Doing Gender In Starbucks

“Doing gender,” according to Judith Lorber, is a phrase that means to categorize people based on gender norms in order to get rid of ambiguity and make it easier to identify people. Some examples of “doing gender” would include mothers who are the primary caretakers of their children, men who act strong and confident in order to impress women, women who wear dresses and heels every day in order to look pretty, and men who work the typical 9-5 job and are the primary financial providers for their families. In order to observe “doing gender” in my community, I sat in the Hemmingson Center at a table at Starbucks. I sat there for an hour, from noon until one in the afternoon, which happens to be a super busy time for the Hemmingson Center. Students

In the hour I sat there, I counted seventy-one girls who ordered something from Starbucks and twenty-six boys. I believe this is a prime example of “doing gender”. Starbucks has a reputation for being the place that “white girls” get coffee. It is stereotyped that the main consumer of Starbucks beverages is a typical teenage girl. Therefore, “doing gender” at Starbucks would mean that the majority of people ordering drinks there are girls. Concluding from my observations, this happens to be true. All seventy-one girls that ordered Starbucks in that hour are examples of “doing gender” because they fall into the stereotype of who Starbucks’ main consumer

Her critical theory states that we continue to do gender because we live in a patriarchal society where men dominate. Take, for example, the Legends Football League, the only all-women football league in the United States. Their founder and CEO is a man, who isn’t concerned with paying his players or their protection. He needs to create a show for other men to watch. Therefore, he exploits these women athletes by making them wear releveling clothing, little protection and doesn’t pay them. The LFL consists of all women teams but is still controlled by a man. Another example would be the double standard that exists for having sex in this country. A man who has a lot of sex is considered to be cool and well liked. But a woman who has a lot of sex is known as a slut because she gets around too much. The men dominate in this position. They can have as much sex as they want and no one cares, but everyone cares if a woman does. This is because we live in a male-dominated society where “doing gender” helps keep men in