Introduction to Gender Theories

1. GENDER THEORIES

2. SEX, GENDER AND SEXUALITY
• Sex: related to a person’s biological traits
(reproductive organs & physiognomy); i.e. male or
female.
• Gender: roles & behaviours acquired through the
process of socialisation; i.e. masculine or feminine.
• Sexuality: a person's sexual preference or orientation;
i.e. heterosexual (straight), homosexual (gay or
lesbian), bisexual or transsexual.

3. GENDER THEORIES
1. Sexuality & the act of creation (writing)
2. Acquiring Gender: LGBT (Queer) Theory
3. History of Feminism: - Feminist theorists
- Schools/ Waves of Feminism
- Post-feminism
- Cultural feminism
4. Gender representations & Stereotyping

4. VOYEURISM
• Erotic pleasures acquired from looking at
sexual objects who are unaware of being
watched.
• Female characters
without any narrative
function.
• Peeping into people’s lives/ sexual encounters.
SEXUALITY & THE ACT OF CREATION

5. SCOPOPHILIA
SEXUALITY & THE ACT OF CREATION
The pleasure of watching something that is culturally forbidden or taboo.

6. OBJECTIFICATION
Related to the ‘gaze’: treated
as an object whose sole value
is to be enjoyed or posed by
the voyeur.
SEXUALITY & THE ACT OF CREATION

7. THE MALE GAZE
• Representation of
women as being
dominated by a male
point of view.
• Patriarchal society.
• Men have active roles
and women are passive.
SEXUALITY & THE ACT OF CREATION

8. • Advocating social political and all other
rights to woman as equal to men.
• An organised movement for the attainment
of rights for women.
• A voice against patriarchal doctrines.
FEMINISM

9. First Wave Feminism
• Late 19th century UK & USA.
• Equal property rights & opposition to ‘Chattel’
marriage.
• Political power and suffrage.
• 1918: Universal Suffrage in USA;
1928: UK.
• Anti-slavery (USA).

10. Second Wave
• “One is not born a woman but becomes one” Simone
de Beauvoir.
• 1960-80’s.
• Women should not aspire
to masculine ideals
• Focus on the social construction of Woman as the

11. The Feminine Mystique
(1963)
• New technologies made household less difficult.
• Women could only find fulfilment through childrearing
and homemaking.
• Women are victims of a false belief system that
requires them to find identity and meaning in their lives
through husbands and children.

12. Third Wave
• Early 1990s, arising as a response to
perceived failures of the second wave.
• 2nd wave over-emphasized the
experiences of upper middle-class white
women.
• Debates between earlier approaches
and those who believe that there are no
inherent differences between the sexes
and contend that gender roles are due

13. Post Feminism
• Feminism is no longer relevant to today's society.
• Views that separate the sexes rather than unite them
are sexist rather than feminist.
• Empowerment does not have to bow to traditional
feminist ideals.
• Adding the prefix post- to feminism undermines the
strides that feminism has made in achieving equality for
women.
• Post-feminism gives the impression that equality has

14. Other forms
• Black feminism argues that sexism, class
oppression, and racism are inextricably
bound together.
• Postcolonial feminists argue that oppression
relating to the colonial experience,
particularly racial, class, and ethnic
oppression, has marginalized women in

15. • Marxist feminism associates the
oppression of women to Marxist
ideas about exploitation, oppression
and labour.
• Radical feminism considers the male
controlled capitalist hierarchy, which
it describes as sexist, as the defining
feature of women’s oppression.
• Liberal feminism assert the equality
of men and women through political
Other forms

16. • Postmodern feminism incorporates postmodern and
post-structuralist theory.
• The argument that gender is constructed through
language.
Other forms