what theory believes that gender serves as a means to organize the social lives of men and women

The Functionalist Perspective

The functionalist perspective of gender roles suggests that gender roles be to maximize social efficiency.

Learning Objectives

Describe gender inequality from the view of the functionalist perspective

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• The functionalist perspective sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability. This approach looks at society through a macro-level orientation and broadly focuses on the social structures that shape society equally a whole.
• This theory suggests that gender inequalities exist as an efficient fashion to create a division of labor, or every bit a social organization in which a particular segment of the population is conspicuously responsible for sure acts of labor and another segment is clearly responsible for other labor acts.
• The feminist movement takes the position that functionalism neglects the suppression of women within the family structure.

Cardinal Terms

• functionalist perspective of gender inequality: A theory that suggests that gender inequalities exist as an efficient manner to create a segmentation of labor, or a social system in which a item segment of the population is conspicuously responsible for certain acts of labor and another segment is clearly responsible for other labor acts.
• The Functionalist Perspective: A wide social theory that sees guild as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability.
• Division of labor: A division of labour is the dividing and specializing of cooperative labour into specifically circumscribed tasks and roles.

The functionalist perspective sees society as a circuitous organisation whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability. This approach looks at gild through a macro-level orientation, which is a broad focus on the social structures that shape club as a whole, and looks at both social structure and social functions. Functionalism addresses society equally a whole in terms of the function of its elective elements, namely: norms, customs, traditions, and institutions. A common analogy, popularized past Herbert Spencer, presents these parts of society as "organs" that piece of work toward the proper functioning of the "body" as a whole.

The functionalist perspective of gender inequality was most robustly articulated in the 1940s and 1950s, and largely developed by Talcott Parsons' model of the nuclear family. This theory suggests that gender inequalities exist as an efficient way to create a division of labor, or as a social arrangement in which particular segments are conspicuously responsible for certain, respective acts of labor. The division of labor works to maximize resources and efficiency. A structural functionalist view of gender inequality applies the partition of labor to view predefined gender roles as complementary: women take intendance of the home while men provide for the family unit. Thus gender, like other social institutions, contributes to the stability of guild as a whole.

In sociological research, functional prerequisites are the basic needs (food, shelter, clothing, and coin) that an individual requires to live above the poverty line. Functional prerequisites may as well refer to the factors that allow a club to maintain social club. According to structural functionalists, gender serves to maintain social gild by providing and ensuring the stability of such functional prerequisites.

This view has been criticized for reifying, rather than reflecting, gender roles. While gender roles, according to the functionalist perspective, are beneficial in that they contribute to stable social relations, many fence that gender roles are discriminatory and should not be upheld. The feminist move, which was on the rising at the same time that functionalism began to decline, takes the position that functionalism neglects the suppression of women inside the family construction.

A Female person Indian Construction: While the structural-functionalist perspective argues that gender inequalities be every bit a form of the division of labor, the photograph above clearly illustrates that women need not be restricted to certain activities.

The Disharmonize Perspective

Conflict theory suggests that men, as the dominant gender, subordinate women in order to maintain power and privilege in society.

Learning Objectives

Depict gender from the view of the conflict perpective

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• Conflict theory asserts that social problems occur when dominant groups mistreat subordinate ones, and thus advocates for a balance of ability between genders.
• Frederich Engels compared the family construction to the human relationship between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, suggesting that women had less power than men in the household because they were dependent on them for wages.
• Men, like any other grouping with a power or wealth reward in Conflict Theory, fought to maintain their control over resources (in this case, political and economic power). Conflict betwixt the two groups caused things like the Women's Suffrage Movement and was responsible for social change.

Primal Terms

• subordinate: To brand subservient.
• dominant: Ruling; governing; prevailing; controlling.
• proletariat: the working class or lower grade
• ascendant grouping: a sociological category that holds the majority of authority and power over other social groups

According to conflict theory, guild is divers by a struggle for dominance among social groups that compete for scarce resources. In the context of gender, disharmonize theory argues that gender is best understood as men attempting to maintain power and privilege to the detriment of women. Therefore, men tin be seen every bit the dominant group and women as the subordinate grouping. While certain gender roles may have been advisable in a hunter-gatherer society, conflict theorists argue that the only reason these roles persist is considering the dominant group naturally works to maintain their ability and condition. According to disharmonize theory, social problems are created when dominant groups exploit or oppress subordinate groups. Therefore, their approach is normative in that it prescribes changes to the power structure, advocating a residuum of power between genders.

In most cultures, men accept historically held most of the world's resources. Until relatively recently, women in Western cultures could not vote or hold property, making them entirely dependent on men. Men, like whatsoever other group with a ability or wealth advantage, fought to maintain their control over resource (in this case, political and economical power). Disharmonize betwixt the ii groups caused things like the Women's Suffrage Movement and was responsible for social change.

Friedrich Engels, a German sociologist, studied family structure and gender roles from a Marxist perspective. Engels suggested that the same owner-worker relationship seen in the labor forcefulness could likewise exist seen in the household, with women assuming the role of the proletariat. This was due to women's dependence on men for the attainment of wages. Contemporary conflict theorists propose that when women become wage earners, they gain ability in the family unit structure and create more democratic arrangements in the home, although they may notwithstanding bear the bulk of the domestic brunt.

"And the villain still pursues her! ": A satirical postcard from the Victorian era commenting on a social club that is structured and then that women are bound past convention to fulfill certain roles and obligations.

The Interactionist Perspective

From a symbolic interactionist perspective, gender is produced and reinforced through daily interactions and the employ of symbols.

Learning Objectives

Draw gender from the view of the interactionalist perspective

Primal Takeaways

Fundamental Points

• Scholars of interactionism study how individuals human activity within society and believe that meaning is produced through interactions.
• According to interactionists, gender stratification exists considering people human action toward each other on the basis of the meanings they have for each other, and that these meanings are derived from social interaction.
• Co-ordinate to Cooley's concept of the "looking-glass self," an individual's understanding of their gender role is based on how society perceives them. Thus, if society views a human being equally masculine, he will also perceive himself to exist masculine.
• "Doing gender" is the notion that masculinity and feminity are performed gender identities. Gender is something we do or perform, not something we are.

Central Terms

• femininity: the sum of all attributes that convey (or are perceived to convey) womanhood
• masculinity: the caste or property of being masculine or manly; manliness
• Charles H. Cooley: an early on twentieth century sociologist who adult the thought of the "looking-glass self"

Interactionism

In sociology, interactionism is a theoretical perspective that understands social processes (such as conflict, cooperation, identity formation) as emerging from human interaction. Scholars of this perspective study how individuals deed inside club, and believe that meaning is produced through the interactions of individuals. According to interactionists, gender stratification exists because people act toward each other on the basis of the meanings they have for one another. Interactionists believe that these meanings are derived through social interaction, and that these meanings are managed and transformed through an interpretive process that people use to make sense of, and handle, the objects that constitute their social worlds.

Goffman and Command

Social interaction is a contiguous process that consists of actions, reactions, and common adaptation between 2 or more individuals. The goal of social interaction is to communicate with others. Social interaction includes all language, including body language and mannerisms. Erving Goffman, one of the forefathers of this theoretical perspective, emphasized the importance of control in social interactions. Co-ordinate to Goffman, during an interaction, individuals will endeavor to control the behavior of the other participants, in order to attain needed information, and in lodge to control the perception of one's own prototype. If the interaction is in danger of ending earlier an private wants it to, it can be conserved through several steps. One conversational partner can arrange to the expectations of the other, he or she tin ignore certain incidents, or he or she can solve apparent issues.

Symbolic Interactionism

Symbolic interactionism aims to empathise human beliefs by analyzing the disquisitional role of symbols in human being interaction. This is certainly relevant to the give-and-take of masculinity and femininity, because the characteristics and practices of both are socially constructed, reproduced, and reinforced through daily interactions. Imagine, for example, that you walk into a bank, hoping to become a small loan for school, a home, or a small business organization venture. If you meet with a male person loan officer, you might state your case logically, listing all of the hard numbers that make y'all a qualified applicant for the loan. This type of approach would appeal to the analytical characteristics typically associated with masculinity. If you meet with a female loan officeholder, on the other hand, you might make an emotional appeal, by stating your positive social intentions. This blazon of approach would appeal to the sensitive and relational characteristics typically associated with femininity.

Gender as Performance

The meanings fastened to symbols are socially created and fluid, instead of natural and static. Because of this, we act and react to symbols based on their current assigned meanings. Both masculinity and feminity are performed gender identities, in the sense that gender is something we do or perform, non something we are . In response to this phenomena, the sociologist Charles H. Cooley's developed the theory of the "looking-glass self" (1902). In this theory, Cooley argued that an individual'due south perception of himself or herself is based primarily how society views him or her. In the context of gender, if society perceives a man as masculine, that man will consider himself as masculine. Thus, when people perform tasks or possess characteristics based on the gender part assigned to them, they are said to exist doing gender (rather than "being" gender), a notion first coined by West and Zimmerman (1987). West & Zimmerman emphasized that gender is maintained through accountability. Men and women are expected to perform their gender to the betoken that it is naturalized, and thus, their condition depends on their performance.

Confounding Expectation: The adult female in this moving-picture show blurs the boundaries between the symbols that are traditionally considered masculine or feminine. While she has long hair and is wearing makeup, typically feminine markers, her wearing apparel are much more masculine in nature.

The Feminist Perspective

Feminist theory analyzes gender stratification through the intersection of gender, race, and class.

Learning Objectives

Explain gender stratification from the feminist perspective

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• Gender stratification occurs when gender differences give men greater privilege and power over women, transgender and gender-not-conforming people.
• Feminist theory uses the conflict approach to examine the reinforcement of gender roles and inequalities, highlighting the role of patriarchy in maintaining the oppression of women.
• Feminism focuses on the theory of patriarchy as a organisation of ability that organizes order into a circuitous of relationships based on the assertion of male supremacy.
• Intersectionality suggests that diverse forms of oppression– such equally racism, classism, and sexism — are interrelated to form a system of oppression in which various forms of discrimination intersect. The theory was start highlighted past Kimberlé Krenshaw.
• Intersectionality suggests that various biological, social, and cultural categories– including gender, race, class, and ethnicity — collaborate and contribute towards systematic social inequality. Therefore, various forms of oppression do not act independently but are interrelated.
• Mary Ann Weathers drew attention to the ways in which white women face up a different form of discrimination than working class women of color, who additionally must fight racism and form oppression.

Key Terms

• patriarchy: The authorization of men in social or cultural systems.
• Intersectionality: The idea that various biological, social, and cultural categories– including gender, race, form, and ethnicity– collaborate and contribute towards systematic social inequality.
• disharmonize theory: A social science perspective that holds that stratification is dysfunctional and harmful in society, with inequality perpetuated because it benefits the rich and powerful at the expense of the poor.

In sociology, social stratification occurs when differences lead to greater condition, power, or privilege for some groups over others. Simply put, it is a system by which guild ranks categories of people in a bureaucracy. Members of society are socially stratified on many levels, including socio-economical condition, race, class, ethnicity, religion, ability status, and gender. Gender stratification occurs when gender differences requite men greater privilege and power over women, transgender, and gender-not-conforming people.

Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical or philosophical discourse. It aims to empathize the nature of gender inequality, and examines women's social roles, experiences, and interests. While more often than not providing a critique of social relations, much of feminist theory also focuses on analyzing gender inequality and the promotion of women's interests.

"Women! The same rights, the aforementioned duties. ": This 1919 German social democratic ballot poster advocates for the rights of women. Withal, did white women face the same challenges that women of other races and ethnic groups did?

Feminist theory uses the disharmonize arroyo to examine the reinforcement of gender roles and inequalities. Disharmonize theory posits that stratification is dysfunctional and harmful in society, with inequality perpetuated because information technology benefits the rich and powerful at the expense of the poor. Radical feminism, in particular, evaluates the role of the patriarchy in perpetuating male person dominance. In patriarchal societies, the male's perspective and contributions are considered more than valuable, resulting in the silencing and marginalization of the adult female. Feminism focuses on the theory of patriarchy equally a system of power that organizes lodge into a complex of relationships based on the assertion of male supremacy.

The feminist perspective of gender stratification more than recently takes into account intersectionality, a feminist sociological theory first highlighted past feminist-sociologist Kimberlé Crenshaw. Intersectionality suggests that various biological, social and cultural categories, including gender, race, class and ethnicity, collaborate and contribute towards systematic social inequality. Therefore, various forms of oppression, such equally racism or sexism, do non human action independently of 1 another; instead these forms of oppression are interrelated, forming a organisation of oppression that reflects the "intersection" of multiple forms of discrimination. In low-cal of this theory, the oppression and marginalization of women is thus shaped not only past gender, simply past other factors such as race and class.

Mary Ann Weathers demonstrates intersectionality in action in "An Argument for Black Women's Liberation as a Revolutionary Strength." In this publication, Weathers reveals that in the twentieth century, working-class women of color embodied the notion of intersectionality. The showtime and 2d waves of the feminist movement were primarily driven past white women, who did not adequately represent the feminist movement every bit a whole. It was– and continues to be– important to recognize that white women faced a different form of discrimination than working course women of color, who non only had to bargain with sexism, simply also fought confronting racism and class oppression.

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Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-sociology/chapter/sociological-perspectives-on-gender-stratification/

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