Psych of Gender week 5 paper

The assignment: Use these questions as a starting point for your paper.

1. Describe your own gender identity.
2. Describe what aspects of your own gender identity fit within the status quo, and what does not.
3. What has been expected of you with regard to your gender?
4. Where have these expectations come from? i.e. parents, school, church.
5. How have you been affected by these expectations?

Psych of Gender
Activity 5-1
Gender Identity

I’ll never forget the moment that the difference between boys and girls became crystal clear to me. I was 14. Our church had a youth Sunday, with junior and senior high students directing the workshop service. Another girl and I were chosen to be ushers, and one of our duties was to collect the offering and place it on the altar. But as we approached the dais, the minister stood up and stopped us. Women were not allowed to approach the altar. He took the collection plates from our hands and placed them there himself.

That seemed to sum up everything I had learned about gender roles. Boys could do anything. Girls on the other hand, were lesser, not as good as, unworthy and I chafed at the rules governing what girls were allowed to be and the goals to which they could aspire. Some of the expectations came from my teachers and neighbors, and some from religion, as I’ve just related, but most came from my parents and extended family, who never knew just what to make of me.

I responded by rebelling and being non-conforming. As a female I was expected to be quiet and studious, excelling in English but with no aptitude for math; instead, I taught myself math and cut literature class. I played football and got into fights after school. I scorned pink. I cut my hair short and wore baggy t-shirts and oversized boys’ jeans. I was encouraged to aim for teaching or nursing as a career; I took up music as a profession and paid my tuition by playing in a rock band instead. I strove to be androgynous, and for the most part succeeded.

That was in my youth. Now, at the age of 48, my gender identity is completely female, though not always within the status quo. I married young and quickly had three children, which is very mainstream. I left paying employment to raise them. I enjoy cooking, and I love spending time with my family. These are all traditionally feminine things. But other parts of my identity are not so easily categorized.

Over the years I’ve developed my own way of defining gender. I work in a creative field, but one that is male dominated. I write novels with female characters, but in a traditionally male genre. I have long hair and paint my nails, but I don’t wear make-up. I still wear jeans, but they come from the women’s department, not the men’s, and under them are white ankle socks with embroidered penguins on them. Over those girly socks are boys’ hiking boots, but I also own red high heels.

The “one size fits all” rules I learned as a child no longer work for me, any more than they do for most people, I believe. A gender identity based on old fashioned sex roles is only half a life, and I want a full one.

I can change the oil in my car. I know how to drive a tractor-trailer rig and have shingled a roof. I define my own femininity.

And I make a killer cheesecake.