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In all cultures there is a cultural construction of gender. Contemplate over your personal experience and discuss the ways that you were personally trained into your gender at home, at school, with your friends, etc. Define gender and specify first the ideas and practices which are associated with the particular gender in your culture. Do you see yourself as passive recipients of the dominant gender roles in your society?
As we said already, every culture has its subcultures. Therefore, males and females are subcultures of their own. Sexual identity of human beings can be established through email and etc definition. The etc definition gives us the explanation through primary and secondary sexual characteristics. On the other hand the email definition of gender varies depending on the society and its social characteristics, its culture and religion beliefs. As Marvin Harris said Male and female and other genders are subjects to the same kinds of hierarchical distinctions, advantages, and disabilities as classes, castes, ethnic groups, and social races.
Controversies regarding the equality of the sexes always exist, but still in most of the societies even today mails are the dominant sex, that is, most of the societies today are still patriarchic al. The beliefs that matriarchic al societies ever exist are still not proven. First of all because the role of man has always been considered very important even do in old societies in the days when there was no meat to be hunted the whole community depended on the woman gathered plants. Second of all till now anthropologists havent been able to found proofs about social life of woman and man, they could only examine the remaining left behind. And third most of the anthropologists till resent years were mails.
On the other hand as we study already there are the! Kung who are living proof for existent's of egalitarian societies. But even here there is a big man; one among equals; but still a big man not a big woman. The position of woman in society changed and improve through the years but the question is still there: Was woman and can she ever be equal with man? , and, Can there be gender equalities? . The answer to this question varies according to the societies. Every country and every society has it own social characteristics, religion beliefs therefore different gender roles.
The gender roles in my country have varied enormously in the last decades, but in the borders of typical male centric society. Older generation in my society were having typical housewife live. Imagine yourself on the position of a typical housewife in that time. Neither she nor anyone else had any idea when the safe period for woman was, and for her any sexual act could mean pregnancy. She was obliged to sleep with her husband whenever he wanted. The male unconcern for the welfare of the woman lay in the nature of traditional marriage.
People in earlier times married for reasons of lineage, a man needed a wife to help him run the farm or to provide male children to whom he could pass the patrimony. There was little emotional contact between man and wife. In fact man saw other man as their spiritual companions. Woman on the other hand knew that their husbands cant understand them so they so other woman as their allies.
Thus the position the status that woman had was very low. She was like a servant to her husband and her sons. At table the father said at the head together with his sons, woman and other female children sat on the other side. Nobody dared to raise his voice during the father presence. The father was the authority of the family and the wife most of the times address to him as mister... The woman lived in already established household where her mother in law and other relatives always inspected her.
Her husband always criticized her work and she was turning all her qualities into abilities as being a farm worker. The wife was never aloud to go out by herself while he could go out with neighbors or friends anytime that he wished for. More or last the wifes in that period were constantly beaten by their husbands. There are even written proverbs and jokes from that time: Question: What do mules and woman have in common? Answer: A good beating makes them both better. This way woman was sexually broken and controlled.
That period for woman sex was dutifully rather then a source of joy. Husbands were not just over brutal they simply didnt care for their wives. The sex of infants was the only critically important thing for fathers especially when it comes to a boy who would carry carry the family name. Everything else was secondary. This gender differences characteristics of three generations behind. That period of time was due and after liberation of the Turks, who undertake my country for centuries.
The influence of Islam was very strong. Beside that the people in my country are Catholics and Orthodox they are Christians, and according to Harris: All three chief religion of Western civilization- Christianity, Judaism, Islam stressed the priority of male principle in the formation of the world. This is another proof of older generations living in a typical male society. My country is changing, the society is changing, the gender differences are changing but they are still there and they will continue going from generation to generation through the process of enculturation. Woman were engaging more and more privilege, especially after the process of Industrialization. Woman labor was required more and more.
Woman got assented with more liberal rights. They start going out by themselves, of course with their father or brother precision. Also arranged marriages still exist and was still hold around the household. She wasnt given the chance to be educated or to make her own choices. All her income she had to share her community (family).
The generation before me, my mother generation assumed much status and bigger privilege then the previous generation. Freedom of speech, their opinion was also taken into consideration. They are aloud to go out without anybody permission; aloud to be educated, have their own jobs and carriers; be financially in depended from their husbands. They could marry the person that they love, but adultery was still a taboo subject for woman. Western societies and their influence are doing their own. Their strong influence changed our societies greatly, together with that the position of woman really grew enormously.
Woman nowadays share almost the same privileges as man. But! The question still remains: Can woman be equal to man and can there be gender equalities? Maybe a better answer to this question can be given by the next generations. As we know nothing stays static not even culture. Harris, Marvin.
Cultural An tropology. Harper Collins College Publishers, 1995
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