Get It in Writing

In writing class we are using a textbook called New Directions Reading, Writing, Critical Thinking. It offers five themed units each with readings and writing assignments. For the first half of the semester we worked on the Education unit and now we are working on the Gender Roles unit. One of the exercises in that unit asks us to identify a set of adjectives as male or female traits according to what you think most people will say. You may not necessarily agree with the associations. Here are the words and where I think most people would place them. A word may be placed in both categories.

Female Traits: compassionate, frivolous, intuitive, jealous, sensitive, sentimental, sophisticated, submissive

Male Traits: adventurous, aggressive, ambitious, competitive, decisive, jealous, self-reliant

There do seem to be tendencies that tilt these adjectives to one side or the other even though there are ample examples of crossovers, e.g. woman who are aggressive, ambitious, and competitive and men who are sensitive, sentimental, and compassionate. It is preferable, in my view, to minimize the tendencies and see each sex as capable of any of these traits. Generalizations can be helpful at times, but they can also be misleading. The trick is knowing which is the case.

Gender roles have been profoundly affected by Title IX of the 1972 Education Act passed by the United States Congress and that states:

"No person in the U.S. shall, on the basis of sex be excluded from participation in, or denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving federal aid." Dr Mary Curtis and Dr. Christine H.B. Grant at the University of Iowa. "Gender Equity in Sports." WWW. February 3, 2006. (http://bailiwick.lib.uiowa.edu/ge/GEREDESIGN.html)

This legislation requires all educational institutions to promote and allocate resources equally for women's and men's sports. Now, 27 years later, women athletes are more common, debunking the notion that only men were interested in and play sports.

This law and the effect it has had in changing a perceived gender role is a great topic for an essay. I plan to write about it for the second essay assignment for the Fall 2009 Academic Writing class.

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