- Sex is what you are biologically: male, female, or intersex.
- Gender is how you identify in terms of sex. Most people who are biologically female identify as female, and same for males. However, if you choose to identify outside of the gender binary ( i.e. a man or boy expressing their gender as female), that is your gender identity.
- Gender expression is how you choose to communicate your gender.
- The way that you express your gender is not indicative of your sexual orientation (i,e. a man can choose to express their gender as female and still be heterosexual).
I looked up "gender expression" on Google to try to find a simple website that would help explain my point of view to my friend, and this was the simplest one that I could find: http://www.gendersanity.com/diagram.shtml. It's not extremely thorough, but it makes the same points as I was trying to.
I didn't really have the questions that I had answered at the end of the conversation, but it was still a conversation well-spent.
These are really compelling arguments you raise, Tricia. I think that it is interesting that you use the word "choose" when referring to certain people expressing their gender identity. I feel that most people who identify as trans feel as though they were born into the wrong body. I would argue that they do not choose to identify as male or female, they naturally identify with a particular gender, despite the gender society expects their biological sex to dictate. This idea of "choice" can be expanded to the queer community as a whole, given the debate about whether being gay (or bisexual or lesbian or queer etc) is in fact a choice.
ReplyDeleteI'm really glad you posted this, because I was thinking something similar today while looking at the assigment-- the huge amount of pull society has on both gender identity and gender expression.
ReplyDeletePsychological research has indicated that people begin "separating" genders as early as infancy-- given a pink-and-lace-covered baby, the person is more likely to coo and whisper praises relating to looks and spend significantly more time holding the child. However, given the same child wearing more "masculine" baby attire, the subject is far more likely to encourage the baby to explore the room, pick up toys, and crawl around on their own.
It seems ridiculous and slightly infuriating to me that, as a society, we begin placing infants into gender identity boxes, if you will, before they are aware of their own existance. Almost as soon as they draw breath, most people in the room will have reacted in a way specific to the newborn's gender.
The answer? Name the child a genderless name, dress them only in yellows or greens, and refuse to answer questions about their gender.
But really. This is ridiculous.
Kevin, I think that I needed to make more clear that I wasn't just talking about transsexuals. I was talking about the people who are mostly comfortable with the gender they've been assigned because of his or her sex. If, for example, I was dressing in a way that a man is thought of as dressing, I would be making a conscious choice to go against the gender I was raised to be dressing in traditionally masculine clothing.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad this conversation is starting--as you read the Lorber Social Construction of Gender and Fausto-Sterling's The Five Sexes and Dueling Dualisms we will go far deeper into the category of gender, sex, sexual orientation and gender identity/expression.
ReplyDeleteHaving a clear understanding (and definition) of these terms should be a learning outcome of the next week or so.