WHAT

Connection
s
WE’RE
DOING
Week 9: Gender Roles
TODAY

 Defining


Gender Roles
Expectations Gender Roles
about
Gender
Gender Role: Do you believe that you are supposed to act
 Stereotypes
Activity
certain ways and do certain things because you are a man or a
 Reality of woman? Gender role is a set of expectations held by society
Gender Roles about the ways in which men and women are supposed to
 Transitions behave based on their gender. For example, my wife once told
Video me that I should cut the lawn because that is "the man's job."
 Gender
Although she was kidding (I think) this is an example of an
Equality
expectation held because of gender. Remember, these are
 Gender Roles
Values dependent on the culture/society and can change over time.
Exercise
“Instead of being
  presented with

stereotypes by age,

sex, color, class, or

religion, children
What are some other
must have the expectations people have about
 gender
Dependentroles?
opportunity to
Independent
learn that within  Emotional Non-emotional
each range, some  Passive Aggressive
people are  Sensitive Competitive
loathsome and  Quiet Strong

some are  Graceful Rebellious

delightful.”   Innocent Confident

― Margaret Mead  Flirtatious Active

 Nurturing Brave
 Gender Stereotypes Exercise
You have several magazines in front of you. Break into two
groups and look for different gender stereotypes in the
magazines. One group will focus on Male stereotypes and
the other on Female Stereotypes. After we cut out
examples of Male and Female Stereotypes, we will discuss
why we chose these examples as a group.

“Playing roles in
The Reality of Gender
any relationship is Anthropologist Margaret Mead reasoned that if gender reflects
false and will biological facts of sex, that people everywhere in the world would
define the same traits as masculine or feminine. However, she
inevitably lead to argued, that if gender is cultural, such conceptions should vary.
the relationship's Mead researched three societies in New Guinea and concluded
that “culture is the key to how sexes differ”.
collapse. No one

can be any one

What are some ways that gender roles are different in other
thing all the cultures?
time.”  __________________________________________________________________
―  Portia de Although our culture continues to emphasize gender
Rossi, Unbearab roles, in general, our culture is very open minded
le Lightness: A about people breaking traditional gender roles. Some
Story of Loss
people even choose to change their gender. We will
watch a short video and then discuss it as a group.
and Gain
Does Gender really differentiate
 Women perform 66% of the world’s work, produce 50% of the food, but
us? earn 10% of the income and own 1% of the property.
(UNIFEM)

 Women are a driving force behind Africa’s economy running an

estimated 48% of small and medium-sized businesses and growing 80% of
the food. 
(ONE INternational)

   Women invest 90% of their earnings into the health, education and well-

Values clarification on gender roles

To what extent do you agree the following statements about roles? Place a check in the column that suits your answer.
Compare responses with the class.

Strongly Agree Slightly agree Slightly Disagree Strongly Disagree

A woman should give up her

job when children are born. _________________________________________________________________________

A man might help sometimes

with housework. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

A man wouldn’t want his

friends to see him doing

chores. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

There are some jobs

that only a man

should do. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

A woman gives up her social

life when she has kids. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

Women are more natural with

kids than men. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

Men are the real wage earners. __________________________________________________________________________________________________

Men shouldn’t have to change dirty