Readings:
Suzanne J. Kessler and Wendy McKenna, selection from Gender: An Ethnomethodological Approach (CP).
Phyllis Burke, selections from Gender Shock (CP).
Questions:
Kessler and McKenna reading:
1. What do the authors mean by "gender attribution"? How is the action of gender attribution related to "gender"?
2. Why do the authors use the example of transsexuals in their analysis? How does the existence of transsexual people undermine popular conceptions of what gender is?
3. Kessler and McKenna write, "How is a social reality where there are two, and only two, genders constructed" (3). What relation between language and reality is implied by this question. What evidence do they present to support their argument about that relation?
4. How has the term "gender" traditionally been defined by social scientists (7)? What distinction do they make between gender and sex?
5. How do the authors define the following terms? In addition to the definition, give examples where possible.
a. gender assignment
b. gender identity
c. gender role
d. stereotype6. What are some of the "gender-based categories" that society has for describing people? What are the implications of the fact that these categories rely on a concept that is socially-constructed? (13-16)
7. Briefly outline their argument about the "primacy of gender attribution."
Burke reading:
1. Why might "looking at what society pathologizes," as Burke argues, also tell us something about those who are not defined as ill, or pathological?
2. What are some of the penalties for challenging dominant gender norms?
3. How was Becky's gender inappropriate behavior treated? Was the treatment successful?
4. How did Dr. Barlow develop his "Gender-Specific Motor Behavior Form"? What are some of the "passing" criteria for men and women? What does the creation of the test, and the "gender identity disorder" it pathologizes, tell us about the relation between statistical norms, and value-based norms, between the "is" and the "ought"? How are the statistical norms -- in this case, gender "appropriate" behavior, enforced by the psychiatric industry?
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