CRJ #4

Biology shows the distinction between men and women as a being, while society gives the interpretation of feminine and masculine. For doing this, society leans on the nature and nurture hypothesis and ideas. We also give preconceptions to gender from a society standpoint. This is because we have preconceived notions of how little boys and little girls are supposed to act and then how they are then supposed to act when they grow older. For one, it is okay when children of both genders play with Barbies. But it is not okay for older boys to play with these Barbies, instead they should play with toy guns or G.I. Joes, or take up a sport. But at the same time, little girls and older girls are allowed to play with Barbies, toy guns, G.I. Joes and play sports.

But then after bringing up the idea of sports we can divide sports into masculine and feminine sports. For example, baseball, basketball, football and rugby can be seen as masculine sports because they need lots of strength and endurance. They are contact sports. More feminine sports would be gymnastics, figure skating, swimming, and cheerleading (depending on one's stance whether its a sport or not. But for argument's sake, we'll call it a sport). These need flexibility and smaller body structures.

"Gender is a process that involves multiple patterns of interaction and is created and re-created constantly in human interaction" (Women's Voices Feminist Visions, pg 126). This to me means that gender is a learned behavior and can be altered at times, depending on the situation someone is in or how they are feeling at one moment. It is something we do, it is in our culture; biology is something we have (Women's Voices Feminist Visions, pg 126-127).

Both masculinity and femininity have different adjectives that as a culture we apply toward them. They are completely opposite ideas and do not overlap at all. Masculinity can be described as intelligent, courageous, honest, sexual, violent tendencies, providing, ambitious, confident, competent, and strong (Women's Voices Feminist Visions, pg 130-132). But a masculine person can never be weak, soft, or vulnerable. Femininity is seen as soft, passive, domesitc, nurturing, emotional, dependent, sensitive, delicate, intuitive, fastidious, needy, and fearful (Women's Voices Feminist Visions, pg 133).

All of these ideas show how our culture perceives masculinity and femininity. I think it is safe to say that there is no one who is always masculine or always feminine. We all have moments where we feel stronger or weaker, courageous or scared, ambitious or timid. It is just part of our nature and varies from one situation to another. So I don't think it can be said that a person is or is not masculine or feminine. We have moments when we feel more one way than another. Some women can feel masculine but still be feminine, and some men can feel feminine but still be masculine and vice versa. Our culture seems to show that men=masculine and women=feminine and I tend to agree with this idea but still believe we have both inside of us regardless of our biological make-up.