Lesson 1: Gender and Sexuality

Sex and sexuality are two very essential yet underrated parts of human life.

What is sex?

Whiles sex is often referred to as the act of reproduction, it is nonetheless, an important notion of how pop culture
sees sex. According to popular culture, sex is something done for pleasure, and perhaps in a more Freudian sense, it
is what drives people to do certain things.

Sex, in a biological sense, is a category for living beings specifically related to their reproduction function.

There are two sexes, the male and the female. The female sex is determined by; producing egg cells, which are
fertilized by another sex, and bears offspring. The male sex, on the other hand, produces sperm, cells to fertilize the
egg cells.

Chromosomes determines one’s sex. Chromosome XX equates to female, and XY equates to male.

Genitalia, or the organs used for reproduction, and Secondary Sex Characteristics are largely influenced by one’s x
and y chromosomes.

Hormones also play a large part in the definition of one’s sex. The exposure of hormones in the wombs affects how
the organism develops as a male or a female.

Both males and females have estrogen, testosterone, and progesterone but in varying amounts. Usually, males have
more amounts of testosterone, and females have more amounts of estrogen.

What is Gender?

It is a socially learned behavior usually associated with one’s sex. It is sort of gender relations between the sexes, or
how the male and female relate to one another.

Gender is a social construct that determines one’s roles, expected values, behavior, and interaction in relationships
involving man and woman.

Sex Gender
Physiological Social and Cultural
Related to Reproduction Learned Behavior
Congenial Changes Overtime

Does Sex Correspond to Gender?

Many scientists, psychologists, and sociologists believe that sex does not determine one’s gender. Femininity, or the
behavior that associates with females, may not actually be tied to a woman’s sex.

Similarly, masculinity is not tied to one’s gonads.

Gender Role Socialization is defined as the process of learning and internalizing culturally approved ways of thinking,
feeling, and behaving.
Lesson 2: Gender Stereotypes

Gender Stereotypes

- Develops when different institutions reinforce a biased perception of a certain gender’s roles.
- It is generalized view or perception about attributes or characteristics, or the roles that are or ought to be
possessed by, or performed by women and men.
- Are the beliefs that people have about the characteristics of males and females

Four Types of Gender Stereotypes:

1. Sex Stereotypes – are a generalized view of traits that should be possessed by men and women, specifically
physical and emotional roles.
2. Sexual Stereotypes – involves assumptions regarding a person’s sexuality that reinforce dominant views.
3. Sex-Role Stereotypes – encompass the roles that man and woman are assigned to base on their sex and
what behaviors they must possess to fulfill these roles
4. Compounded Stereotypes – are assumptions about the specific group belonging to a gender.

Agents of Socialization

Family Religion
Peer Groups Government
School Media
Workplace Ethnic Background

Representation of Men

Dominant Assertive
Strong Brave
Independent Innovative

Representation of Women

Emotional Vulnerable
Collaborative Caring
Nurturing Humble

Lesson 3: SOGIE and Gender Equality

SOGIE – Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression.

Sexuality is different from sex, as the former is the expression of a person’s thoughts, feelings, sexual orientation
and relationship, as well as the biology of the sexual response system of that person

Different means of SOGIE:

1. Sexual Orientation covers the three dimensions of sexuality namely:

a. Sexual attraction, sexual behavior, sexual fantasy
b. Emotional preference, social preference, self-identification
c. Heterosexual or homosexual lifestyle
2. Gender Identity – refers to one’s personal experience of gender or social relations.
3. Gender Expressions – determines how one expresses his or her sexuality through the actions or manner of
presenting oneself.
LGBTQIA – Lesbian, Gay, Transgender, Queer/Questioning, Intersex, Asexual.

Heteronormativity is defined as the notion that being heterosexual, or the attraction to the opposite sex, is the
standard for correctness.

Heterosexual, or straight, refers to people who have sexual and romantic feelings mostly for the opposite gender.

Homosexual describes people who have sexual and romantic feelings for the same gender.

Cisgender is someone whose gender identity corresponds with his or her biological sex.

Lesbian pertains to woman who are attracted to other woman.

Gay refers to man who are attracted to other men.

Bisexual or “bi” denotes people who are attracted to both genders.

Transgender is an umbrella term that refers to someone whose assigned sex at birth does not represent his or her
gender identity.

Why Equate Gender Issues with Women’s Issues?

Sexism is defined as the prejudice against a certain sex. Because we live in a patriarchal society, men are still seen as
dominant, leaders, and the “norm.”

Gender Equality is defined as the recognition of the state that all human beings are free to enjoy equal conditions
and fulfill their human potential, to contribute to the state and society.

Discriminatory Gender Roles can be institutionalized through laws and policies.

Gender – Fair Language

It is a language that avoids bias toward a particular sex or gender and therefore is less likely to convey stereotypes.

Language and Gender Relations

Language is a potent tool for how humans understand and participate in the world.

Thelma Kintanar and Angela Tongson, in their 2014 book “Gender-fair Language: A Primer,” focused on three aspects
of language that inform how gender is shaped-language articulates consciousness, reflects culture, and affects
socialization.

Violations of Gender-fair Language

Sexist language is a tool that reinforces unequal gender relations through sex-role stereotypes, microaggressions,
and sexual harassment. Language can be used to abuse, such as in the case of sexual harassment, or to perpetuate
stereotypes.

Invisibilization of Women

The invisibilization of women is rooted in the assumption that men are dominant and are the norm of the fullness of
humanity, and women do not exist. Some obvious examples of women invisibilization in language are:

- The generic use of masculine pronouns or the use of a masculine general.

- The assumption that certain functions or jobs are performed by men instead of both genders.
- The use of male job titles or terms ending in man to refer to functions that may be given to both genders.
Trivialization of Women

- Bringing attention to the gender of a person, if that person is a woman.

- The perception of women as immature.
- The objectification, or likening to objects, of women.

Fostering Unequal Gender Relations

Language that lacks parallelism fosters unequal gender relations. The use of “man and wife” assumes that men are
still men and women’s identities are subsumed and shifted into beings in relation to their husbands.

Gender Polarization of Words in Use of Adjectives

This polarization of adjectives shows how perception does change how one sees certain acts, depending on who
performs them.

Hidden Assumptions

Hidden assumptions in sentences can also be forms of microaggression if the underlying perceptions are sexist and
degrading.

Philippine Culture and Language

Filipino or Tagalog is mainly gender-neutral, without gendered characteristics or titles for men or women. The values
and the shaping of the education system were influenced by Western powers and ideals. Filipinos portray a mix of
identities, an infusion of both native and foreign perspectives and values.

Identities and Naming Things

Language gives a person the power to define oneself and the external world and one’s place in it. It provides a
definition of others as well, and one’s relationship with them.

Naming things give them power.

Sexist Language and Culture

Language that admonishes certain acts depending on one’s gender is a form of externalized social control. Language
is both a symptom and a perpetrator of sexism, and is the very telling of how a society sees a certain gender.

Toward a Gender-fair Language

The use of gender-fair language in educational institutions and the removal of sexist language as imperative to
gender-responsiveness is currently being advocated, GABRIELA (General Assembly Binding Women for Reforms,
Integrity, Equality, Leadership, and Action) Women’s Party national president and party-list representative Liza Maza
called for a ban of sexist language in all official communication and documents in the House of Representatives.

Women’s Ways of Knowing

Women and the Metaphor for Silence

Women associate silence with knowledge as they themselves are often left unheard and silent. In the study, silence
and voice were dominant themes for women who acknowledge and authority was supposed to be listened to, but
women who spoke out were silenced. To be quiet was to feel dumb, as the voice had come to represent one’s
intellectual and ethical development. To have a voice was to have self; to have a voice was to develop a sense of
voice.
Difference in Ways of Knowing: Women and Connectedness

Women and men have different ways of knowing, judgement, forms of human development, values, and visions of
humanity and existence. This book assumes that the main difference between men and women comes from
upbringing and gender socialization.

How Women Know

1. Women and Silence

 Women who live in silence are often disconnected from their families and communities due to their
situation, the geographical separation of the families from the greater community, and suffocation,
all which bring about lack of space for constructive thought.
2. Received Knowledge: Listening to the Voices of Others
 Received knowledge is developed by absorbing knowledge. Silence is still valued in this way of
knowing as the receiver must be silent to receive the knowledge transmitted
3. Subjective Knowledge: The Inner Voice and the Quest for Self
 Women who learn through subjective knowledge learn to what is called their “inner voice and
infallible gut.”
4. Procedural Knowledge: Voice of Reason and Separate and Connected Knowing
 Procedural knowers learn through processes. Often, the women utilizing this method have learned
well from formal system of knowledge, enough to excel. However, they have views that differ from
what they are taught.
5. Constructed Knowledge: Integrating
 Instead of learning to play the system, women must learn to value their own methods of knowing
and their own constructed knowledge. To do this, the constructed knowledge must turn inward
instead of outward, with the idea that “knowledge is constructed and the knower is an intimate part
of the known.”

Meaning of Difference in Knowing

The first wave of the western women’s movement often equated women’s liberation with reason; its main aim was
to achieve equality with men. This goal was to be realized through the inclusion of women in all aspect of society,
meaning that all the rights afforded to men must be afforded to women.

Exclusion of Women in Disciplines?

Knowledge, specifically in the science, are said to be gender neutral. However, many feminists argue that this is not
the case. Male bias is present in different disciplines, from the topics one chooses to study, the kinds of research
questions one develops, to the observable data that is deemed “relevant”