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Sex vs. Gender. GENDER-RELATED BEHAVIOR Concepts Sex vs. Gender Third Genders Biological vs. Social Male Berdache Hijras Biological vs. Social Female fa’afafines Guevodoche Eunuchs Castrati Pseudo-hermaphroditism Institutionalized Homosexuality
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GENDER-RELATED BEHAVIOR Concepts Sex vs. GenderThird Genders Biological vs. Social MaleBerdache Hijras Biological vs. Social Femalefa’afafines Guevodoche Eunuchs Castrati Pseudo-hermaphroditism Institutionalized Homosexuality Patriarchal Society Matriarchal Society Uniformitarianism Occam's Razor Correlation does not prove causality. Typical does not mean "natural." A constant cannot explain a variable. Ethnobiology Dichotomous vs. Continuous Sexual Paradigm Aristotelian vs. Galilean essentialist vs. conditional Infrastructure Structure Superstructure
Hermaphrodites a.k.a. Intersexuals
Jamie Lee Curtis * * * * * Male or Female?
Dr. Anne Fausto-Sterling has proposed that we replace our two-sex system with a five-sex system: • Males • Females, • Herms ("true" hermaphrodites) • Merms (male "pseudohermaphrodites") • Ferms (female "pseudohermaphrodites")
From a Dichotomous to a Continuous Model of Sexuality Dichotomous MaleFemale Continuous Male Female
Forms of Sexuality In Nature
Typological Approach: • The categories are real. • Race, species, sex, cultures, etc. • Behavior is explained in terms of the categories. (Aristotelian) • Population Approach: • Individuals are real. • Categories are only abstractions. • Behavior is explained in terms of conditional factors. (Galileian)
Classification of the Cassowary among the Karem of New Guinea SOURCE: “Why the Cassowary is not a bird”, R. Bulmer, Man, Vol. 2, Issue 1, (Mar. 1967)
Species Hybridization Mallard – Pintail Hybridization
Species Hybridization Coyote Red Wolf Gray Wolf
Asymmetrical Sterility Male Female YES NO Female Male
Homosexuality • 64% of human societies surveyed either condone of encourage same-sex relationships. • Platonic love in ancient Greece • Presentation of the body (with women) • Presentation of the mind (with men) • Greek soldiers brought young boys on military campaigns • Azande military homosexuality • Warriors have boy-wives • Boy wives become warriors with their own boy-wives • The Sambia of Highland New Guinea • Boys Fallate older men • Build up store of semen • Prohibition against masturbation
Third Genders HijrasTwo SpiritsFa’afafines (Berdache) GuevodocheCastratiEunuchs Sworn Albanian VirginsSunflowers
Gender-Related Behavior
GENDER-RELATED BEHAVIOR Concepts Sex vs. GenderThird Genders Biological vs. Social MaleBerdache Hijras Biological vs. Social Femalefa’afafines Guevodoche Eunuchs Castrati Pseudo-hermaphroditism Institutionalized Homosexuality Patriarchal Society Matriarchal Society Uniformitarianism Occam's Razor Correlation does not prove causality. Typical does not mean "natural." A constant cannot explain a variable. Ethnobiology Dichotomous vs. Continuous Sexual Paradigm Aristotelian vs. Galilean essentialist vs. conditional Infrastructure Structure Superstructure
The issue is not whether differences exist between men and women --which of course they do-- but rather whether those differences are relevant for explaining differences in behavior from one society to the next.
“There are more methodological problems in regards to the study of cognitive sex differences and sex differences in general than there are actual sex differences.” --Dr. Caroline Jaklin
The Role of Prediction in Science. (Given a, . . . Then b.) • The goal of scientific research is to develop theories and models that lead to better and better predictions of behavior. • Predictability is, thus, fundamental to doing science. • Yet, predictability is severely lacking in sex-difference research. • “We gain little in prediction by knowing the sex of a child.” (Jacklin) • Differences generally range from 1- 5% when, in fact, they differ (Caplan & Caplan) • Which means that between 95 - 99% of sex-related behavior is indistinguishable
Why Does Sex-Difference Research Persist? • Given all of the methodological problems associated with such studies and the consistently small (and frequently non-existent) differences found, it is reasonable to ask why such research persists? • Would we continue to conduct such inconclusive research in physics, chemistry, biology or medicine? • Would we continue to fund research that after 30 years could not point to conclusive results? • Whose interests might be served by such research?
Commonly used Aristotelian Concepts: Maternal Instinct Male Aggressiveness Machismo Patriarchal Society Human NatureMatriarchal Society
Aristotelian concepts of Gender cannot explain . . . 1. Why Net-hunter Pygmy women enjoy a higher social status than archer women. 2. Why Yanomamo women have much lower social status than Dobe !Kung women, or why they also have a lower social status than women in most other Amazonian societies. 3. Why Inuit (Eskimo) women have among the lowest social status of all women in hunter-gatherer societies. or . . .
. . . why the role of women and their status in both the domestic and political economy changed dramatically among the Plains Indians as they moved onto the Great Plains and became increasingly dependent on mounted bison hunting. 1. Among the Sioux, the Cheyenne and other eastern tribes, the family structure changed from being matrilocal and matrilineal extended kin groups to individualized patrilocal and polygynous ones. 2. Among the western Plains Indians, such as the Blackfoot, which had previously been organized along extended patrilocal and patrilineal lines evolved male-focused independent polygynous households. or . . .
. . . why most of those executed for witchcraft in Europe and North America during the Great Witch Craze were women, whereas most of the Pueblo Indians in the Southwest that were executed as witches by the early Spanish Conquistadors were men. . . . or why most witches among the Pueblo, Apache and Navajo in the American Southwest are believed to be men. . . . or why among the Yoruba of Nigeria, not only do most men suspect their wives of witchcraft, but most women suspect their co-wives and their mothers-in-law of witchcraft.or . . .
. . . Or why . . . 1. 47% of the 95 societies she surveyed were "rape-free", while 17% proved to be "unambiguouslyrape-prone.” 2. The Ashanti of West Africa and the Mbuti Pygmies of the Ituri Forest are rape-free societies, whereas 47.2 rapes per 100,000 persons were recorded for the Gusii of Kenya. 3. The highest rape rate among Industrial societies occurs in the U.S. at 13.5 rapes per 100,000 inhabitants. In contrast, the incidence of rape in Japan, a more “patriarchal” society than the U.S., is far below that of the U.S. _________________________________________ SOUCE: B. L. Benderly, “Rape Free or Rape Prone” Science 82 (1982)
. . . why female income relative to male income in the U.S. increased from 59¢ to 60¢ per dollar between 1960 and 1980, whereas it increased from 60¢ to 73¢ per dollar between 1980 and 1990 (during the politically conservative Reagan and Bush administrations), and only increased from 73¢ to 76¢ per dollar between 1992 and 2000, when Bill Clinton and Al Gore were in office. . . . or why average female income increased10% from 1979 to 1990, while averagemale income decreased by 8%. . . . or why White female employment increased 72% between 1974 and 1977 at the same time that Black male employment declined by 11%.
. . . or why there was a dramatic increase during the 1970s and 1980s in the number of individuals in the U.S. claiming: 1. to have recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse by family members 2. to have recovered memories of sexual abuse by members of satanic cults 3. to believe that they possessed multiple personalities. . . . or why: 1. this was a distinctly American phenomenon 2. the overwhelming majority (over 90%) of these individuals were white middle class females.
. . . why M. Konner reports that 57 out of 94 studies of aggression showed "statistically significant sex differences" in aggressive behavior. 1. in 52 of the 57 studies that showed gender differences in aggressive behavior,boys were more aggressive than girls. 2. In 5 of the studies, girls were more aggressive than boys. 3. In 37 studiesthere wereno gender difference in aggression.
Gender Differences in Wages Discrimination Or Adaptation?
RE: the Census Bureau statistic that women earn 76% of what men earn. “Among women and men aged 27 to 33, who have never had a child, the earnings of women in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth are close to 98 percent of men’s.” --June O’Neill, Director Congressional Budget Office “It’s the vast majority of us who become mothers who are responsible for dragging the average down.” --Danielle Crittenden New York Times (1995)
Effect of the Differential Opportunity Costs of Men’s vs. Women’s labor • 1. ”Although the role of children is typically ignored in studies of male labor supply and wage discrimination, fatherhood has quantitatively and statistically significant effects on both outcomes.” • “Because we observe increases in both hourly wages and annual hours of work for fathers, increased specialization of husbands and wives in response to parenthood is the dominant pattern for both early (pre-1950) and later (post-1950) cohorts.” • --Lundberg & Rose (2002)
“Tests indicate that housework has approximately the same impact on wages for men and women who are not currently married, but that the negative relation is somewhat stronger for married women as compared with married men. Evidence suggests that this differential could be due to gender differences in the type of housework performed by married persons.” --Hersch and Stratton (2002)
Women and Violence • Women commit the majority of child homicides in the U.S. • Women commit the majority of physical child abuse in the U.S. • Women commit about 25% of the child sexual abuse in the U.S. • Women are primarily responsible for infanticide. • 30% of the women who killed men in one Chicago study had previous arrest records for assault, battery, and weapons charges.
Domestic Violence in Gay and Lesbian Relationships
Domestic Violence in Gay and Lesbian Relationships Kelly & Warshafsky (1986): 46% of gay and lesbians reported using physical aggression for conflict resolution with their partners. Brand & Kidd (1986): 25% of lesbians surveyed reported that they had been physically abused by their lesbian partners. Coleman (1990): Of 90 lesbian couples surveyed, 46% experienced “repeated acts of violence in their relationships.” Reyes (1991): 26% of lesbians reported physical, sexual and emotional abuse in their current same-sex relationship. Renzetti (1996): 22-46% of all lesbians have been in a physically violent, same-sex relationship.
Are these women “victims” of “patriarchy”, or active participants in socially accepted gender roles? Are they being “exploited”, or are they using the resources they have to their own advantage? “Arm Candy”
Comparing the State of Children 19601990 5% Children born to unwed mothers 28% 7% Children under 3 living with one parent 27% 1% Children under 18 experiencing the 50% divorce of their parents 17% Mothers returning to work within 53% one year of a child’s birth 10% Children under 18 living in a 25% one-parent family 19% Married women with children under 60% 6 years old in the labor force ______________________________________________ SOURCE: New York Times
Females are capable of taking up arms . . . One-third of Columbian rebel soldiers are female. . . . and killing people
Violent Women Jenny Metcalf Pearl Hart Circle Piru Blood
