3.2　What is gender?

3.2　What is gender?

The term 'gender' differs from the term 'sex' in that the former is a cultural definition of the behaviour considered appropriate to the sexes in a given society at a given time,while the latter is purely a matter of biological fact (Lerner,1986).Thus,gender equates to femininity and masculinity,while sex simply means female and male.In practice,society identifies women,both socially and culturally,with a gendered understanding of women's position in society as being subordinate to men.Gender inequality has influenced and continues to influence social development in politics,economics,culture and education and many academics are engaged in research on its impact (Huang,2005;Jackson et al.,2002;Li,2005;Peterson &Runyan,1993).The general population,within the Chinese context,has started to acknowledge the importance of eliminating gender inequality between women and men.

As Archer and Lloyd (1985),Gao et al.(2005),Han (2005) and Jackson (1999) point out,gender emphasises the differences between women and men which are socially and culturally constructed rather than biological.For example,according to Chinese cultural customs in some rural areas,rice straw is planted at the gate of a house where a woman has just given birth.Straw with roots is planted if the baby is a boy,but straw without roots is planted if the baby is a girl (Liu,2005).This behaviour suggests that a girl coming to the world is regarded from birth as a non-family member,presumably because she will leave her family (and her 'roots') and marry when she grows up.She will then become a member of another family(Coward,1983;Xi,2003) and her children will take her husband's surname.The family line can only be continued by sons and not by daughters.This suggests that gender inequality occurs socially and culturally in China from birth.

In the UK,the majority of British women,according to long-standing social custom,put aside their 'maiden' (that is the name of their father's family) on marriage and take their husband's surname in its place.Husbands,however,retain their surnames after marriage.From this,we may infer that women,in many respects,are subordinated to their husbands on marriage.As de Beauvoir (1993) noted,femininity is not innate but is created.Society and culture has constructed masculinity and femininity as separate categories and these categories force women into a subordinate position in the home and society where they may encounter culturally-induced practices such as forced or arranged marriage,domestic violence,and so on.

As Li (2001) and Peterson et al.(1993) point out,gender refers to socially learned behaviour and expectations.Society,in the light of socially regulated criteria,perceives women and men in gendered ways.Thus,gender should be understood as a social,not a psychological or biological,construction of femininity and masculinity (Peterson et al.,1993).Gender is a complex phenomenon and is learned through the socialisation experience,and through the impact of social learning about gender,we may infer that there is a dichotomy between women and men (Li,2001).For example,at birth each child is given a name which reflects the expectations of its parents.Typically the name will also reflect both era and gender.In China,girls are frequently called 'hong' (red),'yan' (gorgeous),'li' (beautiful),'hua' (fl ower),'ling'(bell),'xian' (gentle and prudent) but boys are named 'wei' (great),'qiang' (strong),'yong' (brave),'jie' (outstanding),'guo' (country) (Li,2001).Girls' names are associated with beauty,gentleness and prudence,which suggests that women may be viewed as objects for others to view and admire and expected to be obedient to others.Boys' names link to strength,bravery and nation,which suggests that men are destined for success and for domination.Thus,gender difference is apparent from naming at birth.

Gender embodies hierarchical divisions between women and men in all aspects of society (Huang,2005;Jackson et al.,2002).Such a hierarchy,as Jackson et al.(2002) point out,is created through social institutions and social realities.Gender is not only a social structural phenomenon but also is produced,negotiated and sustained at the level of everyday interaction.Gender is all pervading because natural sexual divisions,female and male,are expanded into the social sphere of femininity and masculinity.Society classifies these differences in social status and hierarchy,usage of resources and social participation according to gender (Huang,2005).The world people live in is inevitably ordered by gender.Therefore,gender encompasses both social divisions and cultural distinctions between women and men.Gender is evolved from pure sex defined biologically into social sex defined socially and culturally.

Since gender reflects a particular hierarchy,differences in the division of labour and resources,and in the position of and relations between women and men,will occur in families and society.For example,with regard to the division of labour,nearly half of the female (49.7%) and male (51.8%) respondents in one study in China (Li,2001) agreed with the conventional statements 'men outside but women inside' (nanzhuwai,nüzhunei) and 'men deal with outside association' (nanren chuli waibu jiaowang).Why are these concepts still so widely accepted in China? This may be attributable to Confucian norms which relegate women to spiritually and physically demeaning lives in their homes and bar them from discussing public issues,and inculcate the value of submission to patriarchal authority(Gilmartin,1999).Men appear to be superior to women because they are the main breadwinners,their work is visible and valued by society,while women's household tasks are neither visible nor valued.Men are conventionally admired and looked up to.

However,through a gender-sensitive lens,we can in fact see that such constructions of masculinity are not independent of,but are in fact dependent upon,opposing constructions of femininity (Squires et al.,1993).The presence of men,in a sense,depends upon the absence of women.Originally,as Coward (1983) points out,the concept 'men outside but women inside' arose through women's biological function of child bearing.Women have been subordinated because of their reproductive capacity,which limits their ability to undertake outside work.This convention has passed down from generation to generation and the awareness of gender difference has become rooted in the minds of both women and men.Thus gender inequality between women and men in terms of the division of labour has caused different outcomes between them in terms of their role in the home and in society.

As a result of such historical and cultural conventions,society has fixed expectations of the sexes according to biological function,and,while both women and men are affected by gender issues,men are mostly positively affected and women are mostly negatively affected.Women are categorised by their biological sex as inferior to men by culture and society and while the fact that they are also individuals (like men) is overlooked (Cheng,2005).Gender division is a social construct (Lerner,1986).For example,in the Chinese labour market,men are employed because they are by convention considered as having strength,energy,bravery,and resolution and a wide range of occupations is open to them.However,in contrast,women find employment with comparative difficulty because they are seen as weak,soft,dependent,and hesitant and the range of occupations available to them is much narrower (Su,2006).Men therefore have far greater employment and career opportunities.Such social expectations and appraisal of women hinder them in their social efforts and also adversely affect their self-esteem.In China some 67 per cent of private employers employ young women on the condition that they should not become pregnant,and that they will be dismissed of they get pregnant(Yi,2006).These gendered divisions of labour which place men and masculinity above women and femininity ensure that institutions and practices that are male dominated or perceived to be masculine in style or to embody masculine traits are held to be superior (Peterson et al.,1993).

Yang (2003) argues that gender is a means of expressing the balance of power between women and men.It is a social and political,but not a biological,construct.For example,by law men have been given special rights to exercise power in the home and society.In both the UK and China,for example it has in the past been legal for men to exercise patriarchal authority and use violence against both their wives and their children.In effect the subordination of women has been institutionalised through history,culture,society and politics.

Usually,legislation informs popular behaviour,that is,it establishes a framework of conduct for people,who act in accordance with it.Under its influence,people tend to consider men as dominant and women as subordinate.The law,therefore,perpetuates the classifi cation of women and men into feminine and masculine and helps sustain the power/gender inequalities which exist between women and men.These gender divisions and definitions (femininity and masculinity) are therefore crucial factors in social organisation (Coward,1983) and gender may be seen as a symbol of male power.

Such power can also be seen as representing patriarchal authority.Patriarchy implies a model of power of interpersonal domination,where all men have forms of literal,legal and political power over all women (Coward,1983).Patriarchy controls women politically and socially.In this context,men as a group (masculinity) have rights over women which women as a group (femininity) do not have over men,for example in the home,because it is men who have recorded the past and created law and language (Spender,1985).Women have had no past,no history and no religion of their own (de Beauvoir,1993).Their subordination is engendered by culture,society,history and politics.Therefore,women's place is seen as lowly both in the home and in society.In the context of my research topic of domestic violence,specifically,we need to explore how gender inequality occurs between wives and husbands and how patriarchy is reflected in marriage and in the family?　This is examined below.