Explaining Gender Hierarchies

1. Explaining Gender Hierarchies

2. Supernatural • religious cosmologies • origin stories

3. Woman created from man’s rib

4. Adam and Eve • 2 conditions 1) subordinate to husband 2) bring forth children in pain

5. “Natural” Law • “The relation of male to female is naturally that of the superior to the inferior – of the ruling to the ruled.” • - Aristotle • “woman is naturally subject to man because in man the discretion of reason predominates.” • - Aquinas

6. Arguments from Nature • Greek medical • -- womb floats around female body so women are irrational and incapable of ruling themselves

7. Darwinian, sociobiologists • sperm is active, warrior • egg is passive • sperm invades egg

8. Primatologists • look at apes • men fight each other • women take care of children

9. Critique: Counterexamples • Bonobos • Spiders

10. Social Construction Theories

11. Good Old Days • women once had greater authority • moment historically when it all changes

12. Before patriarchy… • Egalitarian societies • no differences in sizes of houses • no differences in sizes of burial plots • no evidence of weapons • evidence of “culture” – the arts • evidence of women being held in high esteem

15. Rise of Dominator Societies • 5000-3000 BCE on – • consolidation of power in hands of temple bureaucracy • development of militarism – weapons • institutionalization of slavery

16. Woman Slave • Slavery – first institutionalized form of hierarchical dominance in human history • Crucial invention - possibility of designating group to be dominated as “different” - Other - not human Predominance of female slaves over male

17. Slaves are “yoked”

18. Hierarchy among men rested on property relations, reinforced by military might Women’s place in hierarchy mediated through the status of the men on whom they depended Somewhere above wives – exceptional women distinguished by virginity and religious service Top - wife Middle – slave-concubine Bottom - slave woman Which Women? The Legacy of Sowing Division Among Women

19. ..and then incorporating it into custom, law, religion, … • Veil is symbol and emblem of married woman elevated to distinguishing mark - wearing it is made a privilege • Distinction between women based on their sexual activities • Women not under one man’s protection and sexual control are “public” - unveiled

20. Patriarchy – begun in violence and force – is institutionalized through: - customs - economics - religion - law - family structures - paradigms of thought