not use a mixed approach. However, it is useful for my research topic about the lack of mentorship of African American women because this article provides the reasons for the inability to come to gender equality in mentorship and leadership.

Reference

Segovia-Pérez, M., Figueroa-Domecq, C., Fuentes-Moraleda, L., Muñoz-Mazón, A. (2019). Incorporating a gender approach in the hospitality industry: Female executives’ perceptions. International Journal of Hospitality Management 76, 184–193.

As many commentators about sex research are fond of pointing out, in the fourth century B.C.E., the philosopher Plato offered a fanciful account that attributed the origins of erotic desire to divine punishment. Zeus punished the first human beings for impious and willful misbehavior by splitting them in half. Erotic love, the desire to reunite lost halves, is the legacy of that punishment. Plato’s mythology described not only the erotic entanglements of men and women but of men and men as well as women and women. Since then, the debate about the origins and meaning of eroticism, and especially same-sex eroticism, has only grown more contentious. Some twenty-five hundred years and a great deal of failed research later, questions about the origins of erotic interests still enjoy considerable prominence, though lately it has not been philosophers scientists who have taken up the inquiry, and they study not eros but sexual orientation. Genetic loading, fetal hormone exposure, and cerebral lateralization have supplanted gods, divine wrath, and mortal longings as the categories used to investigate and explain erotic desire.

Anne Fausto-Sterling and Evan Balaban have said in Dean Hamer’s 1993 report that the scientific debate about the origins of homosexuality is taking place in the midst of a highly political one about the place of gay men and lesbians in our social fabric. Given the increased frequency of hate crimes directed against homosexuals, it is fair and literal to say that lives are at stake.

Since scientific efforts to account for sexual orientation commenced in earnest in the nineteenth century, researchers have reported differences between gay and straight people in their fat distribution, metabolism, hair quality, height, lisping, lipid levels, the angles at which they carry their arms, susceptibility to paranoia, and an almost indefinite number of biophysical and psycho-developmental traits. From these alleged anatomical and behavioral differences between gay and straight people, various competing conclusions have been drawn about the origins of erotic desires: that they result from events in psychosexual development and are therefore primarily psychological in origin or that they are hormonally or genetically influenced and are therefore largely independent of psychological events.

Anne Fausto-Sterling has rightly argued that the presumptive “biological” differences between males and females are often artifacts of the projection of value-laden social expectations onto biological reality. This same kind of projection has too often been the rule in documenting alleged differences between gay and straight people. The search for biological differences has, therefore, often amounted, both in regard to gender and sexual orientation, to an investigation of social stereotypes, which is to mistake social appearance for biological or psychological reality (Anne Fausto-Sterling, 1992).

Regardless of its vocabulary and assumptions about causality, scientific research is thought to have considerable significance in judging the psychological integrity, morality, and social accommodation of various sexual orientations. For example, taking the evidence to show that homoeroticism was a psychic disorder, perhaps having roots in heredity, many psychologists in the past two centuries investigated treatments and cures. Researchers and the public alike once routinely looked to biomedicine and the health sciences to rid society of a trait they judged psychologically, if not also morally and socially offensive. By contrast, rarely–and only rarely–have there been people wanting to move from heteroerotic to homoerotic interests and identities. 3 Against this historical backdrop, some commentators worry that current sexual orientation research can only reinvigorate pathological interpretations of homoeroticism, as philosopher Eric Juengst has cautioned might happen.

Most morphological males have a dominant erotic interest in morphological females, and most morphological females have a dominant erotic interest in morphological males. This is not to say that human beings are always male or female in any uncomplicated way, for even that simple division has fluid borders in anatomy and genetics; people may be apparently male or female in anatomy but apparently the opposite in genetic endowment. Neither is it to say that those erotic interests are dictated by bodily morphology. It is merely to say that most human beings have these erotic interests and not others. Common usage designates such people as heterosexuals. There are nevertheless significant numbers of people whose sexual orientation does not fit this profile. Some males evince erotic interest only in other males, and some females evince erotic interest only in other females. Common usage designates these people as homosexuals. To complicate the mix even further, some people range across both males and females as objects of erotic interest–if not simultaneously, then at least serially during their lives. By default and linguistic convention, these people are bisexuals.

Biologist Anne Fausto-Sterling has offered an analysis of gender in exactly this regard, arguing that the search for biological differentiation between men and women has reflected and reinforced prevailing – but erroneous – notions of what roles women ought to play in society (Anne Fausto-Sterling, 2000).

The effort to account for this cleaving of erotic interest has a long and contentious lineage. For example, there has been considerable debate about the distribution of erotic interests in a given population and also about whether the categories underlying their study make sense. Homoeroticism has been alleged, for example, to be more common in certain nations than in others. In some cases, it was even attributed to the climate of those places. It was the case in the last century when languid Mediterranean countries were thought given to homosexuality. In fact, homoerotic interest is not necessarily more prevalent in countries where it is simply more visible or socially accommodated. As for the adequacy of the concepts at stake, sex researchers from zoologist Alfred Kinsey to anthropologist Gilbert Herdt have cautioned against taking the terms homosexual, heterosexual, and bisexual to stand for natural and mutually exclusive kinds of people. They note that human erotic lives are often plastic in a way that defies easy categorization. What is the sexual orientation of a male adolescent who, for example, has sex with both male and female farm animals? What is the sexual orientation of a male who enjoys having sex with a woman in the presence of other sexually aroused men? Because of the variability of human sexual expression, some researchers believe that sexual orientations are distributed across a population in a way that could be mapped onto a bell curve between poles of homoeroticism and heteroeroticism, with most people having some measure of bisexuality in their erotic lives. Others argue that sexual orientation is bimodally distributed, with most people lumped as heterosexual or homosexual at opposite ends of a continuum, with very few bisexuals in between.

These cautions and debates are emblematic of the considerable problem in documenting the numbers of people with gay, straight, and bisexual orientations and determining why people have the erotic interests they have. Although there are obstacles to counting people according to their sexual orientations, social research can study sexual practices, labels people apply to themselves, fantasy content, and household arrangements, and thereby offer useful if not perfect generalizations about the way in which erotic interests divide. Whether science can identify the causes or determinants of sexual orientation depends in part on what sexual orientation is and what science is capable of describing the causes of sexual orientation.

Developmental geneticist Anne Fausto-Sterling has criticized LeVay’s study for mapping something as complex as sexual orientation onto a binary system that presupposes a rigid divide between erotic categories. She is certainly right to do so inasmuch as the terms homosexual and heterosexual are very rough categories. LeVay does not know, for example, whether his homosexual subjects were functionally heterosexual at one point or whether his heterosexual subjects exhibited some homoerotic desire or behavior at some point in their lives.

Rather than putting people into Procrustean categories of sexual orientation, it might be better to see people as having some sort of general capacity for erotic interests but understand that that capacity varies according to age, situation, learned and entrenched habits, and maybe, yes, some dispositional influences. It may turn out that it would be better to speak of homoerotic interests as a threshold phenomenon rather than as a trait like bone density that exists in isolation as both effect and cause from all others. Because of age, situation, and existing erotic habits, some people may more easily have an interest in homoerotic practices than others. Some can be easily nudged over the threshold by circumstances, while others resist homoeroticism more stringently.

The rhetoric of contemporary science invokes the image of unlimited control over the most elemental units of biological causality, rhetoric that raises questions about manipulation and control of a vast range of human traits. Biologist and co-discoverer of the structure of DNA James D. Watson characterized the ambitions of the Human Genome Project this way: “A more important set of instruction books will never be found by human beings. When finally interpreted, the genetic messages encoded within our DNA molecules will provide the ultimate answers to the chemical underpinnings of human existence.” Despite the fact that the majesty and benefits of the Human Genome Project are typically couched in the language of improved health and freedom from disease, which seems all to the good, it was inevitable that the project would raise questions about eugenic purposes and applications, about implications for privacy, social control, and biological manipulation. 5 If society as a whole rightly has abiding worries about the impact of the Human Genome Project, minorities such as gay people will be especially worried by efforts to uncover genetic determinants of human traits. The rhetoric of science is pungently ripe when it comes to auguring the future powers that will be handed to ordinary citizens.

It is to be noted that some of the most atrocious applications of sexual orientation science took place not in global backwaters but in the world’s most advanced cultures, advanced not only in science and the arts but also according to their own lights and rhetoric in morality as well. The mistreatment of gay people deserves lengthy chapters in British, German, and United States history, cultures that loom large in any history of human accomplishment. Is it fair to expect that the same Constitution that held sway in the United States during periods of the involuntary treatment of gay people to “cure” their homoeroticism will in the future protect gay people from the harms that might ensue an ever more powerful sexual science? This is a difficult question to answer, but there are several reasons to be somewhat optimistic that society will not fall victim to antigay atavism.

First of all, there now exist gay advocacy groups that, although limited in political clout, are nevertheless instruments of social correction. Because of the evolution of culture in general and of gay culture in particular, gay people are also now less willing to be complicit in their own mistreatment. Second, a burgeoning historical appreciation of the mistreatment of entire classes of persons offers cautionary tales for our own times, even if it is sometimes difficult to recognize oppression in and of the present. To be sure, a heightened appreciation of sufferings in the past may not translate easily into an appreciation of suffering in the present, especially when one’s status may be threatened by any shift in the social order of things, but attention to the mistreatment of women, Jews, and even gay people can be an educational vehicle by which to sensitize the present to its own ills. Thus armed with moral tales, the world can try to choose less oppressive social policies.

Historically speaking, gay rights has not been the kind of a cause that has energized politicians, social reformers, medical practitioners, or the judiciary-sometimes not even the most radically revisionist among them. One of the few major efforts to protect gay people that went forward in the United States without significant lobbying by or input from gay people involved the Model Penal Code recommendations that were drawn up by the American Law Institute. These recommendations were predicated on the decriminalization of most consensual sexual acts between adults and therefore made no mention of sodomy. 6 When Illinois became the first state to adopt these recommendations in 1960, it did so despite the fact that there were no gay political rights organizations in existence in the state at the time, and the 1969 New York Stonewall riots that are frequently taken as the starting date of the contemporary gay rights movement were still almost a decade away. Most other policy shifts favorable to gay people, though, have required considerable lobbying efforts by gay people, and protection from any malicious uses of sexual orientation science will require diligence from that quarter again. The 1996 Supreme Court decision in Romer v. Evans hardly seems conceivable without thirty years of public gay advocacy behind it. Failing the emergence of a utopian state, gay people and all people subject to sexual orientation science can and ought to seek the protection of informed consent policies and adequate privacy and confidentiality standards. In this sense, the courts and everyone with interest in protecting people from undue social intrusion, ill-treatment, and prejudicial classification can be an ally of gay people.

There are enough historical precedents to know that we should be suspicious of attempts to formulate scientific explanations of why one group differs from another, especially when those attempts are imbued with moral judgments about the comparative worth of those groups. For example, it is reasonable to believe that the attempt to differentiate between homosexual and heterosexual grew in the conceptual ground of trying to differentiate male and female, an enterprise that was itself used in defense of the social standing of men and women.

Anne Fausto-Sterling has rightly argued that the presumptive “biological” differences between males and females are often artifacts of the projection of value-laden social expectations onto biological reality. 8 This same kind of projection has too often been the rule in documenting alleged differences between gay and straight people. The search for biological differences has, therefore, often amounted, both in regard to gender and sexual orientation, to an investigation of social stereotypes, which is to mistake social appearance for biological or psychological reality.

Yet, for all its susceptibility to error, science need not be an instrument of oppression if it differentiates empirical fact from cultural fantasy. Science can debunk false claims about sexual orientation even if it is a science that offers these false claims in the first place. This process of conjecture and refutation can go forward even if science does not ultimately achieve a veridically true characterization of the world. Moral philosophy is the most developed and sophisticated method for the clarification and assessment of matters of value. As sexual science moves forward, it is the task of science to be its own most demanding critic, just as it is the task of moral philosophy to examine the values connected with science and its social uses even if it does not either achieve a veridical window on moral truth. Both science and moral philosophy should proceed with the highest order of intellectual diligence in order to stave off any prejudicial use of research.

Some commentary on sexual orientation research makes it appear that ethics must control what is otherwise a scientific effort running amok. That science and ethics come into conflict or appear to be in conflict about matters of sexual orientation is worrisome because both science and ethics have a common ancestry and common interests as guides to rational action; they have their roots in capacities all human beings share.

The question now before us is whether science and ethics can be brought together in a way that emphasizes the commonality of their origins rather than their differences. Can science and ethics work in shared awareness of their mutual concerns and thereby achieve consensus about the purpose and uses of sexual orientation research? When Friedrich Nietzsche chose Gay Science as the title of his reflections on culture and morality, he did so in order to contrast a spirit of robust and adventurous inquiry to the oppressive and limiting conventions he found prevalent in science and scholarly inquiry of the day. The entrenched contemporary use of the word gay to describe various homoerotic identities and political causes is founded on a remarkably similar self-conscious opposition to oppressive conventions and values, in this case, those conventions and values that hold homoeroticism to be pathological, criminal, and sinful.

Gay ethics has built on a rejection of heteronormative values and gone on to criticize formalistic, rigid, and inhumane social principles. It may be that science and ethics can join forces in their opposition to unfounded beliefs, whether those beliefs occur in regard to the origins of erotic interests or the value of gay people to society. If so, this conjunction would go a long way toward showing that the study of erotic desire can be not only a human activity but a profoundly humane activity as well.

References

Anne Fausto-Sterling, 1992. Myths of Gender, Basic Books, New York.

Anne Fausto-Sterling, 2000. Sexing the Body, New York.

Identity in life is a central thing that starts from childhood up to the culmination of an individual’s life. Gender identity refers to individual’s awareness or logic of being a man or a woman and one of the most essential and obvious characteristics of the individual’s self-concepts. Its function in the adolescent growth and development has been essential as the youth get to understand and identify themselves in ways, which were not applicable during their young age of childhood. More particularly, the capability to reflect on someone’s thoughts and therefore, on one’s self, increases a new view of self-discovery, especially of someone’s sexual identity (Huffaker & Calvert, 2005, par. 2).

This paper focuses on the factors of gender identification and gender roles. Gender identity that refers to an individual conception of oneself as female or male has a linkage to the idea of gender role. Gender role refers to the outward expression of personality, which mirrors the gender identity. Gender identity is self-identification that results from the combination of intrinsic/inherent and environmental or extrinsic factors. On the other hand, gender role, is expressed within the community through visible factors like appearance and behavior. For example, if an individual believes she is a female and she is okay with her personal gender, then she can be termed to be a female to bring out the aspect of gender identity. However, her gender role is female if she only displays specific female characteristics in dress code, behavior and morals. In summary, gender identity is the outward manifestation of the gender role (Ghosh, 1994, par.2).

The development of gender identity is through a process of separation or differentiation that include several factors like; social, cognitive learning and interactions of biological factors, which happen from time to time. Differentiation refers to mostly structures that are the same, developing in different ways as they rely on the influence of additional factors. Examples of biological factors include prenatal hormonal setting and genetic complement. The physical features of the male and female fetus are similar for the first one month but after the sixth week of prenatal growth, there are some differences. As the development continues, several influences bring the distinct between the two sexes. The process starts in prenatal stage with the chromosomes that can determine the sex, fetal gonads development and the effect of hormones on the unborn child and effects on the brain. At birth, the social labeling of all infants is either a boy or a girl depending on the appearance of the external genitals (Democracy Store, 1997, par.3). By the age of one and half to two years, a child can recognize the self as a boy or girl. This type of learning of some issues of gender identity happens at biologically sensitive times and once learned they are hard to change. An example of social factors includes the behavior of the parent’s emotional union and the relationship, which each parent has with their child (Democracy store, 1997, par.6).

Masculinity and femininity means an individual’s gender identity. While masculinity and femininity are different, many individuals find themselves relying on certain traits, which are associated to either males or females. This is termed as the masculinity-femininity continuum. Some of the traits that are more associated with masculinity include; toughness, logical, protectiveness, gentlemanliness, sexually aggressiveness, unemotional and being independent among others. Feminine traits include affectionate, caring, empathetic, gentleness, helpfulness, patience, submissiveness, kindness among others. All the traits mentioned above are physical features that play a major role in gender identity (Rathus, Nevid & rathus, 2005, p.183).

Some of the factors in my life that have helped to determine my gender identity as a feminine is; social, biological and cognitive learning factors. Biological factors include the fact that I have a cleavage, a feminine figure and my reproductive organs tell more about my gender identity. An example of the social factors is the dressing code where I am most of the times on skirts and dresses. Through my understanding, it is clear that I am a female just by the fact of the biological structures of my body.

I consider myself as a feminine due to the characteristics, which I have that are feminine. These characteristics include caring, patience and submissiveness. I consider myself caring because I like spending a lot of time with my family members, visiting sick people in the hospitals and volunteering for charity works. Submissiveness reflects in my life because at anytime I like being under someone who can always give good directions. The reflection of patience in my life is by the fact that I take my time to pursue any task up to completion. However, I also have the masculine traits like being independent and self-sufficient; I do not like borrowing things from other people. My mother has contributed a lot to my traits since she made me believe that women should always be submissive, caring, good homemakers among others. Despite the fact that the society has changed drastically, that effect of my mother’s upbringing has had a great impact in my life. Moreover, my father has also made me believe that anything that a man can do, a woman can also do it.

In conclusion, everybody has traits for both male and female. There are factors that can influence where one will fall in the masculinity- femininity continuum.

Reference

Discovery Score, (1997). Illustration of the sequential and interactional components of gender-identity differentiation. Money, Principles of Developmental Psychology. New York: Continuum. 2009. Web.

Ghosh, S. (1994). Sexuality, Gender Identity. E-medicine. 2009. Web.

Huffaker, D., & Calvert, S. (2005). Gender, identity, and language use in teenage blogs. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 10(2). 2009. Web.

Rathus, A., Nevid, S., & Rathus, F. (2005) Human Sexuality in a World of Diversity. Sixth Ed. Allyn and Bacon.

Gender norms are those rules within a society that guide girls, women, boys, and men on how they are supposed to carry themselves regarding what is considered appropriate. The norms, in this case, restrict one gender identity to participate in certain acts as society sees fit (Knudson-Martin). However, such norms are neither static nor universal as they change over time. An example of a norm in a society is that women are expected to be polite and dress accordingly while men are expected to be solid and aggressive. Such norms, therefore, change from one society to the other depending on the views of that particular society. On the other hand, stereotypes are a belief that is in existence about a specific group or gender. Stereotyping, therefore, focuses on broader cultural and social institutions. Thus, the assumptions of stereotypes are often generalized and may be true or untrue (Matviychuk). Therefore, this paper discusses social norms and stereotypes and how they function within a society.

Using the film, the aspect of gender norms has been reinforced in various ways. In minute 2:05, the lady in the dress accepts that doing an action like a girl is quite okay since she is feminine and proud of it. Therefore, in a society set, embracing the feminine norm shows that you are ready to be identified as one and thus makes a feminine person carry themselves in ways a woman should do (Charlesworth and Banaji). When the lady says that she has accepted waking up, hitting, and running as a woman, it shelves her from overdoing or copying her male counterparts in doing an activity since her actions come out the way she expects them. Another instance showing the function of gender norm in the film is in minute 2:46, the lady is confident that she would run like her if given a chance showing that she is proud to be feminine and act that way and not the opposite of how she would do it. Thus, familiarizing yourself with who you are and bringing it out shows the boundaries that norms have created within the society, require acceptance for one to belong to a particular group.

On the other hand, stereotyping in the video is shown in minute 0:29. The guy is asked to fight like a lady and throws weak punches that are somehow funny. Such stereotyping has put women in a tight spot where they are being seen as inferior to the male gender in specific activities. Additionally, stereotyping is also seen in minute 0:36, where the boy is being asked to throw like a girl. The boy uses the exclamation “awww!” which shows that she is not even in a position to pitch to a further distance. The stereotyping, in this case, depicts women as weaker and cannot do tasks that require power. The boy is later asked how the phrase like a girl sounds when used against women, and he says it sounds like abuse to women and should not be used against her sister. Stereotyping, therefore, causes one to be distracted by the thinking of another individual. In such a case, one may engage in activities that can harm them to prove a point that is unnecessary and may even go unnoticed.

Sill, such gender norms and stereotyping exist as we do our regular activities. For example, in sports, we see so many insults directed against professional athletes, such as “football is a man’s game,” which leaves the women who want to pursue their passion in limbo as they are heading into a discriminative adventure. “I cannot watch women playing soccer” is another insult that stereotypes women’s gender behavior in sports (Marcén et al.). Such statements are therefore demoralizing and should be addressed as gender-based violence. Therefore such utterances as “doing things like a girl” are uncalled for since they are specific and portray the women as weak and undeserving (Ellemers). The phrase, in this case, is a result of gender norms that demand women to have certain limits even if they can do a particular activity. Therefore, these biased and false gender norms have damaging impacts on women.

The impact damages the women who are emotional and break at the slightest form of ridicule or oppression. The effect, in this case, does not make a woman explore their full potential because they fear being stereotyped. Another result is that such stereotypes can keep a woman from engaging in sports or science as they are viewed as male-dominated areas and need strength and brains. How society has created gender norms and stereotyped women is alarming, making the women strain to be noticed in the community (Bates et al.). With this, brands such as” always” has taken the initiative to address the issue through promotion, showing various approaches the women have been viewed and the few who have stood the test of stereotypes. Therefore, the messenger is not the matter, as the issue is getting out of hand, and only a few women can address the issue.

Therefore, gender norms and stereotyping are broad issues that should be handled depending on how society has changed and not how the community was designed. The change enables us to rub off assumptions and encourage the other gender. A more scholarly approach should be used based on facts and opinions and not assumptions. Accepting each other’s sex, gender, group, and abilities should be inclusive since today, women do various activities better than men and vice versa.

Works cited

Bates, Elizabeth A., et al. “The Impact of Gendered Stereotypes on Perceptions of Violence: A Commentary.” Sex Roles, vol. 81, no. 1, 2019, pp. 34–43.

Charlesworth, Tessa ES, and Mahzarin R. Banaji. “Patterns of Implicit and Explicit Stereotypes III: Long-Term Change in Gender Stereotypes.” Social Psychological and Personality Science, vol. 13, no. 1, 2022, pp. 14–26.

Ellemers, Naomi. “Gender Stereotypes.” Annual Review of Psychology, vol. 69, 2018, pp. 275–98.

Knudson-Martin, Carmen. Changing Gender Norms in Families and Society: Toward Equality amid Complexities. 2012.

Marcén, Miriam, et al. Gender Stereotyping in Sports. 2020.

Matviychuk, Ruslana. “Gender Stereotypes in Modern Society.” Topical Issues of Humanities, Technical and Natural Sciences, 2021, pp. 277–79.

Leadership Skills and Functions

In the case of leadership skills and functions, building a safe place is the key objective, which can be achieved by protecting group members from any form of hostility. The accentuation and emphasis will be put on both interaction processes with members as well as among participants. In order words, there will not be any form of communication-based restriction due to the group being an open and welcoming space for the exchange of thoughts and ideas. In addition, there will be strict rules against maleficence and judgment, which need to be eliminated to ensure effective communicative procedures. The group will harness trust and empathy through active listening, encouragement, restatement, confronting, and reflecting on feelings. As a therapist, it is essential to conduct a summary, give honest feedback, and provide high-quality psychoeducation with a description of logical consequences. It is also critical to be initiating, evaluate, and facilitate by applying to block, linking, and modeling techniques.

Gender Violence

Gender violence is a broad term, which describes a wide range of specific issues. These might include rape, sex trafficking and prostitution, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and intimate partner violence or domestic violence (Merry, 2016). In other words, all these crimes or violent acts are committed based on gender. Although traditionally, it is perceived as males oppressing females, it can occur between same-gender couples as well as against men.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

The given group proposal focuses on the extensive utilization of cognitive-behavioral therapy for gender violence victims to ensure their proper recovery from the traumatic experience. The provided approach was chosen due to the evidence suggesting that women achieved a substantial reduction in the levels of distress after the completion of the therapy program. In addition, its structured nature can be highly useful for group settings to eliminate the factor of disorder and chaos.

Rationale

Cognitive-behavioral therapy should include not only what is associated with discoveries in conditioning and theories of learning, but also all the information obtained in experimental psychology. CBT involves restructuring the environment and social interactions and, to a lesser extent, modifying somatic processes through biological interventions (Corey et al., 2010). Cognitive-behavioral therapy should reduce human suffering and limitations in the ability to act.

Group Type

Focusing heavily on current factors contributing to the persistence of the problem does not mean ignoring the client’s history. However, the amount of attention that is paid to events from the client’s life experience in the past directly depends on their contribution to the distress that the client is experiencing in the present.

Membership Criteria & Recruitment

It is important to note that not all willing participants will be accepted to the specified group. Due to the highly limited group size, which is focused on efficiency and thoroughness, stricter criteria for selection will be applied. It is important to understand that a person with a more severe case will be prioritized over individuals with milder ones.

Specific Objectives

The specific objectives will revolve around the goals, and the most vital purpose is to create a welcoming and supportive environment. In addition, the aim will be put on developing effective coping mechanisms for distress and encouraging personal growth and positive action. It is also necessary to advocate and promote Me Too movement initiatives through education as well as teaching the symbolic anthem “A Rapist in Your Path” to encourage strength.

Topics & Activities

There will be a total of seven sessions, with the first one being focused on the introduction and meet-up. The following sessions will address personal story reveals, psychoeducation, Me Too postulates, the anthem, positive action encouragement, and development of personal philosophy.

Outcome Evaluation

The procedures, as well as the criteria for evaluating the results of psychological counseling, may be different. The assessment can be carried out, for example, during the counseling itself, after the beginning, after the end of the counseling (Nadkarni et al., 2015). Multiple evaluations of the results of psychological counseling allow the client to make sure that it is going well. The effects of psychological counseling can be assessed sometime after the completion of counseling if it is assumed that its positive results will not appear immediately and so that they can be fully appreciated. The last version of the procedure for evaluating the outcomes of psychological counseling is most often used when the properties and forms of the client’s behavior changed in the course of psychological counseling are sufficiently inert, stable, and transform slowly, hardly noticeably. These can be, for example, abilities, character traits, habits of the client.

Homework

The homework will primarily be based on reading and getting familiar with official documentation and information on gender violence prevention. For example, one of the mandatory readings will be World Health Organization’s and UN Women’s approaches for the given problem. In the case of the former, promoting gender equality is the most critical element of violence prevention. In addition, the school initiatives need to be well-established to properly address the gender attitudes and norms from a young age. Community interventions are vital to engaging men and empowering females (WHO, n.d.). UN Women is also an outstanding source for gaining insight into gender violence prevention measures (UN Women, 2020). One should note the fact that women’s rights are human rights, which is why it is also protected by the relevant laws.

The tremendous progress of consciousness that characterizes contemporary society in developed countries has a rapid dynamic such that even recently created concepts are subject to social modification in order to adapt to demands. This statement is true to describe what is actually observed in the nature of feminism. In the proposed article, researchers aim to theoretically conceptualize knowledge in order to discuss postfeminist trends for society as a whole as well as for the organization. Recognizing the impermanence of feminism, Lewis et al. (2017) attempt to shed light on this model’s development. This leads them to articulate the idea of moving from liberal feminism, along with a critique of men seeking equality, to a neoliberal type focused only on creating equal rights and opportunities.

The research paper is structured along the lines of a literary review, accompanied by a critical analysis of the sources. It seems that the methodology of selecting source material was such as to showcase the argument from different angles as much as possible, so, for example, by citing quantitative research, the authors subsequently point out that there is not enough data to accurately assess the problem of perception of postfeminism. The review is divided into three central sections, consistently describing theoretical information about the nature of the phenomenon, incorporating the concept of postfeminism, and defining the scope of the special issue.

Summarizing the above, we can conclude that this paper is an eclectic piece summarizing the disparate literature on the role of postfeminism in organizations. The key findings of the paper, in addition to detailing the metamorphosis of traditional struggles for gender equality, were the recognition of postfeminist obstacles that can stimulate organizational development. In particular, the practice of training women to create similar functionality to men entails overcoming existing gender barriers and equity. On the other hand, a rejection of quotas for women is necessary since the very idea of such privilege runs counter to the principles of neoliberal feminism. This is a useful study that provides access to the most relevant perspectives on developing global feminist practices. In this regard, it is important to recognize that Lewis et al.’s (2017) insights can be used in the author’s study. In particular, the lack of mentoring among African American employees can be seen as a violation of the foundations of postfeminism, both in terms of gender equality and ethnicity.

Reference

Lewis, P., Benschop, Y., & Simpson, R. (2017). Postfeminism, gender and organization. Gender, Work and Organization, 24(3), 213-225.

In modern society, the division of people into men and women is not strictly biological but is instead a social construct. The patterns laid down by society and upbringing help individuals identify themselves as either gender during their lives, regardless of their innate biological traits. The gender role assignment discussed in this essay is a prevalent issue in literary works.

One striking textual example of this seeming contradiction is the novel Birds Without a Nest. The novel tells the story of a protest against the socio-economic situation of the indigenous peoples of Peru. Traditionally it has been assumed that women are powerless and dependent on their men, but the novel’s author refutes this position. Her character, Marcela, demonstrates masculine strength of character and determination, which can make the reader ambivalent about her gender. As seen in the novel, Marcela openly opposes social norms and fights for her family’s rights, which allows the reader to regard her as little more than a classic literary helpless woman.

The example of Lucia, another protagonist of the story, is also noteworthy in this novel. The novel’s feminist narrative tells us that Lucia is not a traditional addition to the novel, demonstrating nothing but beauty. On the contrary, Lucia is an educated and intellectual full member of Andean society, which is quite revolutionary for the communities of the time. In other words, the author of the novel shows the reader that women are more than the patriarchal society used to think of them. Thus, the women in de Turner’s novel play a direct role in rebuilding the nation.

A close reading clarifies that women have as many social responsibilities as the men of the novel. The form of sexual services that the female characters must render to the natives is equivalent to the unpaid labor performed by the local men. Marcela acts as a protector of her children and husband as she seeks to destroy this social norm of the tribe. This open confrontation with society, which is the theme of the novel, demonstrates the dynamism of the female gender.

The exploration of the female gender in de Turner’s novel can also be traced through the rejection of the usual standards of patriarchal society. Women rapidly cease to be regarded as the guardians of the home. On the contrary, the female characters in the novel are given new social roles, which shows the female gender as dynamically changing and evolving. In other words, de Turner gives the reader a perspective from which women cease to be only minor characters in the historical novel but are given more literary power and opportunity.

The article “The Nineteenth Amendment and Gender Identity Discrimination” written by Romero A. for the American Bar Association journal reveals the legislative approaches related to gender diversity. The author describes the limitations of different states, cases that affected the law system, new policies, and issues that transgender people experience due to the inability to vote. The article’s main statement is that a crucial civic procedure like voting should not be affected by the gender identity of a citizen.

The Nineteenth Amendment that initially granted the women’s rights to vote is the constitutional act used by the author as the argument of required protection for transgender people. Romero (2020) states that “discrimination “on account of sex” within the meaning of the Nineteenth Amendment encompasses discrimination on account of one’s gender identity, or transition from one gender to another or no gender at all” (para. 4). He explains the contemporary gender identity and protects diversity as such people help society thrive and must not be discriminated against. Transgender individuals might experience mental issues due to their inability to behave the preferred way (Brumbaugh-Johnson & Hull, 2019). The article points out that every citizen deserves equal rights that should be protected by laws.

Although the United States is one of the countries that respects its citizens’ self-identification and legally allows people to change their gender, there are still laws and states that do not comply with these conditions. Romero (2020) claims that “in places such as Florida, Georgia, and Texas, it is perfectly legal under state law to fire a worker, evict someone from his or her home for being transgender” (para. 10). There is no established federal protection strategy from transgender discrimination, yet some existing legislation can be applied as assistance. The author mentions Title VII and the Fair Housing Act that do not include any defense for the right of gender identification (Romero, 2020). However, federal civil rights statutes prohibit sex discrimination in employment, healthcare, banking, education, and other sectors.

The author highlights that the laws and constitutional acts that can protect the rights of transgender people already exist, and the Nineteenth Amendment is an example. The article encourages the legislators to revise the gender identification and the perception of “sex” in laws. The Nineteenth Amendment appliance for transgender voters is a step closer to eliminating gender identity discrimination.

References

Brumbaugh-Johnson, S. M., & Hull, K. E. (2019). Coming out as transgender: Navigating the social implications of a transgender identity. Journal of Homosexuality, 66(8), 1148-1177.

Romero, A. P. (2020). The Nineteenth Amendment and Gender Identity Discrimination.American Bar Association, 19.