anthropology notes
Anthropology notes
Main theme: Gender vs. sexuality
Gender- role based, identity, subjective depriving on culture, fluid, appearances, speech, identities and role, status, schema: collection of ideas that influence perception, essentialism: nurturing vs fighting differences in intimacy (what men do, what women do)
Sex- biological, psychological, anatomy, binary, applications, names, color (blue and pink), and biological differences (build, hormones, and hair), transition: sex change, forms
“The cultural construction of beliefs and behaviors considered appropriate for each sex.”
History of study of gender in anthropology
1970s
Male-centered anthropology
Pay attention to women, but also to gender as dimension of social life (marriage, kinship, reproduction) but they didn’t discuss politics, economy, and social
Power
Neglecting gender-document women roles and lives around the world
Universal sexual asymmetry? - Worldwide gender inequality
Simone de Beauvoir, “the second sex”. Women=nature men=culture. They are devalued because they are responsible for reproduction.
Sherry artner- structuralism- social associations
Between women and nature, men and culture
Uncover underlying structures/codes of society
Feminist anthropologists
Social expectations! Women=reproduce men=money maker
Cooked=raw (babies born tabula rosa)
Marilyn Strathern- cross cultural variation in treatment of women, Hagen of New Guinea. Indifferent societies: women and talking.
1980s – Sexual asymmetry was not true!
Social construction of gender
Cross-cultural analysis
Differences: power, roles, status, relationships,
Materialism
Eleanor Leacock, gender capitalism/colonialism
Capt.: men would go on ships and do the “dirty work”
Intersectionality: the intersection of multiple subject positions How do race, class, and gender intersect and work together to structure cultural institutions?
1990s
Writing culture, through and about women
Famous women anthropologists:
Main theme: Gender vs. sexuality
Gender- role based, identity, subjective depriving on culture, fluid, appearances, speech, identities and role, status, schema: collection of ideas that influence perception, essentialism: nurturing vs fighting differences in intimacy (what men do, what women do)
Sex- biological, psychological, anatomy, binary, applications, names, color (blue and pink), and biological differences (build, hormones, and hair), transition: sex change, forms
“The cultural construction of beliefs and behaviors considered appropriate for each sex.”
History of study of gender in anthropology
1970s
Male-centered anthropology
Pay attention to women, but also to gender as dimension of social life (marriage, kinship, reproduction) but they didn’t discuss politics, economy, and social
Power
Neglecting gender-document women roles and lives around the world
Universal sexual asymmetry? - Worldwide gender inequality
Simone de Beauvoir, “the second sex”. Women=nature men=culture. They are devalued because they are responsible for reproduction.
Sherry artner- structuralism- social associations
Between women and nature, men and culture
Uncover underlying structures/codes of society
Feminist anthropologists
Social expectations! Women=reproduce men=money maker
Cooked=raw (babies born tabula rosa)
Marilyn Strathern- cross cultural variation in treatment of women, Hagen of New Guinea. Indifferent societies: women and talking.
1980s – Sexual asymmetry was not true!
Social construction of gender
Cross-cultural analysis
Differences: power, roles, status, relationships,
Materialism
Eleanor Leacock, gender capitalism/colonialism
Capt.: men would go on ships and do the “dirty work”
Intersectionality: the intersection of multiple subject positions How do race, class, and gender intersect and work together to structure cultural institutions?
1990s
Writing culture, through and about women
Famous women anthropologists: