UH Zine
A digital publication of our research on the history of gender norms, the origin of male/female social inequalities and women's stories.
personal stories
Being in a male-dominated field (engineering) was very tough. I suffered a lot from being seen more as potential lover than anything else: friend, student, colleague. The sexualisation of the woman's body is the worst part for me. Until now I have never been to a workplace where there was not a person falling in love with me.
Women respond to a survey about health care and tell their personal stories.
Where do these stories come from and why? Can history tell us anything about gender norms and sexual health? Can science?
Almost all doctors tell me "it's good that you came to me now because we need to fix you before you get pregnant"
I was raised in post Soviet Russia, my school had sex education where they told us that the women should have no more than 7 partners before giving birth to a child, otherwise the child is going to have the genes of all the partners!
Once I had to assist my friend to go to a gynecologist for a pregnancy test because she was very nervous. The gynecologist (woman) was quite judgemental, because my friend did not use any birth control at the time. She was "giving a lesson" to her, so my friend came out of there even more anxious.
Depends on the doctor. If he or she is polite, make no judgments about my sexual life, make all procedures fast and painless, its ok. Nevertheless, all the setup makes you feel guilty somehow — about you having sex not being married, that you have some problems in the gynecological sphere. All the women in the queue to the gynecologist don't talk with each other and don't even look up from the floor. I don't dare talk with gynecologist about my female partner, and I don't think I ever would.
HISTORY
Social Roles:
1st & 2nd class citizens
Dimorphism
How do women and men present themselves differently in society ? How are they portrayed in the media ? Why ?
The universal fact of culturally attributed secondclass status of woman in every society. Two questions are important here. First, what do we mean by this: what is our evidence that this is a universal fact? And second, how are we to explain this fact, once having established it?
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Specific ideologies, symbolizations and
structural arrangements pertaining to women that vary widely from culture to culture.
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If we are unwilling to rest the case on genetic determinism, it seems to me that we have only one way to proceed. We must attempt to interpret female subordination in light of other universals, factors built into the structure of the most generalized situation in which all human beings, in whatever culture, find themselves. It is in the realm of such universals of the human condition that we must seek an explanation for the universal fact of female devaluation.
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~ Anthropologist Sherry Ortner
WHY? We can sort out for discussion topics concerning social & cultural roles placed on women & men:
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Women are placed closer to nature in contrast to man’s physiology, which frees him more completely to take up the projects of culture.
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Woman’s body and its functions place her in social roles that in turn are considered to be at a lower order of the cultural process than man’s.
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Woman’s traditional social roles are given a different psychic structure, which, like her physiological nature and her social roles, is seen as being simpler and closer to nature.
Gendered Expectations
Science
Pinker Vs. Spelke
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Spelke
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In one class are social forces, including overt and covert discrimination and social influences that lead men and women to develop different skills and different priorities.
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In the other class are genetic differences that predispose men and women to have different capacities and to want different things.
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Pinker
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One can imagine an extreme "nature" position: that males but not females have the talents and temperaments necessary for science. Needless to say, only a madman could take that view. The extreme nature position has no serious proponents.
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There is an extreme "nurture" position: that males and females are biologically indistinguishable, and all relevant sex differences are products of socialization and bias.
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Then there are various intermediate positions: that the difference is explainable by some combination of biological differences in average temperaments and talents interacting with socialization and bias.
"Some ethologists, zoologists and sociologists have looked at other primates and
concluded that primate society depends upon the male for stability and the female for child care. They have extended their observations from apes and monkeys to
human beings, implying that the two sexes limit the possible role of women. But
recent primate studies indicate that earlier researchers may have concluded that
female primates have a far larger role than that of mother. Now, more than ever,
we need to know if apparent differences in behavior between men and women are
more or less biologically fixed or heavily influenced by experience"
(Jane Lancaster, 1973:30).