Lecture 2 G&P - Revisions PDF

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The Body, Sexuality and Madculinity - Maki Kimura...

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The body, sexuality and masculinity

1. Gender and sex (Part 1) A lesson from last week…. ● Gender as socially constructed relations between men and women. “One is not born but rather becomes a woman. No biological, psychical or economic destiny defines the figure that the human female takes on in society. (de Beauvoir Second Sex: volume 2, Chapter 1, Childhood, p. 293) – originally published in 1949 ⇒ need to focus on the social constructiveness of being a womang No biological foundation: also the case for men ● Gender as an analytical category as well as lived experiences. When we explore society and how society’s organised, looking into gender relations, how society impacts those relations - how gender relations also impact on society Understand how gender should be considered as a lived experience - not just a theory ⇒ a reality ● Gender relations are embedded in institutions ⇒ create inequalities ● ●

Do we have both sex and gender? Sex as biological differences and gender as social differences? The gender/sex distinction was developed/introduced by second wave feminists

Ann Oakley (1972) Sex, Gender and Society Famous feminsits sociologist She highlighted this distinction ebtween sex and gender ⇒ gender is social ; sex biological ● Gender-Social vs. Sex-biological roles. ● Sex can be judged by ‘biological evidence’ ● The constancy of sex throughout history and place/culture. ● Gender (whether someone is masculine or feminine) is bound to culture, time and space – a wide variation of the construction of femininity and masculinity ● Sex/gender distinction challenges biological reductionist explanation of gender equality. ● Material basis of gender inequality (i.e. free domestic labour) - women as a class (materialist feminists) Challenges to Oakley’s argument ● Many ‘women’ are unable to/do not reproduce. Even though Oakley highlighted the biological differences - critics argue than when you look closer, there are more biological similarities between male and female ● Human biology can also demonstrate the similarities between male and female. • ● Sex/Gender distinction depends on three prepositions. (HoodWilliams, 1992:6) 1. The biological realm features clear opposite sexes 2. There are two separate realms of the biological and the cultural 3. The former is fixed and certain and the latter open and flexible. Instead of seeing sex and gender diffirently:

Sex itself is the production of the discourse of gender - how we practice gender in our society, creates how we understand biological differences - male/female Writer within the sex/gender problematic have acted as if the body possessed a peculiar ability to generate the true meaning of sex. But, sex does not simply stand like a base beneath the superstructure of gender because the existence of sex itself is an object of the discourse of gender. (Hood-Williams, 1996:8) 2. Denaturalising sex Emergence of non binary movements - think that in mainstreaming culture - this binary of male/female is historical - could we find a way throughout? ⇒ actually it is not the case The history of sex ●

Historically, before the Enlightenment, the human sex was understood not as dimorphic but monomorphic i.e. a one sex model (Thomas Laqueur, 1990, Making Sex). Instead of seeing male/female as opposite ⇒ the one sex model was applied, male and women instead of having different sexual reproductive organs, it was considered that these reproduct organs were the same, but the difference was that the reproductive organs were inside for women ⇒ it was even thought that women could become men

This reflected how people saw intersex people before the enlightenmen ● Foucault’s discussion of Herculine Barbin also demonstrates that there was a far greater acceptance of hermaphroditic person until mid 19th century. Story of a girl borught up in a religious order One day she went to see the doctor because she was in pain - doctor concluded that this girl was actually a boy This story represented how before mid-19th century, people had greater tolerance to intersex people ⇒ doctor assigned intersex gender easily - there was no rigid sexual binarism ● The shift from the one sex model to the two sex model should not be seen as the result of the ‘development’ of scientific knowledge.

Rather, we should understand this sexual dismorphism as imposed by modern ideology ● Sexual dimorphism is imposed by modernity – since the development of natural science in the Enlightenment. It was rather imposed to see sexual differences that way ● No scientific basis of biological sex (chromosomes, hormones etc.) differentiate all men from women. Because the way that power gender operates and is imposed on sexual differences, women are considered as weaker, and incapable biologically to participate in roles of responsibility - excluded from political spheres ● Women are considered as a (naturally) weaker sex and/or biologically incapable for politics, thus excluded from the political sphere. ● Feminist biologists argue the biological indicators for sex are continuous, and more than two sexes exist (Vigoya, 2015). Not dichotomous: not just male and female - more than two sexes exist The postmodern/post-structuralist influence Discussion developed by scholars influenced by the post-modernist approach Since the 1990s, many feminists have started to challenge the sex/gender distinction and the idea that sex is biologically determined or inscribed on the body (the influence of post-structuralist and postmodernist approach). “There is nothing about being ‘female’ that naturally binds women. There is not even such a status as ‘being’ female, itself a highly complex category constructed in contested sexual scientific discourses and other social practices.” (Haraway, 1990 quoted in Squires, 1999, p.62) ● Sex as well as gender is socially constructed. Our seeing two genders leads to the ‘discovery’ of biological, psychological, and social differences (Hawkesworth, 2015) But this is used as a political category in our society - to demonstrate your legal status ● Sex as a political category and a legal status e.g. birth certificate, passport, driving license, marriage license, citizenship rights, educational and employment opportunities, sports etc. ● Sex is now concepturalised not as a natural reality, but in relation to biological materiality By claiming that sex is socially constructed, we do not claim that sex has nothing to do with the body, but we simply negate that the body is pre-given and fixed ● The concept of non-binary can challenge binary sexual differences (of male and female) and the connection between sex/gender.

3. The politics of the body (Part 2) Scholars started to argue that sex and sexual differences are socially constructed, as well as gender. Instead of seeing sex and sexual differences a ssomething naturally-given and as something fixed - they start to highligh how sex ans sex differences are mere relfexions of the way we understand and practice gender in our society The social and materiality of the body This is not to reject the importance of the body (and bodily differences) and its relation to sex/gender “This is not to say that there are no bodily differences, or that bodily differences do not matter, as obviously they do, but that conceptualisation of bodily difference are not powerneutral. Rather they are

undertaken for purposes involving power, claims to the contrary notwithstanding” (Carver, 1998, p. 23). Differences are important, but we need to conceptualise them as not power neutral ● Feminists emphasise an embodied nature of sex/gender, but challenge the assumption that (biological/natural) binary sexual difference (sex) determines gender identity and sexual identity. ○ Binary of male/female -> binary of man/women -> binary of heterosexual/homosexual In mainstream culture, assumption of binary sexual diffeences, based on this binary sexual differences, sexuality is being developed ● An increase interest in the study of the body (and the construction of sex/gender) “There is a contingent, though not arbitrary, relation between the male body and masculinity and the female body and femininity. To claim this is neither biologism or essentialism but rather to acknowledge the extremely complex and ubiquitous network of significations and its historical psychological and cultural manifestations” (Gatens, 1991, p. 146) . Scholars start to look at the connection between the body and feminity/masculinty ⇒ explore this conflict and connexion - instead of just assuming there is a link ● The ‘materialisation’ of the body – Judith Butler Claim of materialisation of the body ○ Sex/gender/sexuality are ‘constituted through discursively constrained performative acts that produce the body ○ The materiality as well as the social nature of the body The body in politics How has the body been perceived in political thoughts ● The Cartesian dualism of mind/body Basis for liberal political thought ⇒ divinding mind and body Mind: reason, rationality, superior status than body Body: natural, needs to be cultivated Fear of the body - body is being despised ○ The association of mind with reason, rationality, and individual ○ The body as ‘natural’ – androcentricism/somatophobia (vs. biophillia) (Threadcraft, 2015) ● The body has often been associated with the ‘inferior’ groups, such as women, working class, or black and minoritised groups. ● The body as something to be regulated and controlled ○ Regulating the body becomes central to (modern) political order. ○ Foucault’s bio-power and governmentality. (e.g. motherhood, heterosexuality) Trying to highlight how our bodies have been used as an insturment to govern people Body used as an instrument for regulation ○ The body is constructed through these social practices (always gendered, sexed, racialised etc). ● Feminist and gender scholars have challenged the mind/body distinction based on works by MerleauPonty, Freud etc. (e.g. de Beauvoir) “Crises of puberty and the menopause, monthly ‘curse’, long and often difficult pregnancy, painful and sometimes dangerous childbirth, illnesses, unexpected symptoms and complications – these are characteristic of the human female” (de Beauvoir, Second Sex: volume 1, Chapter 1, Biological Data originally published 1949). She tries to portray how becoming a women is based on this material experience of the body ● The body is not natural nor neutral/passive where a socially constructed mind can simply acts upon. “Theorists of sexual difference do not take as their object of study the physical body, the anatomical body, the neutral, dead body, but the body as lived, the animate body – the

situated body” (Gatens, 1991: 147) . The body is something that has lived ⇒ not fixed Instead of seeing it as pre-given and fixed, it is seen more fluid, hybrid, intersectional ○ The body as lived – lived corporeality ○ The body as the centre stage of subjectivity/identity ○ The body became more fluid, hybrid and intersectional. ○ The body as the site of knowledge Feminist look into the role of the developing body as a source of knowledge to tacke the established views ⇒ put body as a central piece of reflexion - had been neglected However ● The regulation, politicization, and medicalisation of the body persists/intensifies e.g. intersexed body and international sport, transgender/transsexual bodies, religious dress, global surrogacy

The body and sexuality ● 1. 2. 3.

What is Sexuality? about our sexual identity/subjectivity sexual practices and erotic behaviour (desire/pleasure) social concern in health and well-being of the population (i.e. reproduction).

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Foucault argued that sexuality is where power operates and the society is organised. ○ Sexuality not as private matters, but public matters ○ The body as the site of this operation of power Regulating body has been one of the central aims of the political order ● Concern about regulating ‘deviant’ bodies People are expected to conform ○ Conforming physically and behaviourally to binary sexual difference ○ Controlling particular kinds of the bodies which are strongly related to sexuality (i.e. reproduction and sexual desire/practice) ●

Such regulations of the body and sexuality has led to heteronormative understanding of sexuality (i.e. heterosexuality vs. homosexuality, reproductive vs. non-reproductive sexuality.) Non-reproductive is considered less important “The codes of sex, sexuality/ies, reproduction and gender (meaning masculine and feminine behaviour, dress, self-identification as a man or woman, etc.) through which human life has traditionally been understood (especially in ‘western’ ethical systems) were rooted in naturalising accounts of biology.” (Carver, 2007: 129) Defines the way body should be presented and considered (deviant or not) as a target for control ●

Sexuality (embedded in the body) is a system of domination ○ Presumption of sexually active (men) – passive (women) dichotomy and heterosexuality ○ Patriarchy vs. heteronormativity Assumption of active/passive dichotomy ●

Heteronormativity (heteronormative understanding of sexuality, i.e. heterosexuality vs

homosexuality and reproductive and nonreproductive sexuality) has shaped political institutions and practices. ●

Transgender, intersex, and non-binary groups challenges the stereotypical model of sexual binary (heterosexuality vs. homosexuality) and heteronormativity – queering gender/sexuality.

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Technology (technologically assisted reproduction, gender reassignment surgeries, cyborg, virtual bodies etc.) can challenge the supposedly basic biological facts of human bodies, sexual practices, reproduction and moral as well as gender/sexual identities. Technologically can offer new avenues for us to understand, gender, sex, sexuality in different ways ○ But also negative aspects exist 4. ●

Men and masculinities

The growth of studies in men and masculinities in the 1980s and 1990s. ○ The study of men as gendered beings. ○ Not the celebration of masculinities but the critical examination of masculinities and their social and political impact, e.g. fatherhood, boy’s failure in school, violence relationships ○ Men and boys play a crucial role in gender equality We cannot explain inequalities if we don’t look at men’s roles ● Important to note black writers’ work on black men and masculinities earlier in the 20th century (Du Bois, C.LR.James, Césaire, Wright, Fanon, Baldwin etc.) Talk about black men and masculinity - impacting on the development of their sexuality ● The danger of adopting the essentialist notion of masculinities and femininities to challenge the equality of the sexes. Addressing masculinity can also help understand gender inequality ● Masculinity (and femininity) - the socially accepted way of being a man or a woman ● Though there is a link between the male body and masculinity, it is understood that masculinities are socially, and historically constructed This link is not a given, it is constructed through social practices More important to deconstruct and see how the connection between men and masculinity is being created ● There is no natural connection between men and masculinity. ● Deconstruct the hegemony of the concept of men ● Multiple and diverse masculinities - intersectionality ● There is still a need to examine the system of male domination and gender inequality – hegemonic masculinity ● Hegemonic masculinity as successful way of ‘being a man’ in specific places, time and culture “Hegemonic masculinity can be defined as the configuration of gender practice which embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of the legitimacy of patriarchy, which guarantees (or is take to guarantee) the dominant position of men and the subordination of women.” (Connell, 2001: 38-39) ● Diverse masculinities and hegemonic masculinity Not every masculinity embodies hegemonic masculinity “Yet, particular men’s personal trajectory and sense of belonging, …. they are all constrained by the force of, and their fantasy relation to, a dominant or hegemonic ideal of masculinity as tough, heterosexual, authoritative successful…” (Segal, 2001, p.239) ● This does not mean that those who display hegemonic masculinity are the most powerful ones.

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Hegemonic masculinity and male dominance is underpinned by institutions, e.g. the military, political institutions (e.g. elected assemblies, political parties.) The importance of understanding men and masculinities in the history of slavery, colonialism and coloniality (Ratele, 2019).

To sum up….. ● The idea that sex is biologically (naturally) determined has been challenged. ● There is no straightforward distinction between sex and gender. ● Feminists have started to look at the body as the source of identity and knowledge. ● Technology related to the body (such as assisted reproductive technology) may challenge traditional gender relations and practices, but can also have negative impacts on gender equalities. ● There is no natural connection between men, male body, and masculinity. ● Hegemonic masculinity as the basis of gender inequality which is underpinned by social and political practices....