Pine, Francis, Gender
(Encyclopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropology, 1996) Overview of
women and gender studies
male and female bodies are distinguished

the role male and female bodies play in reproduction,

the role male and female bodies play in local understandings of biological
basis of difference,

cultural attribution to the masculine and feminine and

their importance
vary from culture to culture.
Sex gender (1980s)

Political unrest in 70s

Marxism

"The second sex"
Bias in anthropology (before 70s)

Male bias: exclusion of women from analysis and representation
(women have been present in ethnographic accounts)

Anthropologists:
Practitioners of anthropology were mainly men.
Female anthropologist also worked within male-centred models

Societies being studied
Data produced during fieldwork reproduced the local male view.

Western cultural bias
Anthropologists mainly followed the their own cultural ideological
models.
1
Two basic assumptions:
1.
historically specific complex set of relations/subordination of
women is not universal
e.g. Karen Sacks (now Brodkin)
Eleanor Leacock
Louise Lamphere
2.
universal subordination of women or sexual asymmetry
cultural analysis and symbolism, historical materialism
major dichotomies: (definition?)

public/domestic

nature/culture

production/reproduction
e.g. Rosaldo, Ortner, Ardener
Rosaldo (Women, Culture and Society, 1974)
Domestic: “those minimal institutions and modes of activity that are organized
immediately around one or more mothers and their children” (p.23)
Public: “activities, institutions, and forms of association that link, rank, organize,
or subsume particular mother-child groups” (p.23).
Rosaldo's main arguments:

universal gender asymmetries are to be found in the universal
domestic/public opposition.

women’s lack of value is related to their confinement in the domestic
sphere (they gain power when they enter the men’s world or by creating
their own social universe).

the most egalitarian societies are those in which men value and participate
in domestic life.
2
Ortner

argues against biological determinism
(biological differences between men and women take on significance only
within culturally defined values systems)

Women are second-class(devalued) pan-culturally

The distinction between nature and culture is universal.

The opposition between nature and culture and its association with gender
can be observed in every society.
1980s rejection of universals

rejection of dichotomies universal female subordination/male dominance

recognition of Western bias /historical and culturally specific dichotomies

recognition of presence of symbolical representations of both male and
females in various cultural categories
e.g. Olivia Harris/Laymi -wild/domesticated
not all symbolic systems have hierarchical orders
Prestige systems (Ortner-Whitehead) Sexual Meanings- Introduction
integration of kinship systems
men-women with similar status
Goal: to elucidate the culture (symbols, meanings, ideologies) of gender
Focus: on gender and sexuality as cultural (symbolic) constructs
Explore: sources, processes, and consequences of construction and organization of
gender and sexuality
3
methodological approach:

culturalist: a gender symbol can be understood through an appreciation of its
place in a larger system of symbols and meanings.
top-down
(making sense of sex and gender symbols in terms of other cultural
beliefs, classifications, assumptions)

recognizes the sociological approach
(focusing and exploring the effects of political, economic and social organizational
arrangements such as kinship-marriage)
bottom-up
(- which aspects of social relations have greater influence upon the
shape of gender ideology than others
- how certain types of social orders tend to generate certain types of
cultural perceptions of gender and sexuality)
Prestige structures (social honour or social value):

the mechanisms by which individuals and groups arrive at given levels or positions,
&

the overall conditions of reproduction of the systems of statuses
aspects:
a) A gender system is a prestige structure itself
b) Prestige structures in any society tend toward a symbolic consistency with one
another
4
c) Gender constructs are partly functions of the ways in which
male prestige-oriented actions articulates with structures of
cross-sex relations.
a) A gender system is a prestige structure itself
simple societies →
men
junior
men
women
more complex societies→ gender formal social organizational principle
(boys who are not sporty and masculine → like a girl)
b) Prestige structures in any society tend toward a symbolic consistency with
one another
harmonized with other prestige orders: nature/culture or two more fused
(age/gender), caste/class/rank/gender, occupational specialization
c) Gender constructs are partly functions of the ways in which male prestigeoriented actions articulates with structures of cross-sex relations.
other-than gender-prestige hierarchies are male games
men → defined according to their role (warrior, statesmen)
simple societies → big man (women wards)
more complex societies → statesman, Brahmin, elder
women → defined in relation to men (wives, mothers)
not as a result of domestic/public domains but
sphere of prestige relations
domestic = female (childtenders, hostesses)
domestic ≠
female (mothers, wives)
5