IDENTITY RESEARCH.

IDENTITY RESEARCH.

Gender Identity.

Introduction.

This is a very common question. How can someone really know what gender they belong in? Well, Gender identity is an individual innermost concept on self as female, male, a combination of both or neither. Some people posses’ similar gender identities while others are different depending on their sex assigned at birth in some cases it differs with this rule. According to a study conducted by American Academy of Pediatrics by the time one is four years of age they must have a stable sense that pertains to their gender identity.

People express their gender identities through physical expressions for instance dressing code, make up, hairstyle and social expressions such as pronoun choice and name. Across the world there are many types of gender identities that different persons identify themselves with. regardless of your specific gender identity, there are both advantages and disadvantages of belonging to a particular or multiple gender identities.

Since I grew up, I have always known that I am a lady. Identifying your identity is very essential for all female individuals since, the way in which we define ourselves and base our sense of self will finally act as a groundwork for this identity. My identity is female and I am very pleased to belong to this gender identity.  My identification to this group is manifested by a combination of things I do and traits such as my dressing style, the chores I carry at home versus what my brothers do, my sexual orientation physical appearance and the concept of procreation.

Gender Stereotypes.

There exist very many stereotypes associated to gender.  The Gender stereotypes encompasses what men and women are like. According to theory of Social role, gender stereotypes are derived from women and men discrepant distribution into their social roles at work and home. Both the social complex and foraging societies, faces the challenge of gender division of labor. Women are expected to perform routine domestic work. To begin with, here are the types of gender stereotypes;

• Domestic Behaviors – In most cases people expect women to carry on home chores, take care of children while men on the other hand work on home finances, repair cars and other home appliances.
• Occupation – Majority of people assume that some careers such as nursing belong to women while piloting and engineering is for men.
• Personality traits – Men are expected to be aggressive and self-confident while women are anticipated to be accommodative and emotional.
• Physical appearance – Men are expected to be muscular and tall while women are to be graceful and thin. Apart from these, women and men are expected to dress differently in a manner that portray their specific genders.

Gender stereotypes can ultimately cause inequality and unfair treatment depending on persons gender. These stereotypes may in the long run suppress people’s emotions. For instance, its detrimental for men to have a perception that they shouldn’t cry. On the other hand, female can also be smart independent and assertive.

Globally nations are putting up measures to empower their women such as ensuring get privileges just as their male counterparts. Women empower is crucial for development of any society because it facilitates both the quantity and quality of human resource readily available for development In the Unites States, females have shown a significant improvement towards minimizing the gap that hinders them from achieving their goals equally with men.

Women privileges

A privilege is referred to as an advantage, immunity or special right granted to a particular person or group. In the gender context, it is clear that men are born with more advantages than women such as a larger jurisdiction in the society. career expectations and a better pay. Therefore, if male have such privileges, female privileges also exist. When put in the context of certain legal structure, Social Norms and educational statistics, it appears that females band some advantages over men. For instance, in the US when it comes to divorce cases, women are more likely to get children custody.

Below are some of the privilege that that women in the US enjoy.

• Chivalry on women -In our contemporary society, Chivalry is equated to how a man should treat a woman. Chivalry is system of rules that emanated from the medieval era that outlines expected qualities of a night like courage, preparedness to protect the weak and honor. The big question is? How is opening door for a woman and offering them free drinks helps them in the society? Is it a real privilege? Well these privileges do not hurt women and do not help them either. These privilege makes women to be viewed as unequal and in most cases men who behave around women in such a manner, might me expecting a reward for their conduct.
• Women who don’t feel or want to work can marry rich men – This is a privilege that women across the world have not just in the US.
• Acceptance of women as Emotional beings – This privilege makes women look weak with inability to manage their emotions. Men are always aware that women are very emotional giving men unfair burden for emotion caging but remember this happens at the women expense. While examining this privilege, women open emotion acceptance, it reinforces them as lesser gender and tampering with men ego.
• Women are more likely to get children custody – With the rampant divorce cases in the US and the entire world, women are more likely to be allowed to stay with the kids as their father visits once in a while. According to a study conducted in Massachutes.in a period of five years, a smaller number of men won children custody as compared to women.

The privileges associated to female identity are good because women get an advantage because of their nature. However, these privileges have had some detrimental effects on women. For instance, when electing student leaders within the University, majority of voters vote for male contestants leaving out the female contestants. The bottom line is that women are weak and may fail to address student’s grievance to administration. At the end of the day the students end up electing incompetent leaders at the expense of gender bias.

In the United States, most women hold top positions such as being CEO in big companies and associations. Other women have grown their own businesses from scratch and are doing quite well globally. In addition to these, I am very glad to see iconic women like Oprah Winfrey and Mitchell Obama on the forefront empowering young girls through mentorship and even offering scholarship programs to the needy. This are some of the reasons that make me strongly identify with this group. In additions to this, the women tenderness and care on others is on another level. I am also proud to see women stand up for justice and equality in the society. We all have equal abilities to perform different tasks regardless of our genders.

I am very proud and pleased to belong to female identity even so, there are times I feel so annoyed especially when I see women stooping low for things, they also have ability to achieve. Here in the United States, both male and female are equally educated. It therefore means that, what men can do, I as a woman can also do even better. The aspect of some women wanting to be favored because of how the society views them is unacceptable. Everything should be awarded on merit not basis of gender.

Interaction of gender and Sexual orientation.

Everybody has identities more than one and these unique identities interacts in one way or another. Most people treat sexual orientation and gender as one thing. Well, these two identities are distinct but they interrelate. In order to clearly communicate my sexual orientation, I get rid of any inconsistencies in my gender expression. Note that the manner in which someone wears mostly relates to gender expression not sexual orientation. Clothes alone can never tell someone’s sexual orientation unless they open up.

Interaction of gender and sexuality.

Most researches who have researched on the relationships of these two identities i.e. those in the Nirantar suggest that, theses two aspects are intimately related. Sexuality and gender interrelate in the sense that an individual gender role has an impact on other people perspective on their sexuality. For instance, both female and male genders are subjected to heterosexuality assumption. The relationship between these two identities is explored in the following ways;

• Influence of gender norms on sexuality.

The behavior of men and women is usually influenced by gender linked social expectations and this include their attitudes, feelings and sexual behavior. These social expectations base their assume that only two categories exist and behave differently depending on their biological sex.

• Sexuality ideologies.

In many circumstances, females both young and aged are viewed vulnerable and need to be protected from the sexual advances by men. Virginity is always valuable and brings some sort of social status to the family. Sexuality is often utilized in order to control females who are seen defying feminity norms. Education o girls has contributed massively to girls taking care of themselves.

There are so many research work that have carried out by different researchers globally. According to a research by sage journals the primary factor that affects a female when deciding on their identities is the family upbringing and culture. Our cultures, customs, rituals and traditions have much influence on behavior. Women are mandated to behave in a particular manner while adhering to cultural norms. This finding is exactly what we are seeing today in our societies. The ideal woman syndrome is not something that emerges from nowhere. It results from a series of observations and emulations from the ideal women.

According to the biologic perspective, the root of feminity arises from the fact that men and women poses different hormonal structure. According to these findings, the concept of beauty that attract men, a curved body has contributed greatly on explaining feminity. The expectations that men have on women influence them to live up by these expectations which in the long run may put some pressure psyche to live up to these expectations.

Feminity is not just defined by physical structure of a woman but also the physiological features that make them femine. Women are represented with submissiveness, sensitive on emotions and sacrificing. If theses traits are replaced with being arrogant and tough then that is considered masculine. This aspect is very disturbing to some women because there are those ladies with physical features that makes them look masculine forcing them to go an extra mile to represent herself as a female. In most scenarios, the expectations that men have on women forces them to fulfill these expectations to bring that picture of an ideal woman.  A positive feedback on a woman from a man make women feel special while a negative feedback makes the females try even harder. I think ultimately this aspect may have some detrimental effects on women psychology.

The findings also show that men are more concerned with the body size of women. Most women go into depression and a feeling of inferiority especially when they have excessive fats in their bodies. Some end up cursing their bodies for the disgrace it has brought them. What surprises me is that someone could go to an extent of being depressed because of their body size instead of picking up the broken pieces and work out on their bodies. Life is full of solutions what we are required to do is to find them and make our life interesting to live. Finally, despite the challenges that females undergo, we are actually the pillars of the society. It is always amazing to get those privileges that are exclusive for women.

References.

Ichino, A., Olsson, M., Petrongolo, B., & Skogman Thoursie, P. (2019). Economic incentives, home production and gender identity norms.

Tabaac, A., Gordon, A., Reisner, S., Austin, S. B., & Charlton, B. (2019, November). Gender Identity in Longitudinal Research: Addressing Changes in Self-Reported Gender Identity in the Growing Up Today Study. In APHA’s 2019 Annual Meeting and Expo (Nov. 2-Nov. 6). American Public Health Association.

Kodadek, L. M., Peterson, S., Shields, R. Y., German, D., Ranjit, A., Snyder, C., … & Haider, A. H. (2019). Collecting sexual orientation and gender identity information in the emergency department: the divide between patient and provider perspectives. Emerg Med J, 36(3), 136-141.

Newman, A. (2020). Towards a Distinction between Gender Identity and Gender Orientation.

Bennett, D., Hennekam, S., Macarthur, S., Hope, C., & Goh, T. (2019). Hiding gender: How female composers manage gender identity. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 113, 20-32.

Eisenberg, M. E., Gower, A. L., Rider, G. N., McMorris, B. J., & Coleman, E. (2019). At the intersection of sexual orientation and gender identity: variations in emotional distress and bullying experience in a large population-based sample of US adolescents. Journal of LGBT youth, 16(3), 235-254.