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Cultural Gender

Posted by xJane on October 1st, 2008 at 10:33 am · 6 Comments

There’ve been a couple articles about gender & children’s clothing that recently got me thinking. One of my sisters has 4 boys and one girl (the youngest). Her boys all wear hand-me-downs (as I remember doing, myself), but the girl has new clothes. New, pink clothes. Sometimes not pink but instead lavender and frilly. I’ve never seen her in pants. This is absolutely baffling to me.

As the first article discusses, this is mostly a function of culture. Baby clothes simply do not exist for girls that aren’t gendered. The “neutral” (and perhaps “normal”) clothes are for boys. While the “of course boys can’t wear girls’ clothes but girls can wear boys’ clothes” aspect of this annoys me, what is really interesting to me is how important this early cultural gendering is. Obviously important enough that it doesn’t even occur to most people that it’s going on. By the time a girl grows up, she’s spent so much time playing with dolls, ironing fake clothes, and looking “cute” that she doesn’t even realize she has choices available to her. By the time a boy grows up, he’s spent so much time playing with action figures, putting out fake fires, and looking “tough” that he doesn’t realize he has choices available to him. This is why it’s so hard, as an adult or near-adult for either to be taken seriously in the fields that culturally are peopled by people of the opposite gender (male nurses, female techs).

The second article is interesting because it shows how pervasive these cultural norms are. To the point that western cultural assumptions have bled into cultures that may have other cultural gender norms. Which serves as an introduction to the third article, which claims that the pink-blue paradigm is universal and not cultural at all. They claim that, since they used Chinese children in the study, this proves that pink is universally “female”. The second article, of course, debunks this, although it would be interesting to see what colors children from cultures who have not been subjected to western influences might prefer.

[I was looking for an article I read awhile ago about how the pink-blue has switched; that in Victorian times, pink was seen as a color for boys since red was bold and manly (like blood) and pink was pastel color—appropriate for children. If anyone can find it, please let me know, I'd like to know I didn't just completely make that up...]

Tags: Consumerism · Dialog · Feminism · Gender · Pop Culture · Women

6 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Quin // Oct 1, 2008 at 2:17 pm

    You know it’s funny. Until somebody does something as unethical as raising an experimental set of children in a vacuum, we’ll have no way of understanding this. My aunt and uncle had twins; aboy and girl. They were adamant that they would (a) not be overwhelmed by tv, advertising, or too many commercial items and toys and (b) would not do anything to force them to behave according to gender stereotypes. The kids weren’t deprived; the family watched sports, movies, and had a wide variety of exposure to many things. But they were kept away from advertising and television until they were about five. As small babies they shared onesies and my aunt didn’t fuss with church clothes for either of them; they were babies, for crying out loud. All they’re going to do is puke on them.

    However, by the time they were two, real differences emerged. The boy was aggressive, boisterous, and fascinated by balls, throwing things, and playing the part of the rescuer. The girl was more docile and started asking for “pretty clothes.” She naturally gravitated toward pink and slowly appropriated all of the pink t-shirts in the babies’ shared closet. The little boy didn’t care, and still doesn’t care, about what he wears. But even at six, he stands up very straight and struts — yes, struts — when he notices a pretty girl nearby.

    I wonder if we’ll ever know. Is it inborn? Is it cultural? Is it both? I think as long as it’s a choice and not assigned, whatever people want to do is fine.

  • 2 xJane // Oct 1, 2008 at 6:05 pm

    I think you raise some great issues, Quin. It’s likely clear that there is part of this that is inborn and part that is culturally reinforced. One of my sisters’ sons was born gay—this has been clear to me since I met him. If nothing else, that taught me that sexuality is something that we’re born with. But he’s being raised in a very gender-binary household, where men are men and women cook. (Entertainingly, his brother has been interested in women since he was very little—like your nephew, he struts & flirts. And he’s 8.) Similarly, I have a niece who is more interested in swords and sports than is her brother. It may be the case that most female children grow up to be interested in the kinds of things that are culturally reinforced as “female”; the danger comes, I think, when we force this upon children. And some of those children won’t know that they’re interested in something that’s not part of their gendered role unless they’re exposed to it.

  • 3 sarah k. // Oct 3, 2008 at 5:31 am

    In the Philippines, there are people who are born the “third sex”, which is where they are not heterosexual, and are interested in the incorrect gender specific clothing and professions.

    I found this completely disturbing, since the idea that one can label a child at a very early age is ridiculous to me. (I’m not saying that children aren’t born with certain traits, merely that people label them based on irrelevant factors.) But children who are raised “bakla” (males) or “tomboy” (females) always live up to the expectations thrust upon them. A boy will be told he is a bakla if he has a lisp. And he will then grow up to be a lipstick wearing hairdresser. Without exception.

    The Disney movie version of “Peter Pan” is a good place to look for Victorian gender stereotypes. The younger brother, Michael, wears the one-piece pajamas with the bum-flap. They are pink. Wendy’s night-dress is blue.

    Two years ago, for Halloween, my family went as the characters in Peter Pan, and my 2 year old son was Michael. We bought him some pink footie pajamas, and he loved them so much that he wore them every day, all day, for months. I had to buy three more sets in the next year, because he kept wearing them out. One had little stars and magic wands on it, and one was emblazoned with “Sweet” across the front. He didn’t care. He would run around outside, inside, everywhere in his pink pajamas.

    As if my comment weren’t long enough, I now have to rant on why I violently hate the notion that it is acceptable for a girl to wear “boys’ clothes” but not for a boy to wear “girls’ clothes.” The very idea is rooted in the fact that being a girl is not as good as being a boy. Boy stuff is good. For a girl to aspire to being a boy, or to wear boy clothes, or to have a boy job, is understandable, since boy stuff is so very, very cool. But boys are not allowed to want girl stuff. Girl stuff is not good; it is goofy, and sentimental, and inferior. A boy who likes girl stuff is seen as goofy, sentimental, inferior, or, heaven forbid, gay.

  • 4 Chandelle // Oct 3, 2008 at 7:54 am

    Thanks for discussing this topic. It’s a pet of mine. I’ve been working on a post for weeks – WEEKS! – about forcing children into gender stereotypes, and I can’t seem to get through it because it brings up so much emotion. My poor little girl gets called a “diva” by my parents because my son, born first, happened to be exceptionally patient and easy-going and she happens to be more “normal,” which according to my parents means that she’s “demanding,” “high-maintenance,” “such a girl,” and it is definitely “because she has red hair” – just like my son, but “it affects girls differently.” I just can’t stand that my girl is not even speaking in complete sentences and she’s already being demeaned, labeled and dismissed on account of the misfortune of being born with a vulva.

    Never mind that MY HUSBAND made OUR SON a doll…which he loves to pretend to nurse…we won’t even go there, the terrible traumas we’re inducing because he’s nurturing a doll “like a girl” (disgustingly).

    It’s depressing and I feel so completely impotent to raise my kids with the slightest ounce of egalitarianism. Quin’s comments made me think of the fact that we DON’T raise our children in a vacuum and whatever steps your aunt and uncle took to make things more equal and open for their children, every time they took those kids out of the house, their efforts were subverted and despised. That influence is powerful and unavoidable. But it’s much easier now to say, “See? Gender differences MUST be ingrained because even egalitarian parents couldn’t keep their girls from being girlie and their boys from becoming manly!” Anything so we don’t have to think about, and then have any desire to change, the culture in which we reside.

  • 5 Chandelle // Oct 3, 2008 at 7:55 am

    Oh, Quin, I don’t mean that you’re being so obtuse, but I have heard this response literally hundreds of times elsewhere.

  • 6 xJane // Oct 3, 2008 at 11:18 am

    I think the best we can do is look at the little differences in the “cultural norm”: I hated dolls—I was given one that I liked because of who gave it to me and, instead of playing with it, I built her houses, furniture, and stables (never clothes); my nephews were definitely born (from the same stock) with different proclivities—one a flirt, one gay. Nurturing each and allowing each child to be who it wants to be is point, not raising everyone to be gender neutral.

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