SOC101Y1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Gender Role, Neuroplasticity, Masculinity
By highlighting the complexity of different forms of inequalities,
intersectionality highlights various forms of privilege
○
Relational concept, meaning that it speaks to advantages that some
people or groups possess in greater amounts than other people or groups
○
Some come with advantages and disadvantages
○
Privilege can stem from class, race and ethnicity, age, gender, sexual
orientation, education, physical ability, health and other factors
○
Being members of particular groups
○
Patterns of advantages and disadvantages
○
Being privileged means occupying the dominant position within each of
those social locations, that has the highest status, and that is attached to
the most beneficial outcomes
○
Means being part of the norm - facing less discrimination, not being aware
of privilege
○
Less likely to encounter obstacles
○
Typically majority
○
From the perspective of privilege, disadvantaged experiences are often
unseen, allowing people to go about their lives unaware of the privilege
that they benefit from
○
Privilege
•
Virtually everything social in our lives in gendered
○
People continually distinguish between males and females and evaluate
them differently
○
Gender is an integral part of the daily experience of both women and men
○
Kind of drink you are supposed to order
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Gender
•
Boys and girls are not identical at birth - genetic and hormonal differences
do launch males and females down somewhat different developmental
paths
○
However, early experiences and learning are key factors
○
Most sex differences start out small - they are quickly amplified by our
gender infused culture
○
Neurological and cognitive studies
•
A concept used by neurologists to explain why experiences (i.e. learning)
regularly changes brain structure and function
○
Your brain is what you do with it
○
reading, running, laughing, calculating, debating, watching TV, folding
laundry, mowing grass, singing, crying, kissing, and so on
▪
Every task you spend time on reinforces active brain circuits at the expense
of other inactive ones.
○
Brain plasticity
•
Sociologists use the terms sex and gender to distinguish biological sex
identity from learned gender roles
○
A person is born male or female (or some combination, i.e. intersexed) but
becoming a man or a woman is the result of social and cultural
expectations that pattern men's and women's behaviour, attitudes, and
physical appearance
○
Culturally and socially constructed differences between females and
males fund in meanings, beliefs, practices of masculinity and
▪
Gender is about masculinity and femininity
○
Sex vs. Gender
•
Lecture 1.10: Gender
November 23, 2016
12:22 PM
LECTURE Page 35
Document Summary
By highlighting the complexity of different forms of inequalities, intersectionality highlights various forms of privilege. Relational concept, meaning that it speaks to advantages that some people or groups possess in greater amounts than other people or groups. Privilege can stem from class, race and ethnicity, age, gender, sexual orientation, education, physical ability, health and other factors. Being privileged means occupying the dominant position within each of those social locations, that has the highest status, and that is attached to the most beneficial outcomes. Means being part of the norm - facing less discrimination, not being aware of privilege. From the perspective of privilege, disadvantaged experiences are often unseen, allowing people to go about their lives unaware of the privilege that they benefit from. Virtually everything social in our lives in gendered. People continually distinguish between males and females and evaluate them differently. Gender is an integral part of the daily experience of both women and men.
