Marlene Zuk – Feminist Biologist

1. Marlene Zuk – Feminist Biologist • Use of animal models in evolutionary theory • Extreme variation among animals • Precludes simplistic generalizations about sex roles • Argues against gender stereotypes • Maternal ‘instinct’ • Harlows’ experiments with monkeys • Mothering is learned, not instinctive • Natural ≠ good • Use of cultural terms to describe animal behavior • Anthropomorphizing  tautology • Cultural prejudices & stereotypes

2. Evolutionary Psychology • Multiple, rather than single gene • Brain evolved in separate parts • Environment of evolutionary adaptedness (EEA) • Evolved brain interacts with modern environment • Both ‘nature’ & ‘nurture’

3. The Gene as Cultural Icon • Political agendas and personal biases • History of misuse • ‘Sexiness’ of genetic explanations • Human brains evolved to be flexible, rely on learning • Biology may set broad parameters • No uniform or universal implications of biological differences • Social factors more often used to explain gender differences

4. Feminist anthropology 1970s • Focus on women to correct androcentric ethnographic record • Causes of women’s universal subordination • Cultural explanations for gender asymmetry • Cultural universals • Material and ideational origins • Symbolic systems of meaning & differential values • Biological differences  unequal cultural evaluations • Claude Lévi-Strauss – Structuralism • Binary opposition • Cultural interpretations of biological attributes • Values and meanings assigned via binary contrasts

5. Ortner - Nature/Culture • Sherry Ortner (1974) • “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” • Simone de Beauvoir – The Second Sex (1953) • “Woman is not born, but made” • Gender as cultural construct • Western categories • e.g. male & female, Self & Other • Women’s bodies interpreted as ‘natural’ by male-dominated culture

6. Ortner - Nature/Culture • Sherry Ortner (1974) • “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” • Women’s universal devaluation due to association with nature • Women’s body and procreation = nature • Men exhibit creativity externally = culture • Men transcend nature, make culture • Human society result of conquest of nature by culture

7. Self/Other • Self/Other = Men/Women • Women defined by their bodies • Men free of body; selfhood = “not woman” • Women trapped in body, men transcend it • Women defined by lack • Western dichotomies • Deprive women of autonomous selfhood • Define men as central actors in culture • Women as inferior • Men: subject, active • Women: object, passive • Bodies central to self perception

8. Critique of Ortner • Assumption of universal devaluation • Men’s view • Universality of binary thinking • Universal meanings of nature/culture • Diversity and complexity of gender and conceptual systems

9. Kimmel & Cross-cultural Research • Male domination as ‘near universal’ • Correlations without resort to biology • Biological model • Cultural variations • Andro- and ethnocentric biases • Effects of colonialism • Cause and effect • Gender inequality  gender difference • Similar biology has different outcomes • Gender differences culturally constructed

10. Social and Cultural Determinants • Division of labor • Functionalist view • Evolutionary imperative • Change and variability • Ideologically sustained • Male power • Marx/Engels – historical materialism • Social evolution • Primitive communism  feudalism capitalism • Private property and inheritance • Nuclear family and control of women • Rise of nation-state

11. Friedrich Engels • Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884) • Women’s status declines with: • Private property • Production for exchange (surplus) • Early communal society • No private property, no nuclear family • Sexual division of labor, but for group • No domestic/public divide • Men and women equal producers • Sedentarization emergence of private ownership • Nuclear, patriarchal family • Productive, economic, decision-making unit • Competition • Economic differences (inequality) emerge

12. Engels’s Historical Narrative • Primitive clan-based society (primitive communism) • Production for use-value • No class differentiation • Domestic labor also public labor • Gender equality • Advent of private property • Men’s control of animals and land • Family carved out from clan unit • Domestic/public, division of labor • Women’s work devalued, become dependent • Production for exchange • Become more important than production for subsistence • Increased class and gender differentiation • The State • Bourgeoisie and proletariats