Monday, August 31, 2009
Jane's Gender Bio
Since I am the only daughter of the family besides my two older brothers, my mom always tried to enforce rules of how I ought to act as a girl even until this day. Being brought up by traditional Asian parents, my dad worked hard to support us and was rarely home, and my mom was a homemaker who devoted all her time and efforts to raise and look after my brothers and me. As a little girl, I disliked the big frilly dresses that my mom made me wear, disliked the bows that my mom tied my hair in, and especially detested the perms that my mom gave me that left my hair into an afro every time. My mom was overly protective of me and strongly believed that I should stay away from any “masculine” activities because she was afraid that I would injure myself because I’m so feminine and “fragile” (lol :P). I couldn’t understand my mom even at a very young age and I soon found myself rebelling against my mom’s wishes and became a tomboy. Although I still had an affinity for pretty sparkly things and played with barbies, I also played with swords and legos, and hit boys and made them cry. In retrospect, there was a subtle and gradual point of transition during junior high that transformed me from being masculine to a feminine young lady; after I started to date boyfriends, I subconsciously became more feminine. In addition, media and my peers greatly influenced and reinforced me to become feminine during my junior high and high school years.
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I think this gender bio really brings up a lot of the concepts we have talked about in class. Your mom seems to have participated in anticipatory socialization by dressing you up and doing your hair and therefore trying to mold you into a refined adult woman. Her behavior follows the Cultural Anthropology pattern of cultural values leading to childrearing procceses leading to your personality. Your mom also seems to have formed a sort of social structure in her household, causing you to rebel against her desires and try to be more of a tomboy. However, you clearly found your own gender identity outside of this social structure. I find it interesting that your period of transformation into a more girly girl happened at the beginning of junior high school. I would assume that this happened because you observed the actions of your peers, kind of like the children in the "Barbie Girls vs. Sea Monsters" article. The limits of the Cultural Anthropology are demonstrated through your gender bio, since even though your mom did use your cultural background as a large part of her childrearing strategy, this did not seem to immediately mold your personality. Instead, it appears as if your personality resulted from a combination of your own natural interests, some femininity instilled by your upbringing, and the typical feminine activities you observed in the media and your peers.
ReplyDeleteAccording to your gender bio it seems like you were brought up in a very traditional household. Your mom was clearly an essentialist, which means that she believes that the differences between women and men are natural and grounded in biology. This is why your mother was very protective of you and wanted you to stay away from activities in which you could get hurt. You were also the subject of anticipatory socialization. Your mother taught you to do things that were “gender appropriate” such as doing your hair and dressing you in frilly dresses. So, the gender socialization by your family consisted of your mother raising you to be very girly and very different from your two brothers. However, your gender socialization consisted of an array of conflicting beliefs and values. Your family was not the only factor influencing you. You were exposed to many other gender beliefs through schools, friends, and the media so you rebelled and became a tomboy. The gender socialization theory would say that at this point your gender identity was fixed. This clearly was not the case because during junior high you transformed into a more feminine lady. So, your gender bio shows one of the limitations of the gender socialization theory which is that it assumes that there are fixed identities after childhood when in fact people’s gender identities continue to change and develop throughout life. Factors such as your friends and the media continued to influence you and you became much more feminine.
ReplyDeleteI think the example of your mom making you wear “big frilly dresses” and giving you perms is a perfect example of Anticipatory Socialization. In our society, I feel that most women eventually are expected to dress up and look “feminine” for the men. Here, your mom was teaching you a “gender appropriate” task that anticipated the gender role you’re expected to play as an adult. She also created somewhat of a self-fulfilling prophecy for you, claiming you were “fragile” and then being overly protective and not letting you participate in “masculine” activities. Obviously you were going to be more fragile and timid if you never got a chance to go out of scab your knees up a few times! When your mom considered you “fragile” it was also an example of gender attribution. If you had been a boy doing the exact same thing, she probably would’ve described you in a different way. I also thought it was interesting how even though you were drawn to sparkles and Barbies that you still enjoyed many “masculine activities” (such as beating up boys). Truly, you were socialized as a kid to be drawn towards girly things, but what would make you rebel and want to play with the boys? To me, it seems more acceptable for girls to occasionally play “boy games” than it is for boys to ever play “dress up” with the girls!
ReplyDeleteYour gender biography is reflective of the gender socialization theory that Professor Messner has discussed in class. Your mother attempted to socialize you to clothing and concepts that have widely been accepted as feminine because she was teaching you from a young age how to be a “proper lady.” Your rebellion to your mother and the fact that you transitioned into a more traditional female later on in life conveys the limitations of this theory because it doesn’t account for you being an active agent in the way you were being raised—which obviously you were since you actively tried to distance yourself from your mother’s attempts at female mantra. It also does not account for the fact that there are other spheres of influence and factors that affect children such as yourself outside of the family where children learn to develop their own gender identities. Your mother seems to think, along with a majority of parents, that boys and girls have predetermined roles within the household and this leads to the sort of gender attribution that makes your mother assume you were fragile and thus forced her to shield you from anything that could harm you. It is interesting to me to see how textbook the things we talk about in class play out in every one’s lives.
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