I learnt the essential difference between Gender and Sex today:
Sex is something biological. We are born with it.
Gender is a social function. It depends on the way you are brought up.
What it implies is that
Not acknowledging eunuchs as an alternative sex is a grave issue.
On the contrary, a woman may have different expectations with planning versus a man. (Gender issue)
I kept mixing sex and gender in my argument on "why should there be separate seats for separate sexes in buses, or separate compartments in trains". Today it is clear to me that these divisions are social and not biological. Thus, where I may argue that women are equally physically capable as men, the difference is only that the society doesnot see them as so. Thus it is a gender problem, and not of the sex.
However, Gender is a construct of Sex. In simpler words, Gender is a subset of sex. And this creates a lot of problems - the problems of perception, the issues of trans-genders, and so many more. In our times, gender is trying to become the universal set. Thus there are cases of people wanting to change their identities (social construct) by transforming themselves biologically!
That's quite a backdoor entry!
But I think this definition becomes crucial in the understanding of Feminism, the discourse of the Body, etc. We shall be discussing this in our humanities class later this year. It will be exciting....
Sex is something biological. We are born with it.
Gender is a social function. It depends on the way you are brought up.
What it implies is that
Not acknowledging eunuchs as an alternative sex is a grave issue.
On the contrary, a woman may have different expectations with planning versus a man. (Gender issue)
I kept mixing sex and gender in my argument on "why should there be separate seats for separate sexes in buses, or separate compartments in trains". Today it is clear to me that these divisions are social and not biological. Thus, where I may argue that women are equally physically capable as men, the difference is only that the society doesnot see them as so. Thus it is a gender problem, and not of the sex.
However, Gender is a construct of Sex. In simpler words, Gender is a subset of sex. And this creates a lot of problems - the problems of perception, the issues of trans-genders, and so many more. In our times, gender is trying to become the universal set. Thus there are cases of people wanting to change their identities (social construct) by transforming themselves biologically!
That's quite a backdoor entry!
But I think this definition becomes crucial in the understanding of Feminism, the discourse of the Body, etc. We shall be discussing this in our humanities class later this year. It will be exciting....
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