Masculinity, Femininity and Women Subordination
Masculinity
Qualities or
attributes regarded as characteristic of men.
Sex
is biological: From the moment we are born, we are
learning about both sex and gender. At birth, we are assigned a sex, either
female or male, based on our biological characteristics (internal/external sex
organs, chromosome and hormonal profiles). This division of people into either
male or female does not recognize intersex people (those whose biological
makeup includes both male and female characteristics).
Masculinity social expectations of being a man: The term ‘masculinity’ refers to the
roles, behaviors and attributes that are considered appropriate for boys and
men in a given society. Masculinity is constructed and defined socially,
historically and politically, rather than being biologically driven. We can
think of masculinity as a shorthand for talking about the social expectations
and practices of manhood; expectations and practices which are reinforced
everyday by individuals as well as by institutions, such as the law, the
economy, religion, education and the media. Women as well as men are involved
in reinforcing these social expectations of masculinity (e.g. when a mother
tells her son to act like a man and not to cry.)
Power
is seen as masculine: In most parts of the world, having
power over political, economic and social affairs is associated with
masculinity. The roles, behaviors and attributes that are associated with
maleness and considered masculine usually bring greater social status, economic
reward and political power than those associated with the feminine. Even though
more and more women are taking on leadership roles in many walks of life, from
government to private companies, the norm remains that leadership is seen as
masculine and done by men; authority in the public sphere still has a male
face. As of June 2017, women make up only 23.4 percent of national
parliamentarians, 7.9 percent head of state, and 5.2 percent head of
government. The norm that equates leadership with masculinity is one example of
political masculinities. The term “political masculinities” refers to ideas
about and practices of masculinity that shape and are shaped by political
actors, processes and institutions.
Public/private
distinction: In many societies, women’s power (if
any) is associated with the domestic space of the household and family; the
masculine/feminine binary is associated with a public/private split. Even as
more and more women are entering the ‘public’ sphere of waged work, the
‘private’ sphere of the family remains a ‘feminine’ space, with care work and
household work still regarded largely as ‘women’s work’. Globally, on average,
the time women spend daily in caring for the home and children is still about
three times what men spend.
Patriarchal
masculinities: Patriarchal masculinities is a term
that can be used to describe those ideas about and practices of masculinity
that emphasize the superiority of masculinity over femininity and the authority
of men over women. Ideas about and practices of patriarchal masculinities
maintain gender inequalities. Violence against girls and women maintains and is
maintained by ideas about and practices of patriarchal masculinities. Violence
is used, mostly by men but sometimes by other women, to keep girls and women in
their position of having less economic, political and social power than men
overall. Variety of masculinities: Because masculinity is about the social
expectations of manhood, this means that there is no single, fixed definition
of masculinity. There are many socially constructed definitions for being a man
and these can change over time and from place to place; as we can see from our
own lives when we compare the lives of our fathers and grandfathers with those
of the younger generation of men today. If different masculinities exist, then
alternatives to patriarchal masculinities are possible. In many places we can
see that there are roles, behaviors and attributes that are considered
appropriate for men which emphasize relations of equality and respect between
women and men and which regard femininities as different but equally valued.
Not
all men are powerful: Men dominate positions of political,
economic and social power. In no country does gender equality exist. Of course,
this does not mean that all men are or feel powerful. Some men may feel
relatively powerless in terms of their political influence, wealth or social
status. Men differ greatly in their access to and control over economic,
political and social power. Economic inequalities, racism and ethnic
discrimination, xenophobia and antiimmigrant discrimination, faith-based
persecution and other forces of social inequality create hierarchies among men,
as they do between men and women.
Femininity
social expectations of being a woman: By the same token, the term ‘femininity’
refers to a society’s ideas about the roles, behaviors and attributes
considered appropriate for girls and women.
Professor of English
Tara Williams has suggested that modern notions of femininity in
English-speaking society began during the medieval period at the time of the bubonic plague in the 1300s. Women
in the Early Middle Ages were
referred to simply within their traditional roles of maiden, wife, or widow. 4 After the Black
Death in England wiped
out approximately half the population, traditional gender roles of wife and mother changed, and opportunities opened up
for women in society. The words femininity and womanhood are first recorded in Chaucer around 1380
In 1949, French
intellectual Simone de
Beauvoir wrote that
"no biological, psychological or economic fate determines the figure that
the human female presents in society" and "one is not born, but
rather becomes, a woman".The idea was picked up in 1959 by Canadian-American
sociologist Erving
Goffman and in 1990 by American philosopher Judith Butler,who theorized that gender is not fixed or inherent but
is rather a socially defined set of practices and traits that have, over time,
grown to become labelled as feminine or masculine
Traits such as nurturance, sensitivity,
sweetness, supportiveness, gentleness, warmth,passivity,
cooperativeness, expressiveness,modesty, humility, empathy, affection,
tenderness, and being emotional, kind, helpful, devoted, and
understanding have been cited as stereotypically feminine. The defining
characteristics of femininity vary between and even within societies.
The word ‘patriarchy’ literally means the rule of
the father or the ‘patriarch’, and originally it was used to describe a
specific type of ‘male-dominated family’ – the large household of the patriarch
which included women, junior men, children, slaves and domestic servants all
under the rule of this dominant male. Now it is used more generally “to refer
to male domination, to the power relationships by which men dominate women, and
to characterise a system whereby women are kept subordinate in a number of ways.
Patriarchy refers to the male domination both in
public and private spheres. Feminists mainly use the term ‘patriarchy’ to
describe the power relationship between men and women. Thus, patriarchy is more
than just a term; feminists use it like a concept, and like all other concepts
it is a tool to help us understand women’s realities. The concept of patriarchy
is defined by different thinkers in different ways. Mitchell, a feminist
psychologist, uses the word patriarchy “to refer to kinship systems in which
men exchange women” (Mitchell 1971:24). Walby defines “patriarchy as a system
of social structures and practices in which men dominate, oppress and exploit
women” (Walby 1990:20). She explains patriarchy as a system because this helps
us to reject the notion of biological determinism (which says that men and
women are naturally Patriarchy and Women’s Subordination: A Theoretical
Analysis 3 different because of their biology or bodies and, are, therefore
assigned different roles) or “the notion that every individual man is always in
a dominant position and every woman in a subordinate one” (Ibid). Patriarchy,
in its wider definition, means the manifestation and institutionalization of
male dominance over women and children in the family and the extension of male
dominance over women in society in general. It implies that “men hold power in
all the important institutions of society” and that “women are deprived of
access to such power”. However, it does not imply that “women are either
totally powerless or totally deprived of rights, influence, and resources”
(Lerner 1989:239). Thus, patriarchy describes the institutionalized system of
male dominance. So we can usefully define patriarchy as a set of social
relations between men and women, which have a material base, and which, though
hierarchical, establish or create independence and solidarity among men that
enable them to dominate women (Jagger and Rosenberg 1984). Patriarchal ideology
exaggerates biological differences between men and women, making certain that
men always have the dominant, or masculine, roles and women always have the
subordinate or feminine ones. This ideology is so powerful that “men are
usually able to secure the apparent consent of the very women they oppress”.
They do this “through institutions such as the academy, the church, and the
family, each of which justifies and reinforces women’s subordination to men”
(Millett 1977:35). The patriarchal system is characterized by power, dominance,
hierarchy, and competition. So patriarchy is a system of social structures and
practices in which men dominate, oppress and exploit women.
According to Lerner (1989), patriarchy was not one
event but a process developing over a period of almost 2500 years (from
approximately 3100 BC to 600 BC) and a number of factors and forces that were
responsible for the establishment of male supremacy as we see it today. Gerda
Lerner (1989), begins by emphasizing the importance of women history in women’s
struggle against patriarchy and for equality
According to her, patriarchy, in fact, preceded the
formation of private property and class society. One socialist feminist school
of thought prefers to use the concept of subordination of women rather than
patriarchy, which they reject as being historical. Patriarchy, according to
them, is neither universal nor an all embracing phenomenon as different kinds
of relationships have always existed between men and women in history.
According to
them, it is not sex but gender which is important; sex is biological, gender is
social. This group is concerned with what they call gender relations (Oakley
1972). The search for the social origins of this relationship is part of the
political strategy of women’s emancipation. Without understanding the
foundation and the functioning of the asymmetric relationship between men and
women it is not possible to overcome it.
Women’s Subordination Patriarchy, which pre-supposes
the natural superiority of male over female, shamelessly upholds women’s
dependence on, Patriarchy and Women’s Subordination: A Theoretical Analysis 7
and subordination to, man in all spheres of life. Consequently, all the power
and authority within the family, the society and the state remain entirely in
the hands of men. So, due to patriarchy, women were deprived of their legal
rights and opportunities patriarchal values restrict women’s mobility, reject
their freedom over themselves as well as their property. Subordination means,
“something else is less important than the other thing” (Cobuild 2010:1559).
According to Advanced Learners Dictionary, “subordination means having less
power or authority than somebody else in a group or an organization” (Hornby
2003:1296). The term ‘women’s subordination’ refers to the inferior position of
women, their lack of access to resources and decision making etc. and to the
patriarchal domination that women are subjected to in most societies. So,
women’s subordination means the inferior position of women to men. The feeling
of powerlessness, discrimination and experience of limited self esteem and
self-confidence jointly contribute to the subordination of women. Thus, women’s
subordination is a situation, where a power relationship exists and men
dominate women. The subordination of women is a central feature of all
structures of interpersonal domination, but feminists choose different
locations and causes of subordination. Contemporary feminist theory begins with
Simone de Beauvoir’s argument that because men view women as fundamentally
different from themselves, women are reduced to the status of the second sex
and hence subordinate (Beauvior 1974). Kate Millet’s theory of subordination
argues that women are a dependent sex class under patriarchal domination
(Millet 1977). Patriarchy is a system whereby women are kept subordinate in a number
of ways. The subordination that we experience at a daily level, regardless of
the class we might belong to, takes various forms – discrimination, disregard,
insult, control, exploitation, oppression, violence – within the family, at the
place of work, in society. For instance, a few examples are illustrated here to
represent a specific form of discrimination and a particular aspect of
patriarchy. Such as, son preference, discrimination against girls in food
distribution, burden of household work on women and young 8 The Arts Faculty
Journal, July 2010-June 2011 girls, lack of educational opportunities for
girls, lack of freedom and mobility for girls, wife battering, male control
over women and girls, sexual harassment at workplace, lack of inheritance or
property rights for women, male control over women’s bodies and sexuality, no
control over fertility or reproductive rights. So, the norms and practices that
define women as inferior to men, impose controls on-them, are present
everywhere in our families, social relations, religious, laws, schools,
textbooks, media, factories, offices. Thus, patriarchy is called the sum of the
kind of male domination we see around women all the time. In this ideology, men
are superior to women and women are part of men’s property, so women should be
controlled by men and this produces women’s subordination. In this context,
Gerda Lerner in her book The Creation of Patriarchy said, “The use of the
phrase subordination of women instead of the word “oppression” has distinct
advantages. Subordination does not have the connotation of evil intent on the
part of the dominant; it allows for the possibility of collusion between him
and the subordinate.
But have you ever wondered if women were
always at the subordinate position or they got there in time? What was it like
when humankind first started populating the world? Was gender discrimination
prevalant from the very beginigng? Is women’s oppression eternal?
Some people do believe that women were born
subordinate to men and patriarchy existed from the very beginning and will
always do like the other ‘rules of nature‘. According to Greek
philosopher Aristotle, ‘men are always active and women are passive’. The
biological difference of women makes them inferior in their capacity, ability
to reason and therefore the ability to make decisions, according to him.
Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis Sigmund Freud, stated
that for women, anatomy is destiny. In his view, ‘a normal human was male’.
However, these theories of male supremacy have
been challenged, and it has been demonstrated that there is no historical or
scientific evidence for such explanations. There are biological differences
between men, women and other genders in the spectrum, but these differences do
not have to be the foundation of a sexual hierarchy in which men are dominant.
The examination of many of these theories
enables us to recognise that women’s subordinate position is man-made; it is
the result of a constructed, historical processes.
Some of the theories that deny the
universality of female subordination and explore the origins of patriarchy are
given by German philosopher, political theorist and socialist Fredrick Engles
who put forth his theory in his book Origin of the Family, Private
Property and The State. In this work, he says that the division of classes
and the subordination of women developed historically. He also argues that once
a family would become progressive, private property would join the labour
force, and then patriarchy would disappear.
He divided evolution into three main epochs:
savagery, barbarism and civilisation. His book sees women as central to
developing social cooperation and organisation of social groups and gender
relations of equality as dominating the vast period of prehistory of the
hominid (early humans) evolution that falls under the epoch of savagery. It was
at the latter stage of evolution where the sexual division developed.
Engles argues that the source of oppression of women came
from the exclusion of women from social production and the conversion of
household tasks into a private service. With settlement, local domestic animals
were difficult to find and required to be guarded. Normally, women took care of
animals because they had children to care for. Agriculture, or wild
agriculture, became an element of settlement, and women gradually began to stay
at home and care for all of their possessions while males went hunting
According to Engles, the earliest hominid
social groups clustered around females and their siblings. Speculation about
the development of early hominid social groups is based on fairly sparse
evidence but evidence from primate social groups like chimpanzees shows that
food sharing takes place with matrifocal (mother centered) groups rather than
between sexual mates.
The women were in the centre of the social
group and were in charge of carrying infants, teaching their culture to their
infants, and distributing food to the group. The cuisine consisted of natural
goods such as fruits, nuts, and roots, and they had not yet orchestrated speech
at this point. Until the hunting game appeared some 100,000 years ago, there is
no undisputed evidence of a gender division of labour in food collection.
Hunters and gatherers never settled in one
location for long; they had little resources and travelled from place to place;
they had fewer offsprings since they, too, had to be carried. As the social
group was still matrifocal, there was still equality between men and
women.
By the end of the palaeolithic period, there
had been an environmental shift and a change in the nature of social patterns
of relationships within social groups. Archeological investigations demonstrate
that hunters and gatherers began to settle near rivers and fertile lands. This
was the commencement of domestication.
They domesticated both food and plants, and
the settlement enabled the acquisition of possessions as well as the birth of
more children. The social organisation remained matrilineal, but this was the
beginning of the demise, which Engles states as the “world historical
defeat of the female sex.”
A
scrutiny of history does show that gender roles and power equations as we see
today were created to retain male dominance and supremacy. The argument that
the subordination of women is the natural order of evolution has been contested
and proven otherwise in the modern era of mechanisation, scientific advancement
and industrialisation. It is important for us to look at all these aspects
comprehensively in order to recognsie how gender roles work and to be able to
diffuse them
Engles argues that the source of oppression of
women came from the exclusion of women from social production and the
conversion of household tasks into a private service. With settlement, local
domestic animals were difficult to find and required to be guarded. Normally,
women took care of animals because they had children to care for. Agriculture,
or wild agriculture, became an element of settlement, and women gradually began
to stay at home and care for all of their possessions while males went hunting.
These developments resulted from the replacement of communal ownership of property by private male ownership of the basic means of production. He speculates that such a shift took place with the rise of domestication of animals and the breeding of herds which created new social weath. This new property automatically belonged to male members of the group.
With all these changes, the population grew
dramatically and the resources in the settled areas decreased rapidly.
At that stage, when private property arose in the society, men
wanted to retain power and property, and pass it on to their own
children. The matrilineal structure was overthrown to ensure this inheritance.
The land and the animals were valuable assets
that needed to be protected from intruders. As a result, wars began. Invaders
seized the property of the opposition, which included women. It was done to
demonstrate power. Women became property, possessions to be territorially owned.
Women had to be domesticated and confined, and
their sexuality regulated and controlled, in order to establish the right of
men over them. Women had to be protected from male members of other clans since
they were treated as chattel. According to Engels, patriarchy and monogamy for
women were established during this time period.
A
scrutiny of history does show that gender roles and power equations as we see
today were created to retain male dominance and supremacy. The argument that
the subordination of women is the natural order of evolution has been contested
and proven otherwise in the modern era of mechanisation, scientific advancement
and industrialisation. It is important for us to look at all these aspects
comprehensively in order to recognsie how gender roles work and to be able to
diffuse them.
Traits
of Masculinity / Femininity
|
High Masculine |
Low Masculine (Feminine) |
|
|
social norms |
ego oriented |
relationship oriented |
|
money and things are important |
quality of life and people are
important |
|
|
live in order to work |
work in order to live |
|
|
politics and economics |
economic growth high priority |
environment protection high
priority |
|
conflict solved through force |
conflict solved through
negotiation |
|
|
religion |
most important in life |
less important in life |
|
only men can be priests |
both men and women as priests |
|
|
work |
larger gender wage gap |
smaller gender wage gap |
|
fewer women in management |
more women in management |
|
|
preference for higher pay |
preference for fewer working hours |
|
|
family and school |
traditional family structure |
flexible family structure |
|
girls cry, boys don’t; boys fight,
girls don’t |
both boys and girls cry; neither
fight |
|
|
failing is a disaster |
failing a minor accident |
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