Amy Benck
SOC 385
Blog #4: Understanding Gender as Durkheim’s Social Fact
One of the concepts Durkheim talked about was the social fact. A social fact, as defined in class by Professor Zopf, is a behavior which holds an external constraint over an individual, meaning that one’s actions and decisions are being influenced by outside (of oneself, that is) beliefs and actions, and the behavior can also exist without the individual acting it out. To make Durkheim’s conceptualization of a social fact clearer, I am going to use the example of gender as a social fact in American society (as gender may exist differently in other countries or cultures).
Gender is a behavior which females and males act out, making them girls and boys, or women and men. The constraint is held over that individual by virtue of only giving her/ him those two options: the gender binary of femininity or masculinity. Individuals are expected to dress, speak, act, and do in particular ways which are feminine or masculine. They must appear clearly feminine or masculine, and they resign themselves to acting and doing in ways that are allowed and expected of their prescribed gender (which is according to their sex). This means that a woman is generally expected to among other things, wear make-up of some sort, generally have longer hair, and occupy positions of less authority, and in particular, positions which are deemed more nurturing. For example, a properly conforming feminine woman would become a nurse, as opposed to a doctor, because that position holds less authority than a doctor and is considered more of a nurturing profession as a nurse usually has more patient contact than the doctor who usually makes the larger decisions and has less patient contact.
To elaborate further on the idea that one’s behavior is dictated by outside influences I am going to use an example from the article titled “Night to His Day: The Social Construction of Gender” by Judith Lorber, found in the book titled “Feminist Frontiers.” Lorber describes on the first page of the article how we are so used to glancing at others who are surrounding us and identifying them to ourselves, declaring them either female or male, and furthermore, how when we are not able to do this we become uncomfortable and unsure of how to act around them, and especially unsure of how to address them when we interact with them. Lorber discusses an experience of riding a public transit train and seeing a father with his child, whose gender was difficult to decipher, and how in those situations we naturally look for key signs of gender but get confused for example when a young child is wearing a blue shirt and has short hair but is wearing earrings. This is the external control which is being placed on us; we expected others to fit into the gender binary which we are all taught to follow and when an individual does not fit into either of them, we feel uncomfortable and sometimes even frustrated.
In addition, the piece titled “What it Means to be Me: Life on the Boundaries of a Dichotomous Gender System,” Betsy Lucal explains her own experiences as a ‘gender bending’ individual. Though she is female, and identifies herself as a woman, she dresses in mostly men’s clothes and has very short hair, and as a result, reports often being mistaken for a man. She describes herself as trying to undo gender or break down gender, but realizes and admits that while she is not conforming to her prescribed gender, she is still conforming to a gender, that being masculinity. As a result, we can see that even those of us who want to reject gender, and attempt to not perform it, those with whom we interact perform it for us by placing us in the set categories of woman and man, feminine and masculine, regardless of our actual sex. Others will place us depending on which gender we fulfill the most and will address us and treat us accordingly, reinforcing what we are attempting to break apart. In this way we can see that, gender fits the definition of Durkheim’s social fact in that it is always in existence because we have been trained to see it, and we search for it until we find pieces of it, as in the example described by Lorber. Gender does not need particular people in order to exist, it exists on its own; we are the ones who perform it.
Works Cited
Lorber, Judith. "Night to His Day: The Social Construction of Gender." Feminist Frontiers. 8th ed. N.p.: Mc-Graw Hill Companies, 2008. N. pag. Print.
Lucal, B. "What It Means to Be Gendered Me: Life on the Boundaries of a Dichotomous Gender System." Gender & Society 13.6 (1999): 781-97. Print.
SOC 385
Blog #4: Understanding Gender as Durkheim’s Social Fact
One of the concepts Durkheim talked about was the social fact. A social fact, as defined in class by Professor Zopf, is a behavior which holds an external constraint over an individual, meaning that one’s actions and decisions are being influenced by outside (of oneself, that is) beliefs and actions, and the behavior can also exist without the individual acting it out. To make Durkheim’s conceptualization of a social fact clearer, I am going to use the example of gender as a social fact in American society (as gender may exist differently in other countries or cultures).
Gender is a behavior which females and males act out, making them girls and boys, or women and men. The constraint is held over that individual by virtue of only giving her/ him those two options: the gender binary of femininity or masculinity. Individuals are expected to dress, speak, act, and do in particular ways which are feminine or masculine. They must appear clearly feminine or masculine, and they resign themselves to acting and doing in ways that are allowed and expected of their prescribed gender (which is according to their sex). This means that a woman is generally expected to among other things, wear make-up of some sort, generally have longer hair, and occupy positions of less authority, and in particular, positions which are deemed more nurturing. For example, a properly conforming feminine woman would become a nurse, as opposed to a doctor, because that position holds less authority than a doctor and is considered more of a nurturing profession as a nurse usually has more patient contact than the doctor who usually makes the larger decisions and has less patient contact.
To elaborate further on the idea that one’s behavior is dictated by outside influences I am going to use an example from the article titled “Night to His Day: The Social Construction of Gender” by Judith Lorber, found in the book titled “Feminist Frontiers.” Lorber describes on the first page of the article how we are so used to glancing at others who are surrounding us and identifying them to ourselves, declaring them either female or male, and furthermore, how when we are not able to do this we become uncomfortable and unsure of how to act around them, and especially unsure of how to address them when we interact with them. Lorber discusses an experience of riding a public transit train and seeing a father with his child, whose gender was difficult to decipher, and how in those situations we naturally look for key signs of gender but get confused for example when a young child is wearing a blue shirt and has short hair but is wearing earrings. This is the external control which is being placed on us; we expected others to fit into the gender binary which we are all taught to follow and when an individual does not fit into either of them, we feel uncomfortable and sometimes even frustrated.
In addition, the piece titled “What it Means to be Me: Life on the Boundaries of a Dichotomous Gender System,” Betsy Lucal explains her own experiences as a ‘gender bending’ individual. Though she is female, and identifies herself as a woman, she dresses in mostly men’s clothes and has very short hair, and as a result, reports often being mistaken for a man. She describes herself as trying to undo gender or break down gender, but realizes and admits that while she is not conforming to her prescribed gender, she is still conforming to a gender, that being masculinity. As a result, we can see that even those of us who want to reject gender, and attempt to not perform it, those with whom we interact perform it for us by placing us in the set categories of woman and man, feminine and masculine, regardless of our actual sex. Others will place us depending on which gender we fulfill the most and will address us and treat us accordingly, reinforcing what we are attempting to break apart. In this way we can see that, gender fits the definition of Durkheim’s social fact in that it is always in existence because we have been trained to see it, and we search for it until we find pieces of it, as in the example described by Lorber. Gender does not need particular people in order to exist, it exists on its own; we are the ones who perform it.
Works Cited
Lorber, Judith. "Night to His Day: The Social Construction of Gender." Feminist Frontiers. 8th ed. N.p.: Mc-Graw Hill Companies, 2008. N. pag. Print.
Lucal, B. "What It Means to Be Gendered Me: Life on the Boundaries of a Dichotomous Gender System." Gender & Society 13.6 (1999): 781-97. Print.