How Gender Roles Have Changed Since The 1950's

Cursory

Gender roles refer to the set of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be appropriate for people of a specific sex.

Learning Objectives

Describe how gender roles in the U.S. take inverse since the 1950'south

Primal Takeaways

Gender roles are never universal, even within a single country, and they are always historically and culturally contingent.
Gender role theory emphasizes environmental conditions and the influence of socialization, or the process of transferring norms, values, beliefs, and behaviors to group members, in learning how to acquit as a male person or female.
Current trends toward a total integration model of gender roles is reflected in women'due south education, professional accomplishment, and family income contributions.

Key Terms

Division of Labor – A division of labor is the dividing and specializing of cooperative labor into specifically circumscribed tasks and roles.
Socialization – The process of learning one'due south civilization and how to live within it.
Nuclear Family unit – a family unit unit consisting of at about a father, female parent and dependent children.

Full Text

Gender roles refer to the fix of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be socially advisable for individuals of a specific sex. At that place has been significant variation in gender roles over cultural and historical spans, and all gender roles are culturally and historically contingent. Much scholarly piece of work on gender roles addresses the debate over the environmental or biological causes for the development of gender roles. The post-obit section seeks to orient the reader to the sociological theorization of the gender role and discuss its application in an American context.

Gender and Social Role Theory

Gender role theory posits that boys and girls larn to perform ane's biologically assigned gender through particular behaviors and attitudes. Gender part theory emphasizes the environmental causes of gender roles and the touch on of socialization, or the process of transferring norms, values, beliefs, and behaviors to group members, in learning how to bear as a male or a female. Social role theory proposes that the social construction is the underlying force in distinguishing genders and that sex-differentiated beliefs is driven past the sectionalisation of labor between 2 sexes inside a guild. The division of labor creates gender roles, which in turn, pb to gendered social behavior.

Gender Roles in the U.s.a.

With the popularization of social constructionist theories of gender roles, it is paramount that 1 recognize that all assertions about gender roles are culturally and historically contingent. This ways that what might be true of gender roles in the Us for ane cultural group likely is not truthful for another cultural group. Similarly, gender roles in the Us have changed drastically over time. There is no such thing as a universal, generalizable statement virtually gender roles.

One primary thread in discussions about gender roles in the U.s. has been the historical evolution from a single-income family or a family unit unit in which one spouse (typically the father) is responsible for the family income, to a dual-income family, or a family unit in which both spouses generate income. Before the rise of feminism in the 1960s and 1970s and the influx of women into the workforce in the 1980s, women were largely responsible for dealing with home matters, while men worked and earned income outside the habitation. While some claim that this was a sexist structure, others maintain that the construction simply represented a partition of labor or a social arrangement in which a detail segment of the population performs 1 type of labor and another segment performs another type.

Nuclear Family Models

In 1955, sociologist Talcott Parsons adult a model of nuclear families in the United States that addressed gender roles. Family structures vary across cultures and history, and the term nuclear family refers to a family unit of ii parents and their children. Parsons developed two models of gender roles within the nuclear family unit. His first model involved total role segregation; men and women would exist trained and educated in gender-specific institutions, and loftier professional qualifications and the workplace would be intended for men. Women would exist primarily focused on housekeeping, childcare, and children's education. Male participation in domestic activity would be only partially desired and socially adequate. Further, in the case of disharmonize, the man would have the terminal say. Parsons contrasted this commencement model with a second that involved the total integration of roles. In the second model, men and women would be educated in the same institutions and study the same content in classes. Outside the educational milieu, women and men would both perceive career to be important, and equal professional opportunities for men and women would be considered socially necessary. Both parties in a marriage would carry responsibleness for housework and child rearing. Finally, neither gender would systematically dominate decision making.

Current Trends

Of course, neither of Parsons'due south models accurately described the United States in the 1950s, and neither model accurately describes the United States in the present day. However, full role segregation was closer to the reality of the The states in the 1950s, whereas a total integration of roles is increasingly common in the United states of america today.

The national tendency toward a full integration of gender roles is reflected in women's education, professional achievement, and family unit income contributions. Currently, more women than men are enrolled in college, and women are expected to earn more graduate degrees than men over the next several years. In 2005, 22% of American households had two income earners, which suggests the presence of women in the workforce. Nonetheless, in most contexts, women are still expected to be the primary homemakers, even if they are contributing to household income by working outside the home.

Women Behind the Wheel, 1952
This epitome, from the mag Beauty Parade, offers a stereotyped view of female drivers.

Source: Boundless. "Gender Roles in the U.Due south.." Sociology – Cochise College Boundless, 08 Aug. 2016. Retrieved 27 Feb. 2017 from https://www.boundless.com/users/493555/textbooks/folklore-cochise-college/gender-stratification-and-inequality-eleven/gender-and-socialization-86/gender-roles-in-the-u-southward-498-7851/

Source: "Bettie Page driving."
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