Gender Roles

Lindsey Benge

Mrs. Haggard

English Composition II

13 March 2015

Gender Roles

Throughout the article, Becoming Members of Society: Learning the Social Meanings of Gender, by Aaron H. Devor, the author is trying to express that, “Gender identities act as cognitive filtering devices guiding people to attend to and learn gender role behaviors appropriate to their statuses.” He is trying to explain that even very young children can differentiate between what a man looks like and does, and what a woman looks like or does. Small children can even identify themselves as male or female, without having to really think about it. The author states, “Children begin to settle into a gender identity between the age of eighteen months and two years. By the

In this study children were asked to identify the gender of a doll. The author states, “Only 17 percent of the children identified the dolls on the basis of their primary or secondary sex characteristics.” Later on in the article the author quotes Jon K. Meyer and John E. Hoopes. They claim that femininity, “would result in warm and continued relationships with men, a sense of maternity, interest in caring for children, and the capacity to work productively and continuously in female occupations.” Lastly, Devor supports his claim by quoting Erving Goffman. Mr. Goffman claims in his book, Gender Advertisements, that “Masculinity can also be conveyed by stern or serious facial expressions that suggest minimal receptivity to the influence of others, a characteristic which is an important element in the attainment and maintenance of egoistic

He doesn’t cover much about the opposite end of his claim. Also, the fact that he was originally born a woman named Holly Devor is in the back of my mind while I read this article, and I can’t help but think how this article might have been a little different had that not been the case. I do believe that the research is trustworthy because of the sources that Devor uses. For example, Elanor Maccoby was a very well known American psychologist who was mostly known for her work that contributed to the education of the psychology of sex differences. She obtained her Ph. D from the University of Michigan. At the beginning of the article, Devor refers to her self-conducted study that involved young children. This article is subjective. Given, the evidence is based on research, experiments, and facts; I don’t think it is necessarily about an object, and some of the things he writes about cannot be held to truth. Also, since the article is a little biased gives more of a reason for it to be subjective. An objective article would be totally