The Body in Society – Bodies and Identity (Week 3)

I really enjoyed today’s lecture on identity and gender as a cultural construct. This was the subject which I enjoyed the most when studying for my Sociology A Level a couple of years ago. I was also happy to learn some more terminology and get more of an in depth look at the idea. Because I am almost completely decided on doing something in this area for my essay, I will be looking at what Ashley has spoken about today in more detail soon.

Heteronormativity (Warner, 1991) was a new term for me today and it is the belief that society is built upon strict norms of different genders (males and females) and that heterosexuality is the ‘norm’.
Personally I don’t think the second part of that sentence is as true now as it would have been in 1991, because it is now much more acceptable and ‘normal’.
However I do agree that there are norms for genders, although people do seem more aware of this and it is frequently talked about.

Most viewers would assume that this baby is a boy.

And that this is a girl

And this is purely down to the idea that it is the norm for a baby girl to be dressed in pink and a boy, blue.

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