HLTC02H3 Chapter Notes -Fetus, Atomism, Male Reproductive System
Document Summary
The egg & the sperm: science has constructed a romance based on stereotypical male-females roles by emily martin. Introduces the possibility that culture shapes how biological scientists describe what they discover about the natural world. There is a diffusion of cultural beliefs and practises through the teaching of biology. Popular and scientific accounts of reproductive biology relies on stereotypes central to our cultural definitions of male and female. Not only that female biological processes are less worthy than their male counterparts but also that women are less worthy than men. Medical texts describe menstruation as a process that is removing debris and conflating lack of impregnation of an egg as failure. Scientific research, despite it being a seemingly unaffected by social norms and social context, ascribes passivity to female gametes of eggs and active traits to male gametes sperm. The male reproductive system is described with great enthusiasm and awe whereas the female reproductive system is less enthusiastically described.
