Talk:Social construction of gender

OR dispute

There is no original research in this article. Could you please clarify what you mean by "original research?" — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ecdjes (talk • contribs) 04:20, 7 December 2010 (UTC) [sic]

Here's an example: Gender identity is not a stable, fixed trait - rather, it is socially constructed and may vary over time for an individual. This is a topic sentence, with no attribution even contextually, and no source. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.171.223.35 (talk) 12:36, 28 August 2015 (UTC)

There is only original research in this article - it was posted by graduate students in social psychology and we only posted "original research" (Ecdjes (talk) 04:20, 7 December 2010 (UTC)).

You should look at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research 88.114.154.216 (talk) 15:10, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

You say there is no original research and also there is only original research. Which is it? Iguessiknowsomestuff (talk) 02:43, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

NPOV Dispute

Without any statement on the content of the article's actual veracity, I think this article leans heavily towards presenting fairly contentious opinions as facts. That is not to say they are not true, rather that there is a substantial enough body that disputes these statements that they should not be presented without consideration of that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.99.104.180 (talk) 03:16, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree. The problem is that the article is written as to imply that the some opinions expressed by some very controversial philosophers and other researchers are true. For example instead of saying "according to x this and this is so", it says "this and this is so", then refers to an opinion piece... In addition the languages is really bad at places and the use of sources in general does not meet Wikipedia quality citeria. 88.114.154.216 (talk) 15:17, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

Well put-- and in the four years since these complaints, nobody has bothered to add any of the critiques of the theory. I'm sorry, but at the moment this is virtually a press release for a theory. Profhum (talk) 18:06, 23 August 2016 (UTC)

@76.99.104.180, 88.114.154.216, and Profhum: Any editor may add pertinent and sourced material to present another side, if they deem it necessary. Personally, I find the views of someone like, say, Leonard Sax misguided, but as his views are currently not represented in the article and as he has several books out on the topic, it would be appropriate to include some of these views, and source them to him (or to others espousing that view).

In the meantime, I agree that the article is too POV at the moment, so I have restored the {{POV}} banner (within a {{multiple issues}} template}} which was removed in rev 727167655 by Absterr08. See #Multiple issues banner removed, below. Mathglot (talk) 01:55, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Well, 10 years later the NPOV issue has only become larger. This is aggravated by the many editors who edit here as part of a class assignment. They do not dare disagree with the views held as doctrine on many campuses. How many even realize that there are alternative views? Somebody who is knowledgeable about serious literature on this subject, please create a paragraph on alternative views. The present state of this article is not an example of Wikipedia at its best. Pete unseth (talk) 14:10, 31 March 2022 (UTC)

Please point to some alternative views or people who hold alternative views, so that those views can be added and this POV issue can be resolved. ParticipantObserver (talk) 12:46, 1 April 2022 (UTC)

In alignment with the suggestion above, I added an expert help template to the article, with the hope that someone who is knowledgeable about serious literature on this subject might create a paragraph on alternative views. ParticipantObserver (talk) 12:52, 1 April 2022 (UTC)

@ParticipantObserver: I removed it, mostly because it duplicates the NPOV tag that was already there. In addition, with regard to alternate views, one needs to couch any NPOV tag in terms of WP:NPOV policy regarding *this topic*, which is determined by its article title, which is: "Social construction of gender"—that is the only thing that NPOV policy governs here. In particular, this article does *not* need to be neutral about "theories of gender", because that is not the topic in this article.

What I think I am hearing above, is that some editors are unhappy that this article talks entirely about "Social construction of gender", and unfairly avoids talking about, for example, other theories of gender such as gender essentialism for example, which is a competing theory. But that is an invalid argument here with respect to NPOV. *This* article need only be neutral about theories of social construction of gender, and does not need to be neutral about theories of gender writ large, the way that the Gender article would have to be. This article can certainly mention essentialism, and does (four times; mostly in the "criticism" section, as is perfectly appropriate) but there is no need to discuss other theories of gender at this article, and in fact, that would be WP:UNDUE and WP:FALSEBALANCE here, due to the name of this article and what the topic is.

This is similar to any other article about a theory, that by definition, talks mostly about that theory, regardless of competing theories or whether the theory is right or wrong or pseudoscientific or fantastical. The article Flat Earth talks mostly about the flat earth theory; the Steady-state theory article talks mostly about Einstein's discredited theory of cosmological origin; Lamarckism talks almost entirely about the discredited theory of genetics. There is no need to alter these articles, so that, for example, half of the Flat earth article talks about a spherical earth, or that half of Steady-state theory talks about the Big bang theory; or that half of Lamarckism talks about DNA and the standard genetics model. *That* would be non-neutral, and a hijacking of the topic of those articles.

Likewise, the great majority of *this* article must talk about "social construction of gender", regardless if it is true or false, regardless if it is a majority view, and regardless if other, competing theories exist or are held by the great majority of researchers in the field, because that is what WP:Article title policy and WP:NPOV policy (in the form of WP:DUEWEIGHT) require for this topic. To the extent that this article does not fairly or neutrally represent the majority view about "social construction of gender", the NPOV tag may remain (but that is far from clear at this point). Where it *may* be non-neutral, is with respect to the small fraction of population considered (see discussion section #Globalize below).

Perhaps editors are thinking more about the "Gender" article, which must be neutral with respect to its topic, and at that article, theories of social construction, essentialist theories, and other theories about gender should all be covered, in due proportion to their prevalence among independent, secondary sources in the field. But not here.

At this point, I'd be inclined to remove the NPOV tags, because I'm not sure anyone has indicated what it is that is non-neutral about it. I think there is a lot of muddy writing that could stand to be improved, and the article should probably be expanded to include other views about social construction of gender as well, but that is a copyediting or expansion issue, and not an NPOV issue. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 18:33, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Sounds right to me, thanks! I also am unclear on what people think is non-neutral here. I have now removed the NPOV tag from the article. If someone at some point indicates what the alternative views are, then we can always discuss whether there is a NPOV issue. Thanks again for weighing in! ParticipantObserver (talk) 11:37, 10 November 2022 (UTC)

Non-neutrality

The author of article attributes merit to certain theories in a such a way that encourages bias. IE: "Stronger versions argue that the differences in behavior between men and women are entirely social conventions, whereas weaker versions believe that behavior is defined by biological universal factors to some extent, but that social conventions also have some effect on gendered behavior. Other theories even claim that there are more genders than just the two most commonly accepted (male and female)." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.137.198.128 (talk) 21:01, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

This Page is a Mess

This page is full claims of facts that are not only unsourced but at times appear to be non-sequiturs. Many of the claims have been sitting for months with a "citation needed" and they are still there un-cited. Soul Cream (talk) 19:43, 6 October 2013 (UTC)

Why don't you try to bring some positive energy to this article instead of misspelling 'unsourced' and bringing negative energy into this talk page? 24.239.124.140 (talk) 04:34, 14 April 2014 (UTC)

If I get the time, I'll start work on it, but this is a big job. This article is the result of a subculture attempting its bias (i.e. that gender is purely a social construct) as truth, and this is evident throughout the entire article. It article is packed full of unsubstantiated claims, dodgy sources, and more. In its 'Basic concepts' section, it makes no effort whatsoever in describing alternative points of view. The article almost entirely fails to acknowledge the fact that the theory upon which it is written has not received sufficient acceptance to be considered ipso facto valid. If I'm honest, the abundance of Harvard referencing, and the frequently poor writing style smacks of some kind of high school attempt at re-writing the history of gender in psychological science. Thatguykalem (talk) 14:50, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

Like I stated here, while gender is widely accepted as a social construct, such as by the World Health Organization (WHO) (seen here), Thatguykalem is correct that the alternative point of view should feature more than it currently does in that article. Flyer22 (talk) 19:56, 27 June 2014 (UTC)

This is a very important detail that the Wiki community needs to understand at large. Just because a suitably presitgious authority has determined that they ascribe to a particular belief, that does not mean that the belief is to be viewed as fact. The important feature here that you and other like you miss, is that social constructionism is a lens through which the world and the actions of the people in it is interpreted. Is by no means the place of Wikipedia or any of its community members to assert in documentation that one methodology of interpretation is "fact" not only does that miss the definition totally miss the meanings of the words "fact" and "methodology"; it also leaves open the far more sinister opportunity for the assertion that "all conclusions drawn from this methodology are fact". It is precisely this very dogmatic and ornery kind of conjecture that defines ideology. It is precisely what has turned this article into the absolute dumpster fire of disorganization and standards violation that it is, and Wikipedia at large has no place for that kind of thinking (or rather lack thereof). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Azeranth (talk • contribs) 19:34, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Absolutely.

To be franc, the only fact that the WHO is being mentioned as an authority on the reform of language, speech and though is at best laughable, at worst, sinister (as we have seen before on other changes of definitions they have adopted to ensure the consistency of their recommendation with the definition of the situation thay those recommendations referred to)...

If gender was a social construct, why parents, doctors and all the cohort of supporters of the transition of children base their decisions so promptly on the claim by children clearly too young to have any social representation and personal experience of it, to belong to the opposite sex? (sounds binary eh!)...

What else will be said to be a social construct?

Health?

How will that work for children bien with diabetes or leukemia?

Come back to Earth people... This ain't rational... 92.40.216.240 (talk) 08:01, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Agree with above, its a mess and trying to sell the idea of social origins of gender as more settled than it actually is. Notice the WHO link above doesn't support that argument. Also the quote in the article "Therefore, when transgender individuals want to have a sex change operation, they must prove that they can "pass" as a man or woman – so even the choice of changing one's gender is socially constructed." This is just outright wrong and offensive. This may have been the case in the 1970's or prior. That's far from the truth now. That's just one of many examples. Personally, the Gender identity and sexuality/sexual orientation section of the article doesn't even look salvageable to me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.77.35.49 (talk) 18:19, 2 July 2017 (UTC)

Sex and Sex Category

For Khling151:
Content-wise, the information seems to be fine!! Most of the edits that need to be made are grammatical, such as removing comma splicing, verb agreement, and introducing definitions more smoothly. Some suggestions:

Add a colon after Doing Gender (West...Doing Gender:(colon) "Quote here")

Comma splice in "She claims that there is at the minimum five sexes but probably more, this is based off the vast range of ways bodies show up in nature."

("West and Zimmerman also give a good definition for 'Sex category is achieved through...'" does not really make sense as a sentence. What do they give a definition for?).

Mnrszk (talk) 22:25, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments. I am fixing the things you pointed out. Khling151 (talk) 03:39, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Education

For JonJuno:
I think it's pretty good!
There's one part where the same word is repeated twice which hadn't been caught in your editing process:

"three three third grade teachers" (I don't think you were the one who added this in here though)

It also might be helpful to organize this section even further into a couple paragraphs instead of one big paragraph, for accessibility.
Mnrszk (talk) 22:36, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the comment! I agree and have thusly reorganized the paragraph into multiple paragraphs. (embarrassingly that was me...)
JonJuno (talk) 02:08, 25 June 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions for Research Methods

Great work. I feel as if the two sentences

"The gender dichotomy is so engrained that it is impossible for research findings to remain unaffected by it. People are so convinced that there are inherent differences between men and women, which skews both studies and their findings."

could be more supported with concrete examples or facts. For example, the statement that it is "impossible for research findings to remain unaffected" is a sweeping generalization. Also, saying that "people are so convinced" is quite informal. It could be more precise if reworded as "Many people are convinced"

Also, the last two paragraphs would greatly benefit from adding at least one example of the claims being made. Two statements I have in mind are:

"poorly-constructed qualitative research can lead to reproduction of race and class biases"

and

"quantitative research can reinforce gender and cultural assumptions"

If an example of one or both of these statements is added, it would be very nice. Shteveno (talk) 23:54, 24 June 2016 (UTC)

---

Thanks for the feedback! I changed the wording to be more formal, and I elaborated on the flaws of quantitative and qualitative research.

Absterr08 (talk) 04:03, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

I think this is an important example of distinguishing between commentary by third parties, and facts (oh the irony). There is no need to hunt down support for the claim, just remove them. An assertion like the one given only belongs in commentary, which is properly quoted to demonstrate the distinction between claims, commentary, and research (and research methodology)Azeranth (talk) 19:40, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

The whole section "Research methods" is barely related to the main subject of the article. It strikes me as something created by college students who were required to make some edits for a college course. I would remove the entire section, but will let other editors consider this. Maybe some will see more redeeming value in this section than I. Pete unseth (talk) 17:13, 22 March 2023 (UTC)

Social Change Suggestions

Great edits! One thing that could be revised are the second, third, and fourth sentences of this section:

The performance of gender reinforces the essentialism of gender categories.[9][52] When an individual performs their gender to the standards set by societal norms, this bolsters the argument of gender essentialism.[53] Essentialism argues that there are essential differences between genders which manifest themselves in differences in gender performance.

The term essentialism is mentioned in the first two sentences and explained in the last one. Perhaps the term can be explained immediately after it is introduced in order to avoid confusion.

Also, it would be nice to briefly introduce (and possibly discuss) the second and third waves of feminism in the end of this section. It will also be nice to link their wikipedia pages if you do decide to include them. Shteveno (talk) 00:13, 25 June 2016 (UTC)

---

Thanks for the suggestions! I rearranged the content of the first paragraph so that it reads more clearly and added links to second and third wave feminism. Ktmacp (talk) 05:50, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

"Applications of Gender Performance" suggestions

Impressive contribution! I think a few areas might benefit from a second look:

The intro is currently a pretty big paragraph, which can make reading challenging. It may make sense to remove some material: for instance, the first few sentences after "Butler’s text has become quite influential..." mostly summarize and analyze Butler's text, which has its own wikipedia page. Linking to the page instead and focusing on how Gender Performativity relates to gender performance and real-world applications could make it more accessible.

I also think the two subsections could use some additional sources and more neutral language. For example, in "Infancy and Young Childhood":

"From the moment we are conceived, some argue even before that, who we are and who we will become is predetermined. We are either given masculine or feminine names based on our sex; we are assigned colors that are deemed appropriate only when utilized by a particular sex; and, we are even given toys that will aid us in recognizing our proper places in society."

Right now those statements aren't verifiable, and using "We are..." statements can come off as giving a generalization. Who says our identities are predetermined? Who is "we"? Adding some sources giving supporting evidence and using a 3rd person point of view would make the statements stronger.

Finally, in the "Teen Year" sections, two phrases popped out to me:

"As described previously..."

and

"mentioned previously"

If the information already appears in the section, does it need to be repeated? Cutting out repetitions could make the main points in the new info you added stand out more. Similarly, for:

"Penelope Eckert, linguistics professor at Stanford University, in her text titled Language and Gender..."

This information is included in the citation already, so removing it wouldn't hurt and could improve readability. Kmt0715 (talk) 06:57, 25 June 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestions. I attempted to minimize the intro paragraph that describes the definition and basic concept of Gender Performativity. I also agreed that the subsections needed a little work, so I took most of your advice and tried to apply it. Again, thank you for the suggestions! Cal95j (talk) 04:08, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Multiple issues banner removed

A {{Multiple issues}} banner containing {{POV check}}, {{citation style}}, and {{Original research}} advisories from 2012 were removed in this edit without edit summary or discussion. It's true they shouldn't stay up forever, but is everyone okay with this? Mathglot (talk) 08:15, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

I've restored the {{POV}} banner, as it was removed without explanation, and since it satisfies the reasons for inclusion as the POV issues remain, at least in the view of some, and since there is a Talk page section for it. See #NPOV_Dispute, above. Mathglot (talk) 02:01, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Globalize

Much of content of the article refers to a small sliver of the world's population, namely the upper-middle and upper classes, mostly white, living in the richest and most developed countries in the world, primarily the Anglo-Saxon ones. Many statements make generalizations that really refer only or mostly to that very limited sector, and should be qualified with restrictive clauses which make that clear. More importantly, additional material should be added to give a more global view of the topic. Mathglot (talk) 02:14, 28 June 2016 (UTC)

Another bit of adaptation to a global audience "a study of students grade 1-3 by Fennema et al." presumably grade is used in the US sense. Would it be better to indicate the typical ages that correspond to those grades? Billlion (talk)

Copyedit: Grammar Corrections, sentence structure, etc.

Gender Identity & Sexuality/Sexual Orientation I feel as if the second paragraph under this subtopic is not of great use to the content of the article itself. It seems to be of a narrative tone and the article would not lose any clarification or validity if this section was deleted.

Core Gender Identity Sentences five and six could easily be conjoined as one by changing to "LaFrance, Paluck and Brescoll note that as a term, "gender identity" allows individuals to express their attitude towards and stance in relation to their current status as either men or women." By combining these two sentences, I feel the point is better covered and easier to understand for the reader.

Intersections of Gender Identity With Other Identities Second paragraph, Second sentence needs to be corrected to "Hurtado argues that white women and women of color..." There is also an issue with the second to last sentence... "sexual objects and as wikt:recalcitrant and wikt:bawdy women" I am unsure of what these terms are suppose to be.

Gender As Accomplishment The first sentence of the section needs a citation from West and Zimmerman as the statement is made according to them

Accountability In the sentence beginning with "social constructionism asserts that gender... the word "is" in "is omnirelevant" should be changed to "as"

In the second paragraph in this section, the reference to machisimo should be hyperlinked to its own wiki page

In the last paragraph of this section, "women and women" needs to changed to "men and women" & the last sentence can be deleted as it has no significance to the section.

5.3 Nurture v. Nature I would like to switch the wording to nature v. nurture as that is how the topic is referenced to commonly.

These are small edits and issues I came across while scanning the article. Would enjoy getting feedback from others to gain their opinions on my ideas for corrections. Thanks Student1543 (talk) 16:42, 11 September 2016 (UTC)

Hello @Student1543:. Looks like you are working on the 9/13 class assignment for Week 4 of your course, am I right? Welcome. I have no special authority here, I'm just an editor here, like you, maybe with a little more experience, so you can take my suggestions for what they're worth, and seek other feedback. I'll respond point-by-point, using initialisms to refer back to your sections (e.g., GI&SSO for Gender Identity & Sexuality/Sexual Orientation). Also, please learn about Section linking, which helps others if you use hyperlinks direct to the section(s) you are talking about. I've used them below, as an example. Note: if any of my suggestions are beyond the scope of your class assignments, feel free to ignore them. These are suggestions, not assignments.

1. GI&SSO - I see your point, kind of, if by 'narrative' you mean the example cited about one woman's identity. But I think the lead sentence of the second paragraph states the intent of that paragraph to address the topic of essentialism as a follow-up of the first paragraph, which introduces the concept. I kind of agree with you that the example may not be the best, but that doesn't mean the 2nd paragraph should be deleted, unless you feel that there's no call for a discussion of essentialism in the article at all, or not in that much detail as to require a second paragraph, but I wouldn't agree with you on that point. So, unless you want to make an argument for that, why not see if you can find a better way in paragraph two to provide support for what you find in paragraph one.

2. CGI - Sure, sounds good; go for it. Since you're doing a class, it's wise to ask for feedback like you're doing before making the chnage, but in the future when you are more experienced, you could simply go ahead and make a change like this on your own without asking, following the generally accepted editing guideline called Be bold. When you do make a change—any change—to an article, make sure you add a helpful edit summary explaining your change.

(Just fyi, referring to sentences by number can become problematic, because other editors may change the content in such a way that the numbers become meaningless. Where possible, refer to content, as you did in this example. You can use italics or Template {{Quote}} if you want, to set it off from your text.

3. IoGIwOI -

• woman/women: yes, go for it.
• wikt:recalcitrant etc: This is an Interwiki link to a word definition in Wiktionary. You may or may not know that Wikimedia Foundation has other project families like Wiktionary, Wikiquote, and Wikisource of which Wikipedia is just one. Wiktionary is the Wiki dictionary, and wikt:recalcitrant is a wikilink that goes to the Wiktionary definition article for the word recalcitrant. I'm not 100% sure, but I think its presentation is improper, as the colon-prefix wikt: is not supposed to be visible; so rather than code it [[wikt:recalcitrant]] it should be coded [[wikt:recalcitrant|recalcitrant]] using a piped link, or even [[wikt:recalcitrant|]] using the pipe trick. This is a bit advanced for where you are now, so I'd just leave this for now, but I would definitely go have a look at the other Wikimedia properties, because there's a lot of good stuff out there.

4. GaA - It may not need a citation, but a judgment call is involved. The first and second sentences both deal with W & Z, and the second sentence already has the W & Z reference. Since the sentences are closely aligned, in my judgement, it is not necessary to add the identical reference after the first sentence, per WP:INTEGRITY and WP:When to cite. By the way, Citing references is a core principle of Wikipedia, so please read Wikipedia:Citing sources if you haven't already, or Help:Referencing for beginners to start out with.

5 Acc -

• is/as omnirelevant : Go for it!. By the way, that minor typo is not the only problem here, much of this paragraph (and much of the article) smacks of jargon and needs a rewrite or clarification to make them understandable. So there are bigger fish to fry here, than just this typo.
• machismo - Be bold!
• women and women (last paragraph) -> women and men: Be bold!

• And since you mention it, paragraph 2 also has the confusing construction "women and women", but in this case it is correct, though unclear. There are two clauses there, but the way the sentence is written, that is not clear. The sentence needs a comma, or better, a comma and a relative pronoun. I would change women and women" to "women, and that women".

• last sentence significance - I don't agree that you can just delete this sentence, it has something relevant to say about the topic of the page, and it is sourced. The problem with the sentence, is that it is lost at sea, having nothing to do with the surrounding material. See if you can find a better place for that sentence, somewhere else in the article, perhaps dealing with minority or intersectionality issues.

6. 5.3 NvN - Which goes first? This is kind of a minor issue; I suppose the main guideline here would be, "does the change improve the article?" To the extent that you can appeal to frequency of common usage which is about 12:1 in favor of your suggestion, it's probably a (minor) improvement.

Good luck in your class, and happy editing! Mathglot (talk) 21:18, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Oh, one other thing: note that section headings are in sentence case, not title case per MOS:SECTIONS, so only the first word is capitalized. So not Core Gender Identity as you have it above, but Core gender identity. Likewise with all your other bolded terms above. Mathglot (talk) 21:31, 12 September 2016 (UTC)

Edits being made

Thank you Mathglot for your opinions and contributions. 1. GI&SSO - I agree with your point on the use of the example as an example of essentialism, and therefore, I am going to leave the section as it is. 2. CGI - Decided to combine the two sentences 3. IoGIwOI-

• changing woman to women
• not altering the connection between wiktionary

4. GaA - I agree that a citation is not necessarily needed in this instance, and therefore I am not adding one here. 5. Acc -

• changing is / as and am considering digging deeper into this section for greater content corrections
• linking machismo
• changing women and women & am also going to use your suggestions to alter paragraph 2 as well
• I agree with your opinion on not deleting this last sentence due to its signifigance, but hope to find or create a section where it would be more relevant later on

6. NvN - Going to change to Nature v. Nurture Thanks for your suggestions Student1543 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:47, 14 September 2016 (UTC)

@Student1543: Looks good. In the expression "..created a Machismo masculinity..." I lower-cased "machismo".

Minor point concerning Talk page usage: Since your comments above (18:47 14 Sept.) are a follow-up comment to the thread at #Copyedit: Grammar Corrections, sentence structure, etc. above, you didn't need to create a new section "Edits being made" for your reply. New sections are generally for new topics; to reply to a thread about an existing topic, just edit the section, and add your comments indented one more level than the comments above, using the colon metacharacter. To learn more about this, see WP:INDENT.

To link to a user, use [[User:users name here]], for example: [[User:Mathglot]] renders as User:Mathglot, and [[User:Student1543]] renders as User:Student1543.

To page a user to come look at the Talk page you just edited, use {{ping}} like this: {{ping|users name here}}. The at-sign you see above is the result of a {{ping}} paging you. (You can page as many people as you want, in one ping.)

To automatically find out when somebody changes a page you are interested in, even if they don't ping you, put the page on your watchlist.

Don't forget to sign your Talk page entries with four tildes ( ~~~~ ). Three tildes will add your name, but omit the date. Mathglot (talk) 09:49, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Adding Information

Under section Infancy and young childhood I would like to add more information after the sentence ending with "are even toys that will aid them in recognizing their proper places in society." After this sentence I would like to add

According to Barbara Kerr and Karen Multon, many parents would be puzzled to know "the tendency of little children to think that it is their clothing or toys that make them boy or girl."

Student1543 (talk) 14:26, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

References

Deletion

Would anyone else agree upon the idea of deleting the last paragraph from Infancy and young childhood? I realize this paragraph does provide further explanation of the proposed idea of "gender performativity" but I do not see the need for the information. It is good information, but I just don't see it as pertinent information for this subtopic. Would anyone else agree? I don't want to remove the information if other's see a great need for it. Student1543 (talk) 17:44, 29 September 2016 (UTC)

Resources

Here are a few resources I have found that could be a great benefit to the content of this article 1. The Development of Gender Identity,Gender Roles, and Gender Relations in Gifted Students 2. From Pink Frilly Dresses to 'One of the Boys': A Social-Cognitive Analysis of Gender Identity Development and Gender Bias. 3. MASCULINITY, MALE DEVELOPMENT,GENDER, AND IDENTITY: MODERN AND POSTMODERN MEANINGS

• • Great information on gender roles and their influence on developing gender on page 407: Gender Role Strain Theory and Masculinity

4. Readings for Diversity and Social Justice

References

Addition To Page

I am proposing an addition to the page under Social construction of gender during development. I want to add a section under this to introduce the concept and the following subtopics.

• • I have also made updated changes to this contribution proposal

Gender features strongly in most societies and is a significant aspect of self-definition for most people. One way to analyze the social influences that affect the development of gender is through the perspective of the social cognitive theory. According to Kay Bussey, social cognitive theory describes “how gender conceptions are developed and transformed across the life span". The social cognitive theory views gender roles as socially constructed ideas that are obtained over one’s entire lifetime. These gender roles are “repeatedly reinforced through socialization". Hackman verifies that these gender roles are instilled in us from “the moment we are born". For the individual, gender construction starts with assignments to a sex category on the basis of biological genitalia at birth. Following this sexual assignment, parents begin to influence gender identity by dressing children in ways that clearly display this biological category. Therefore, biological sex becomes associated with a gender through naming, dress, and the use of other gender markers. Gender development continues to be affected by the outlooks of others, education institutions, parenting, media, etc. These variations of social interactions force individuals to “learn what is expected, see what is expected, act and react in expected ways, and thus simultaneously construct and maintain the gender order".

Student1543 (talk) 04:26, 13 October 2016 (UTC)

• That's really nice and all but appears to be just some guys opinion or summary of some possibly existing theory. It would be much nicer to have some real fact/evidence about how these things work also in my opinion. Like what research results leads this guy to think like this etc. 88.195.243.29 (talk) 09:27, 15 December 2016 (UTC)

References

Pertinent Quality Resources

Theorizing Sexuality and Gender in Development. By: Bergstrom-Borins, Adryan

MASCULINITY, MALE DEVELOPMENT,GENDER, AND IDENTITY: MODERN AND POSTMODERN MEANINGS (Phillips, Debby A.) Great information on gender roles and their influence on developing gender on page 407: Gender Role Strain Theory and Masculinity

The Development of Gender Identity,Gender Roles, and Gender Relations in Gifted Students Kerr, Barbara A. Multon, Karen D. 

The Influence of Parental Attitudes and Behaviors on Children's Attitudes Toward Gender and Household Labor in Early Adulthood. Cunningham, Mick

PARENTAL INFLUENCE ON CHILDREN'S SOCIALIZATION TO GENDER ROLES By: Witt, Susan D.

Gender-role Attitudes in Middle Childhood: In What Ways Do Parents Influence Their Children? Antill, John K., Cunningham, John D., Cotton, Sandra

Gender differences in adolescent sexual attitudes: The influence of individual and family factors. Werner-Wilson, Ronald Jay

Readings for Diversity and Social Justice 3rd Edition

Student1543 (talk) 14:31, 27 October 2016 (UTC)

References

Evaluation of Article for Class

This article needs to be more heavily sourced, with citations from sources that are neutral and reputable. Also, for example, in the section "Research Methods" there are many claims that need to be backed up by citations. Some of the claims in this section and others seem biased towards a particular position and need to be checked for their neutrality. Ashlyn SAshlyn s (talk) 05:14, 1 February 2017 (UTC)

W+Z views on essentialness

I removed the following sentence from section #Gender identity and sexuality/sexual orientation:

West and Zimmerman state that these individuals wanting to be one sex or the other speaks to the "'essentialness'" of our sexual natures as woman or as men".<ref name="West and Zimmerman"/>{{clarify|date=October 2012}}

for two reasons:

1. it uses a primary source, i.e. W+Z article itself, instead of amply available secondary sources to interpret what they meant
2. it is original research to make a claim about W+Z regarding "essentialness" of sex differences using half a quotation of something they did say, preceded by an editor's setup of an interpretation that is the precise opposite of what W+Z actually do say. This is like the poster boy of OR or SYNTH.

Note that a full quotation of W+Z from their article, unamplified by their OR analysis, would have been fine; but instead, they quoted half a sentence, and stuck on an interpretation that got it completely wrong. (Unless I'm the one that is completely wrong.)

In reality, W+Z say that contrary to the belief that gender differences are a set of traits that are an essential attribute of our sex, they are something that is "not natural, essential, or biological" but a result of our social interactions, which are then used to create both the sex categories and the gender categories and then makes the process appear to come from Nature or be rooted in biology. Rather, we perform or "do" gender in a manner which promotes assignment to one of the categories, under the watchful eyes and interpretation of others; that this is socially required, that we can go along with this, fight against it, but it's impossible to do nothing about it. (Imho, some agenders might disagree with the latter statement, but that's my OR, and W+Z didn't address that to my knowledge, so is entirely irrelevant here.)

I find it distressing that this misstatement of W+Z has been present since the article was created in 2010. Either that, or I've been wildly misinterpreting W+Z for ages, and if so, I'd better get on board with what they are really saying, pronto. If I'm not wrong, then we need to put something about "Doing Gender" into that section, and get it right, this time. Pinging EvergreenFir and Flyer22 Reborn for some feedback. Mathglot (talk) 09:44, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

P.S. Requested opinions from WikiProject Sociology as well. Mathglot (talk) 09:56, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

I support the edit you made on that. Do whatever you need to do to clean up the article. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 10:43, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Agreed, moving the analysis work to secondary sources is the right move. - - mathmitch7 ^{(talk/contribs)} 16:45, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

@Mathglot: I 100% agree with your interpretation of West and Zimmerman and your assertions regarding OR. It's unclear to me if the original editor meant to use "essentialness" in the sense W&Z did or if their trying to say there actually are essential sex/gender differences. If the latter, W&Z clearly don't support that. "Doing gender means creating differences between girls and boys and women and men, differences that are not natural, essential, or biological. Once the differences have been constructed, they are used to reinforce the "essentialness" of gender. ... What is at stake is, from the standpoint of interaction, the management of our "essential" natures, and from the standpoint of the individual, the continuing accomplishment of gender." (pp.137-140) In other words, the essentialness is a socially created and enforced difference. In sum, good edit and good catch. EvergreenFir (talk) 07:45, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

References

Peer Review

Overall the article is well written and contains a lot of great information on the topic but I was wondering what information did you add to this wiki page? Natasha Holloway (talk) 17:09, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Newer Information

I just made an addition on this page discussing more recent studies regarding sexual orientation and its relation to emerging gender identity in children. I plan on including more information along these lines as the world has changed somewhat in recent years regarding acceptance and representation of LGBT people, so this contribution is also meant to test the waters. I understand that there are many problems with this article overall, but it does seem necessary to keep the info within updated in order to best inform readers of Wikipedia. MolluskPal (talk) 17:22, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

I plan on adding a section to this article focusing on Judith Butler's theory of gender performance specifically in regards to how it relates to LGBT individuals. Before I finalize this addition, I have drafted out my idea on my sandbox which can be found here and you can review it to your own satisfaction. MolluskPal (talk) 03:21, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

I added three new sources to the article with regard to a new subheading under applications of gender performance, they are numbered 44, 45, and 46 in references MolluskPal (talk) 13:37, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

The new subheading I have created is called Queer Identity, and it covers specific examples of Judith Butler's theory as applied to the LGBTQ+ community, as well as a concept in queer art that speaks to a similar concept as Butler MolluskPal (talk) 13:48, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

Addition

I made an addition to the page under the Teen Years subheading on how the internet influences gender identity in teenagers and how they perceive themselves. I plan on possibly expanding on the gender construction of teenagers a little bit more, I might possibly add a subheading titled "Media Influence" as there is little talk about the media in general and it could be somewhat parallel to the "Education" subheading. Any feedback on how I can improve this would be helpful. ([User talk: Ckfs27 |talk]) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ckfs27 (talk • contribs) 21:36, 26 September 2018 (UTC)

Edits were made to fix the sentences I had added and fix clarity. ([User talk: Ckfs27 |talk]) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ckfs27 (talk • contribs) 20:55, 10 October 2018 (UTC)

I added a sub heading titled Media under the During Development. With how prevalent media is today in the lives of young people, I felt it was necessary to add a portion on how it can and does affect a developing child/teenagers gender construction. (Ckfs27) —Preceding undated comment added 07:11, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

Hello, I edited the subheading that I previously added titled "Media". to give some more detail, it is briefly about how the media affects the social construction of gender in the youth. The section talked about media as a general topic and did not focus on one platform on media as a whole. I also made sure to edit the article so that it flowed more smoothly and complied with Wiki guidelines. Please feel free to add to this section and give any suggestions on what could be added to improve the article. Thank you. Here is my sandbox for references User:Ckfs27/sandbox Ckfs27 (talk) 04:36, 23 October 2018 (UTC)

In the interest of consolidation and in clarity, it may be preferable to designate an entire heading regarding development and formation, and within that can be subheadings regarding biological, social, evolutionary, and media influences on the matter. Azeranth (talk) 19:17, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

April 2020 Rewrite Undertaking

I am setting out to rewrite the page, which appears to be a cobbled together and poorly transcribed essay written for a college class. Major objectives and methods include:

• Clarification, demonstration, and stipulation of terminology which is used in a way that deviates from their colloquial meaning. Examples: "status" and "arbitrary power"
• Enumeration of relevant facts WITHOUT conflation of fact, statistic, or study with the commentary of experts no matter degree of apparent credibility.
• Description of expert commentary, which does not affirm or deny the opinions expressed
• Consolidation of adjacent topic references, to be both more concise and clear. Ideally structured in a manner to keep terminology clear and consistent across topics.
• General removal or narrative, opinion, and bias which DOES NOT include providing the details of critiques, or in extrapolation on commentary for the purpose of placing it in context along side other commentary INCLUDING alongside critiques of said or similar commentary.

Thanks you for supporting and participating in what is hopefully a test run for writing and preserving informed and informative pages about modern philosophical and cultural topics. Azeranth (talk) 19:11, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Update First portion rewritten. Just clarifying that I've been over and rewritten most of the first section up to about the Gender Roles subheading. To see what was removed, consult the history. Also updated, added, and removed broken citations. There are a lot of them. If you have any questions about why, or how a section was rewritten please ask about it instead of just deleting swathes of work. Azeranth (talk) 19:20, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

While the old version did have problems and so I did not revert to it (original research, misquoting Steven Pinker), your changes have problems, too. It also contains possible original research, and some grammar issues, especially when discussing The Blank Slate. You also should not cite Wiktionary as a source (see WP:RS). You really should fix those problems if you want your edits to stick. And I strongly recommend reading WP:NOR and WP:RS before any more changes. Crossroads ^-talk- 03:23, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

So, I will gradually be going over the grammar and such but as far as wiktionary citing, I just couldn't decide which source for citing colloquial definition was more important or what standard practice there was. Also, on the NOR stuff, there are just some places where I need to reuse citations, example, first paragraph of the Gender subheading looks like OR without a citation, but there are actually to citations to be resued there one of which comes before and the other comes after.

Update Gender Identity section rewritten, I went through it, but I feel like I may have made it a little too dense. The original works were misquoted, poorly cited, and generally stripped of context. Hopefully with all the context present now, the relevant extricated details can be paired down by someone else who can just get a second set of eyes on it.

Also no, the end of that section does not qualify as Original Research, its not opinion it is a deliniation of facts concerning the nature of the source material whos prolific nature and broadly encompassing domain and components such as the sources it refers to are well established by an external credible source, being a journal which cataloged citation to the article and I double checked and multiple other journals agree on roughly the figure i've provided. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Azeranth (talk • contribs) 15:50, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm still seeing some grammar issues and some unsourced text. You should fix that, not expecting others to do it for you. Make sure you do read WP:NOR. And keep WP:Due in mind as well. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:10, 2 April 2020 (UTC)'

I will say, I've read over the NOR and verifiability. The specifics come down to the contention that people will hold over it. So while its nice for every paragraph to have a citation, if a citation doesn't exist it doesn't matter unless there is some claim or quote which might be considered contentious. So reiterating a claim, or contextualizing a claim is not OR and doesn't require a specific quote it only requires the reasonable presumption that it has been supported by evidence on appropriate scale not explicitly by a specific source. Azeranth (talk) 15:17, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

Your opinions here are not correct. WP:V states, Even if you're sure something is true, it must be verifiable before you can add it. Also, "contextualizing" a claim is OR, namely WP:Synthesis. Follow these closely or someone will revert you. That's just how it works here. Crossroads ^-talk- 03:52, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

Original research

There is a lot of original research in this article, which represents the unsupported opinions of editors based on their own reading of primary sources. I've started by tagging section #Applications of gender performance, in which most of the section is drawn from original interpretation of Judith Butler's Gender Trouble, but extends well beyond that.

This has gone on long enough. There are discussions going back a decade about this. I'm going to start removing content which is not sourced, beginning with this section, and then continuing on to other sections. Mathglot (talk) 20:58, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

So, I did some poking around, and much of the work in the #Applications of gender performance section was added by a student editor in June 2016, who appears to have been enrolled in an unidentified Wiki Education-related class, and then in 2018 by two editors from a U. of Louisville Gender studies course. This includes:

• revision 726442836 of 06:00, June 22, 2016 by Cal95j (talk · contribs) (last edit in 2016)
• revision 865240675 of 17:22, October 22, 2018 by MolluskPal (talk · contribs) (last: 2018)
• revision 863450338 of 20:54, October 10, 2018 by Ckfs27 (talk · contribs) (last: 2018)

Significant additional information in this section (Teen years; last paragraph of Infancy; last two paragraphs of Applications) was added in:

• revision 729795163 of 16:16, July 14, 2016 by Klbrain (talk · contribs) (active)

some of which cites acceptable secondary sources (Eckert-2013, Lloyd-1999, Diprose-1994, Nussbaum-1999), while nine citations are to Butler primary sources. Klbrain, not sure if you still have an interest in this article, but if you can find secondary sources for the stuff you added, that would be helpful. If you need time, I can just tag it and leave it in for now, but most of the remainder of the section written by the students will probably be removed, because their contributions are 100% original research, and there's no way to reach them to ask them to add citations, as they are long gone since their courses ended. Mathglot (talk) 00:49, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Good sleuthing. I support nuking the student edited stuff. So many of these classes don't get them writing in Wikipedia-style correctly. Crossroads ^-talk- 04:35, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Giving credit to Klbrain where due: I believe (but have not confirmed) that the content added by Klbrain in July 2016, very likely is due to the merger from Gender performativity decided above at this discussion, and to that extent, any failure to provide sources are not on Klbrain, but on the original authors of the content at Gender performativity that was merged here. I'll just add my thanks now to Klbrain for his work on the merger, and am interested in his feedback on the current discussion. Mathglot (talk) 05:31, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, confirming that my 2016 edit was a merge; see the edit summary for 729795163, which says Merge in from Gender performativity following November 2012 proposal; see Talk:Social construction of gender difference#The problems on this page could be resolved with a merger). I have no objections to material being deleted from the current page on the grounds of POV. Klbrain (talk) 13:47, 17 June 2021 (UTC)

This article is extremely US-centric

The vast majority of what's described in this article is theorised, researched and going on exclusively on the territory of the USA (especially in academic circles). Then it's spread to the first-world Anglosphere countries, then to other western countries. After that, it's almost impossible to find it in other countries, where people still believe that gender is a biological construct and not a social one (try to convince someone from the Balkans that gender is a social construct, you'll be laughed at). Maybe that can be noted in the article? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.73.175.116 (talk) 22:33, 2 July 2021 (UTC)

Yes, and duplicates the discussion at #Globalize above. Mathglot (talk) 19:00, 9 November 2022 (UTC)

Last para of intro. Remove? Or replace with disambiguation.

This paragraph near the top is A) redundant B) not supported C) very convoluted therefore unclear D) uses disputed terminology as if it were not

“A related matter in feminist theory is the relationship between the ascribed status of assigned sex (male or female) and their achieved status counterparts in gender (masculine and feminine).

To parse this out - “A Related matter in feminist theory”. Not sure what that means or how the differentiation of sex and gender and their interplay are specifically feminist questions. They are also topics in psychology and sociology. Many natural Scientists would also make the distinction between biological sex and human construction of gender, and see this as an interesting area of studies (as the number of neuroscientific studies indicates)… - “ the relationship between the ascribed status of assigned sex (male or female)” —- what is “the assigned status of sex”? Where does this term come from? and —— “assigned sex” this is HIGHLY contentious. Evolutionary biologists, obstetricians, midwives, most humans and feminists do not subscribe to the (concept? Theory?) that sex is “assigned at birth”. This is a very contentious POV slipped in here as if it were ordinary language.

(“Assigned sex” as a concept has a specific use in the case of babies with DSD (intersex conditions), especially before the era of sophisticated medical tests and scans. It refers to the ascribing of a sex class by a birthing professional at first observation of the baby based on external genitalia, which in DSD babies may appear either ambiguous or opposite sexed. Ie: DSDs are not always correctly observed at birth, leading to incorrect sexing of a DSD baby. This article is not about DSDs. Biological sex on the other hand can be established from the zygote onwards, in a scientifically verifiable way. - “and their achieved status counterparts in gender” very confusing and though it references back the term “achieved status” from earlier it is still overly academic and confusing

I would guess the writer is trying to both disambiguate biological sex from human gender constructs and suggest the reader look elsewhere for discussion of how the 2 concepts inter-relate??

. Reading the intro without the paragraph doesn’t seem to harm the article, but if disambiguation is needed then something like:

“This article refers to “gender” as a human social construct, distinct from the concept of sex as a biological term. The relationship between these concepts is subject to debate, see [relevant sex/gender articles here]” 209.237.80.84 (talk) 19:23, 3 December 2021 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: GWSS 1101 Introduction to Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 August 2022 and 21 December 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): JHolman43, ETWestacott, Kweekwa (article contribs). Peer reviewers: King1567, Hitomi1252, VenerableBird, Thesi043, Pgvez24.

— Assignment last updated by MNmagistra (talk) 19:53, 20 November 2022 (UTC)

We plan to add in a section called Workplace to discuss some attitudes toward gender in the workplace and how perceptions of gender can change based on occupation status. We also have additional information to add to the Gender roles, Sex and sex category, and Media sections. Under Gender roles, we are planning to add relevant info not about the U.S. Under Sex and sex category, we want to add info on a study done about perception of gender. Under Media, we want to add some info on the use of meme culture to reinforce gender roles. JHolman43 (talk) 23:07, 7 December 2022 (UTC)

OR Tag Removal

Thanks to the work of a lot of editors, especially @Mathglot, I don't see a whole lot of WP:OR in this article. I propose that the global tag be removed, and that editors with specific objections either bold-remove the offending text or apply the template at the section level. Because this is a culture war topic, I am not willing to make changed "above the fold" without establishing consensus here first. I'd rather not go through WP:RfC unless the community thinks it's warranted, but could we use the !vote (•support : •oppose) nomenclature to make everyone's points clear? Cheers, Last1in (talk) 21:54, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Lede (lead paragraph) Rewrite

The lede for this article is shaky. Overlapping edits over the last decade have removed bad info but the result is tough to read. It also has some odd syntheses of sources that don't seem to support the actual wording. As an example, the split between the specific sociological concept and the general usage is pretty clear in the body, but muddled in the lede. I would like to propose the following, collectively rip it apart, and come to consensus on a better version:

The social construction of gender is the set of perceptions within a particular society regarding the gender expression considered appropriate for a particular sex. Specifically, the sociological concept encompasses the cultural origins, mechanisms, and manifestations of both the perceptions and expectations around sex and gender. It stipulates that gender roles are an achieved status (in contrast to sex, which is an ascribed status) in a social environment that motivates conforming behaviour both implicitly and explicitly.[1].

(where [1]. is the cite and see-also currently in place)

Last1in (talk) 22:02, 10 July 2023 (UTC)

Much of content is not part of the topic "Social construction of gender"

The article currently contains a significant amount of material that is not really part of the topic of the article. For example, the section on "Depression" does not add anything to a reader's of this theory. One cause of this may have be that the article has been an assignment for many college students who are required to make additions to it. A problem has been stated above, that several parts of the article treat the title of the article as an established fact, rather than one of different theoretical approaches to gender. I think the article needs to be streamlined. Pete unseth (talk) 03:28, 27 December 2023 (UTC)

One possibility would be to move the "During development" section to Sociology of gender#Gender and socialization. Gmsrubin (talk) 13:53, 15 January 2024 (UTC)