Laura Gougeon

Power and Imagination

February 15, 2016
Prof. Trimble
Research Journal #2
Exercise 2.1: Search Book and Article Database
Basic bibliography
Antrosio, Jason. "Anthropology, Sex, Gender, Sexuality: Gender Is a Social Construction." Web
log post. N.p., Aug. 2015. Web. 14 Feb. 2016.
"Gender vs. Sex: Important Distinction." Review. Web log post.Teenskepchick. N.p., 8 Nov.
2008. Web. 15 Feb. 2016.
Herek, G. M. (1986). On heterosexual masculinity: "Some Psychical Consequences of the Social
Construction of Gender and Sexuality". The American Behavioral Scientist, 29(5), 563.
Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Assessing Interactions Among Social, Behavioral, and
Genetic Factors in Health; Hernandez LM, Blazer DG, editors. Genes, Behavior, and the
Social Environment: Moving Beyond the Nature/Nurture Debate. Washington (DC):
National Academies Press (US); 2006.
Mikkola, Mari. "Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender." Stanford University. Stanford
University, 12 May 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
"'Night to His Day': The Social ComtLiction of Gender," in Paradoxes or Gender, pp. 54-63.
Copyright 1994. Reprinted by permission of Yale University Press.
Risman, Barbara J. Gender As A Social Structure: Theory Wrestling With Activism. North
Carolina University. Sage Publications, Inc., 2004.

Skrla, Linda. The Social Construction of Gender as a Superindency. Diss. Texas A&M, 1998.
N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
"Social Constructs." International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. 2008. Encyclopedia.com.
Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
"The Social Construction of Gender - Boundless Open Textbook."Boundless. N.p., 22 Jan. 2016.
Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
Wrin, Aimee Van Wagenen. "Theorizing Gender [Inequality]: Social Constructionism/
Poststructuralism/ Deconstruction." N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.

Exercise 2.2: Academic Research on the Internet

General Search Engines
AltaVista:
"The Social Construction of Gender - Boundless Open Textbook."Boundless. N.p., 22 Jan. 2016.
Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
Link:https://www.boundless.com/sociology/textbooks/boundless-sociology-textbook/genderstratification-and-inequality-11/gender-and-socialization-86/the-social-construction-of-gender496-8675/
Bing:
"Social Constructs." International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. 2008. Encyclopedia.com.
16 Feb. 2016 .
Link: http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Social_constructionism.aspx\
Metasearch Engines
Dogpile:
Skrla, Linda. The Social Construction of Gender as a Superindency. Diss. Texas A&M, 1998.
N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
Link:http://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED425501.pdf
Momma:
"Gender vs. Sex: Important Distinction." Review. Web log post.Teenskepchick. N.p., 8 Nov.
2008. Web. 15 Feb. 2016.
Link: http://teenskepchick.org/2012/11/08/gender-vs-sex-important-distinction/
Noodletools
Wrin, Aimee Van Wagenen. "Theorizing Gender [Inequality]: Social Constructionism/
Poststructuralism/ Deconstruction." N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
Link: http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/soc/SocialMoments/vanwag7.htm
Mikkola, Mari. "Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender." Stanford University. Stanford
University, 12 May 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
Link: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/feminism-gender/

Exercise 2.3: DataViz- Tell a Story with Facts

https://www.google.com/url?
sa=i&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=images&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwi75TKkf7KAhULymMKHRzRA_kQjRwIBw&url=http%3A%2F
%2Fitspronouncedmetrosexual.com%2F2011%2F11%2Fbreaking-through-the-binary-genderexplained-using-continuums%2F&psig=AFQjCNFRZ1i_ECFcTdeT9T4CJhIDHyqWg&ust=1455775787907767

*I know this is not a personally made infographic but I thought it told a good story and
thought it was very useful. I will scan you my handmade one to the dropbox!

Website Analysis:
Inquiry question:
How do socially constructed gender roles allow us to view ourselves?
1.Link: http://www.criticalmediaproject.org/cml/topicbackground/gender/
Citation:
Analysis: This site includes the way the gender is portrayed through different aspects of
everyday life such as through media. It talks about how gender has been portrayed distinctly with
sex and how this has created gender roles. His website is a collection of articles assimilated
through various resources from online sources to books. This is known as the critical media
project, is a way for teens to learn about how different topics online. There is an organization that
is behind this project. The groups of people that have made up this project include the project
director: Alison Trope, Ph.D., project manager: Garrett Broad, web development: Melissa
Loudon, editorial assistant: Beth Bose and Diana Lee as well as several consultant and students
from various colleges. Since this project is a collection of several resources they are from2002013. This Media Project can be very valuable towards my research due to the fact that there are
many reliable sources that are used to create the different articles and it covers a key aspect of
my research topic.
2. Link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK19934/#a2000fe40ddd00080
Citation:
Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Assessing Interactions Among Social, Behavioral, and
Genetic Factors in Health; Hernandez LM, Blazer DG, editors. Genes, Behavior, and the
Social Environment: Moving Beyond the Nature/Nurture Debate. Washington (DC):
National Academies Press (US); 2006.
Analysis: This is a book composed of several reports on just the definitions of sex and gender
while also explaining the differences of the two. From his article I used the specific section of
Sex and Gender that is in chapter five of the book because that is my main focus for this project.
This report uses information from several different sources but was put up by the Institute of
Medicine (US) Committee on Assessing Interactions among Social, Behavioral, and Genetic
Factors in Health. Since this is a book, it has not been updated since it was published in 2006.
This site is very useful for my project because i is fairly relevant and is reliable.
3.Link:http://www.livinganthropologically.com/2012/05/16/anthropology-sex-gender-sexualitysocial-constructions/
Citation:
Antrosio, Jason. "Anthropology, Sex, Gender, Sexuality: Gender Is a Social Construction." Web
log post. N.p., Aug. 2015. Web. 14 Feb. 2016.
Analysis: This website is an explanation of the differences are between gender, sexuality and sex
are from an anthropologist point of view. This is a blog site is written by an assistant
anthropologist professor at a college. He has also the coeditor of Open Anthropology and is a
coauthor for several anthropology books. The whole blog page Anthropology, Sex, Gender, and
Sexuality: Gender is a Social Construction. The last time this blog page was updated was in
August of 2015. This being said, it can have some very useful information with how recent it has
come out since our society is always changing, it is important to have recent information.

4.Link:http://www.academia.edu/2029516/On_Whether_Gender_Roles_Are_Innate_or_Socially
_Constructed
Analysis: This is a scholarly article explaining the how gender is socially constructed but is also
innate. This essay is written by a college student studying at Bilktent University. To write this
essay, the student used several different credible sources to explain his different points he was
trying to portray. He uses sources from 1997-2010, this being said the essay had be written
between 2010-2015. This article can be useful for my research project because it has a variety of
different sources. Its point of view on how biology is involved with the construction of gender
can give more depth to my paper.
5. Link: http://www.slideshare.net/DeniseAguilar1/social-construct-of-gender
Analysis: This is a scholarly article written by a college student that is explaining all the
differences of gender roles for women and men from verbal to nonverbal communication. In the
section I was referring to he used a book to site his perspective. This essay was published on
March 7, 2011. Looking at the relativity of the source this essay could be useful for my research
project. Also, the information in the piece is very relevant to help explain my point of view on
the distinctive features between male and female roles.
Summary Reflection
After reviewing the essentials to confirm sources on credibility according to Ballenger,
all my sources are more or less useable and reliable. My first sources is reliable for the fact that
there are several contributors towards the project but there are editorial assistants that have
credentials to review the work to be useful. This is a more abstract source since it is a project that
was created by a professor from University of Southern California to inform students on various
topics to continue learning on their own.
My second sources is very easily by most reliable sources because it is a collection of
written reports that is part of the organization Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on
Assessing Interactions Among Social, Behavioral, and Genetic Factors in Health, and you cannot
find more useful information than from the organization that was created to explain these
specific health situations. On the other hand, my third source was debatable on the reliability at
first and is still on the board line of being used since it is a blog site. After reviewing the author
of the blog page, it is safe to use due to the fact that the author of the site has superior credentials
from being a professor at a college to being a coauthor for several anthropology books.
My fourth and fifth site used are reliable for the fact they were written by a students from
a universitys but since they dont have any written credentials to their names, I do not believe it
will make my paper very strong from those perspectives. I will have to follow up on the sources
that both of these students used to write their papers. After this is done, I can potentially use the
scholarly articles and possible the sources that they found as well to make my paper stronger.

NOTES:

Project: The Social Construction of Gender

Source: Genes, Behavior, and the Social Environment: Moving Beyond the Nature/Nurture
Debate.
First thoughts:
This article is about the relations that sex and gender have on an individual's health. Even though
gender is a socially constructed concept in our society, it does play a role in health problem
people can contract for several different reasons usually related to sex. Also due to gender
inequalities that are made from labor force to discrimination, is a huge cause to the health
problems individuals have.
Notes:
Not only can gender relations influence the expression of biological traits, but also sexassociated biological characteristics can contribute to amplify gender differentials in health.
In yet other instances, gender relations can act synergistically with sex-linked biology to
produce a health outcome. For example, the risk of hypospadias is higher among male infants
born to women exposed to potential endocrine-disrupting agents at work
Finally, in some instances, sex-linked biology can be obscured by the influence of gender
relations in producing health differentials between women and men. For example, womens
lower risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) prior to menopause often has been ascribed to the
cardio protective effects of endogenous estrogens (a sex difference), but at the same time, the
male/ female differential in heart disease also may reflect a diagnostic artifact; that is, the under
detection of heart disease among women caused by an unconscious bias among physicians to
ascribe the symptoms of a real heart attack among premenopausal women to some other disorder
(a gender difference).
Besides the behavior of health care providers, a number of other social processes are recognized
as contributing to gender inequalities in health.
Second thoughts:
After reading the report on sex and gender, I learned a lot of information on how gender and sex
intersect when it comes to health problems people get. Even though sex is the biological trait
individuals are born with and gender is a socially constructed concept created by people, they
both play a key role in health problems. Since there are so many inequalities in gender that still
exist it puts people in positions to be at risk for different health problems.
Citation:
Institute of Medicine (US) Committee on Assessing Interactions Among Social, Behavioral, and
Genetic Factors in Health; Hernandez LM, Blazer DG, editors. Genes, Behavior, and the

Social Environment: Moving Beyond the Nature/Nurture Debate. Washington (DC):

National Academies Press (US); 2006.
______________________________________________________________________________
Source: Social Constructs
First thoughts:
This article explains exactly what it means to have something be socially constructed. Then it
goes into explaining just how gender has been socially constructed and how it continues to
change as time goes on. There are a lot of elements that are included on how gender is socially
constructed from the way girls and boys speak to their manners.
Notes:
Gender, which represents ways of talking, describing, or perceiving men and women, is also a
socially constructed entity.
Generally distinguished from sex (which is biological), notions of gender represent attempts by
society, through the socialization process, to construct masculine or feminine identities and
corresponding masculine or feminine gender roles for a child based on physical appearance and
genitalia.
However, Ian Hacking (1999) believes that there are few if any universal constructionists, in
which case few people would argue that the sun or DNA are socially constructed, existing
entirely independently of that construction
Second thoughts:
After reading this article, I found out that there were two sides of the argument to social
construction. Though people do believe that gender was socially constructed, they believe that
there is a chance that everything was socially constructed from DNA and the sun. If this were to
be true, then everything would be independently existing on the fact that they were constructed.
Citation:
"Social Constructs." International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences. 2008. Encyclopedia.com.
Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Source: Feminist Perspective on Sex and Gender
First thoughts:
This article gives the perspective of a feminist on the view of sex and gender. Feminist are
people trying to end the oppression of women and create equality for women and men. The term

woman was originally referred to for someone's sex but it soon was socially constructed to fit
that gender role as well which is the problem. Sex is the biological characteristics of a person
while gender are the roles assigned to the specific sex. Feminist believe that physiological and
behavioral differences are socially constructed rather than for biological reasons.
Notes:
More recently, differences in male and female brains have been said to explain behavioral
differences; in particular, the anatomy of corpus callosum, a bundle of nerves that connects
the right and left cerebral hemispheres, is thought to be responsible for various psychological
and behavioral differences.

So, this group of feminist arguments against biological determinism suggested that gender
differences result from cultural practices and social expectations. Nowadays it is more
common to denote this by saying that gender is socially constructed.
One way to interpret Beauvoir's claim that one is not born but rather becomes a woman is to
take it as a claim about gender socialization: females become women through a process
whereby they acquire feminine traits and learn feminine behavior. Masculinity and
femininity are thought to be products of nurture or how individuals are brought up.
Commonly observed behavioral traits associated with women and men, then, are not caused
by anatomy or chromosomes. Rather, they are culturally learned or acquired.
Second thoughts:
After reading this article, I was able to retain another perspective on the difference on gender and
sex. Feminist believe that the physiological and behavioral traits and problems individuals
acquire are due to gender and socially constructed concepts rather than biological and genes.
Citation:
Mikkola, Mari. "Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender." Stanford University. Stanford
University, 12 May 2008. Web. 16 Feb. 2016.
Source: Anthropology, Sex, Gender, Sexuality: Gender is a Social Construction
First thoughts:
This anthropology professor makes it very clear on what it socially constructed gender does NOT
mean. every article talks about what it is, but this is the perspective of exactly what it's not. He
also explains the difference between sex, gender and sexuality. He goes into depth about different
perspectives from different societies on the socially constructed gender roles.
Notes:

Social scientists introduced the term gender as a way of talking about all those expectations and
beliefs we load onto people with certain physical characteristics.
And we could do a tour through history and different cultures to find out how very different
those expectations and beliefs can be, which is why we say they are socially constructed.
When social scientists use shorthand phrases like gender is a social construction they are
1. in no way denying that humans vary biologically in many different ways, or
claiming that biology is irrelevant;
2. not trying to say that these social effects are somehow not real or important; and
3. not saying that they are necessarily subject to extensive individual manipulation.
Those shorthands simply indicate that many observed behavioral characteristics and life
experiences are heavily influenced by social expectations, norms, and roles.
Second thoughts:
After examining this blog post, it made it very clear that there are very distinguishing features
between gender, sex and sexuality but they are all important. Even though sex is the biological
aspect of an individual and gender is socially constructed, gender roles would not be understood
without sex. There are specific features that come with the sex of an individual that contribute
with a specific gender including activities assigned to specific people.
Citation:
Antrosio, Jason. "Anthropology, Sex, Gender, Sexuality: Gender Is a Social Construction." Web
log post. N.p., Aug. 2015. Web. 14 Feb. 2016.
______________________________________________________________________________
Source: Gender as a Social Structure: Theory Wrestling with Activism
First thoughts:
In this article the author is trying to portray the just how much gender is socially constructed.
Once this concept is understood it will become easier to comprehend how individuals are
socialized, interact and institutionalized in our society. Paying attention to how discrimination
plays a key role in how gender roles were created and change is a very important concept as
well.
Notes:
Also a reaction to the individualist thinking of the first, emphasizes social interaction and
accountability to others' expectations, with a focus on how "doing gender" creates and
reproduces inequality.

The word "institution" is too commonly used to refer to particular aspects of society, for
example, the family as an institution or corporations as institutions. My notion of gender
structure meets the criteria offered by Martin (forthcoming) as well. While the language we use
may differ, our goals are complementary, as we seek to situate gender as embedded not only in
individuals but throughout social life .
Smelser (1988) suggested that all structuralists share the presumption that social structures exist
outside individual desires or motives and that social structures at least partially explain human
action. Beyond that, consensus dissipates.
Generic structural theories applied to gender presume that if women and men were to
experience identical structural conditions and role expectations, empirically observable gender
differences would disappear. But this ignores not only internalized gender at the individual level
(which indeed purely structural theorists deny exists) but the cultural interactional expectations
that remain attached to women and men because of their gender category
Second thoughts:
After reading this article, the author clearly explains how social construction of gender has
institutionalized individuals into society and their culture. If we were able to to allow women and
men to have the same role expectations then gender would no longer exist. This is impossible
due to the many years of socialization and internalized gender roles learned from when you are
born. Some people see individual desires and motives are created from outside sources that are
internalized and become part of your personality which end up correlating with the gender you
were assigned to by your sex.
Citation:
Risman, Barbara J. Gender As A Social Structure: Theory Wrestling With Activism. North
Carolina University. Sage Publications, Inc., 2004.