Gender, Ethnicity, and Social Stratification Gender and Anthropology • interest in hierarchical relations between men and women has been a feature of anthropology since its earliest days • anthropology of gender has been key in establishing that sexual inequality is not a biological fact but instead and cultural and historical one • the body is "simultaneously a physical and symbolic artifact, both naturally and culturally produced, anchored in a particular historical moment" (Scheper-Hughes & Lock) development of the study of sex, sexuality and gender in anthropology • Anthropology of Women early 1970's attention to the lack of women in standard ethnographies • Anthropology of Gender challenged the basis for understanding social roles of male and female • Feminist Anthropology challenged the biological basis of sex and sexuality – and the foundations of anthropology as it had been done SEX, SEXUALITY, GENDER • not the same thing • all societies distinguish between males and females • a very few societies recognize a third, sexually intermediate category SEX • differences in biology • Socially & culturally marked/constructed SEXUALITY (reproduction) • all societies regulate sexuality – lots of variation cross-culturally • degree of restrictiveness not always consistent through life span – adolescence vs. adulthood • Varieties of “normative” sexual orientation – Heterosexual, homosexual, transexual • Sexuality in societies change over time GENDER • GENDER - the cultural construction of male & female characteristics – vs. the biological nature of men & women • SEX differences are biological - GENDER differences are cultural • behavioral & attitudinal differences from social & cultural rather than biological point of view GENDER ROLES, STEREOTYPES, STRATIFICATION • gender roles - tasks & activities that a culture assigns to sexes • gender stereotypes - oversimplified strongly held ideas about the characteristics of men & women & third sex-third gender • gender stratification - unequal distribution of rewards (socially valued resources, power, prestige, personal freedom) between men & women reflecting their position in the social hierarchy universals versus particulars • universal subordination of women is often cited as one of the true cross-cultural universals, a pan-cultural fact – Engels called it the “world historical defeat of women” • even so the particulars of women’s roles, statuses, power, and value differ tremendously by culture persistence of dualisms in ideologies of gender • a particular view of men and women as opposite kinds of creatures both biologically and culturally • nature/culture • domestic/public • reproduction/production Reproduction and Social Roles • roles - those minimal institutions and modes of activity that are organized immediately around one or more mothers and their children • women everywhere lactate & give birth to children • likely to be associated with child rearing & responsibilities of the home a long running controversy in anthropology • Sherry Ortner’s famous article “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture” • argument is that across cultures, women are more often associated with nature and the natural and are therefore denigrated • Ortner - in reality women are no further nor closer to nature than men - cultural valuations make women appear closer to nature than men The “Third Gender” • essentialism of western ideas of sexual dimorphism - dichotomized into natural & then moral entities of male & female that are given to all persons, one or the other • committed western view of sex and gender as dichotomous, ascribed, unchanging • other categories - every society including our own is at some time or other faced with people who do not fit into its sex & gender categories The “Third Gender” • a significant number of people are born with genitalia that is neither clearly male or female – Hermaphrodites • persons who change their biological sex • persons who exhibit behavior deemed appropriate for the opposite sex • persons who take on other gender roles other than those indicated by their genitals Third Gender: Western Bias • multiple cultural & historical worlds in which people of divergent gender & sexual desire exist – margins or borders of society • may pass as normal to remain hidden in the official ideology & everyday commerce of social life • when discovered - iconic matter out of place "monsters of the cultural imagination“ • third gender as sexual deviance a common theme in US – evolution & religious doctrine – heterosexuality the highest form, the most moral way of life, its natural Third Gender Cross-Culturally • provokes us to reexamine our own assumptions regarding our gender system • emphasizes gender role alternatives as adaptations to economic and political conditions rather than as "deviant" and idiosyncratic behavior • rigid dichotomozation of genders is a means of perpetuating the domination of females by males and patriarchal institutions. RETHINKING SUBORDINATION • Ardener - muted models that underlie male discourse • diversity of one life or many lives • gender roles, stereotypes, stratification – changes over time – changes with position in lifecycle – status of men & women i.e. in male dominant societies • decision making roles belong to men but as women reach menopause; change with marriage status, virgins, wives, widows (and men) RETHINKING SUBORDINATION • women, like men, are social actors who work in structured ways to achieve desired ends • formal authority structure of a society may declare that women are impotent & irrelevant • but attention to women's strategies & motives, sorts of choices, relationships established, ends achieved indicates women have good deal of power • strategies appear deviant & disruptive – actual components of how social life proceeds Social difference • Basis for recognition of difference within and between social groups • Relationship to political power and inequality • Beyond the face to face community Status & Social Difference • status - ascribed & achieved • ascribed status - social positions that people hold by virtue of birth – sex, age, family relationships, birth into class or caste • achieved status - social positions attained as a result of individual action • shift from homogeneous kin based societies (mechanic) to heterogeneous societies of associations (organic) involves growth in importance of achieved Social Stratification • inequality in society • the unequal distribution of goods and services, rights and obligations, power and prestige • all attributes of positions in society, not attributes of individuals • Stratified society is: – when a society exhibits stratification it means that there are significant breaks in the distribution of goods services, rights obligations power prestige • as a result of which are formed collectivities or groups we call strata race • There are no biological human races • up until 14th cent. in Europe cultural & social evolution based on the idea of progress from kin-based societies to civil society through governance & law • after 16th cent. in Europe ideas of blood were used to characterize difference race and social difference • Race as social grouping based on perceived physical differences and cloaked in the language of biology • social races – groups assumed to have a biological basis but social constructed • Racism – systematic social and political bias based on idea of race – Operates as a form of class Social races • Race exists as a cultural construct • Racism builds upon idea that personality is linked with hereditary characteristics which differ between races • Race is important for academics studying local discourses on ethnicity • Race relations as a special case of ethnicity • Race as the categorization of people • Operates as an ASCRIBED status of personhood American Anthropological Assoc. statement on race • “Evidence from the analysis of genetics (e.g., DNA) indicates that most physical variation, about 94%, lies within so-called racial groups. • Conventional geographic ‘racial’ groupings differ from one another only in about 6% of their genes…. • ‘Race’ thus evolved as a world view, a body of prejudgments that distorts our ideas about human differences and group behavior…. • The ‘racial’ world view was invented to assign some groups to perpetual low status, while others were permitted access to privilege, power, and wealth” from race to ethnicity • ethnicity forged in the process of historical time • subject to shifts in meaning – shifts in referents or markers of ethnic identity • subject to political manipulations • ethnic identity is not a function of primordial ties, although it may be described as such • always the genesis of specific historical forces that are simultaneously structural & cultural building blocks of ethnicity/ethnic identity • associated with distinctions between language, religion, historical experience, geographic isolation, kinship, notions of race (phenotype) • may include collective name, belief in common descent, sense of solidarity, association with a specific territory, clothing, house types, personal adornment, food, technology, economic activities, general lifestyle cultural markers of difference must be visible to members and nonmembers • valued markers of difference by insiders may become comic or derided by outsiders • caricature and exaggeration frequently mark outsider depictions of boundary mechanisms – stereotype is one form ethnicity and boundaries • where there is a group there is some sort of boundary • where there are boundaries there are mechanisms for maintaining boundaries – cultural markers of difference that must be visible to members and non-members • Code switching • Marked and unmarked categories Boundary maintenance • Social boundaries that may have territorial counterparts • The ethnic boundary canalizes social life – complex organization of behavior and social relations – playing the same game • Distinctions between us and them criteria for judgement of value and performance and restrictions on interactions – Allows for the persistence of cultural differences – Identities are signaled as well as embraced • All ethnic groups in a poly-ethnic society act to maintain dichotomies and differences ethnogenesis • fluidity of ethnic identity • ethnic groups vanish, people move between ethnic groups, new ethnic groups come into existence • ethnogenesis – emergence of new ethnic group, part of existing group splits & forms new ethnic group, members of two or more groups fuse political organization and ethnicity • ethnicity is founded upon structural inequities among dissimilar groups into a single political entity • based on cultural differences & similarities perceived as shared Ethnicity as identity formation and political organization • Ethnic groups – those human groups that entertain a SUBJECTIVE belief in their common descent because of similarities of physical type or of customs or of both, or because of memories of colonization and migration • Belief in group affinity can have important consequences for the formation of a political community • feelings of ethnicity & associated behavior vary in intensity within groups (& persons) over time & space