Gender

role
Oscar
Maxson
Mardhiah
Vivian
Ruhaizah
Zuliany
Oon
 Introduction

• Gender role
as a set of behavioral norms
related especially with males
or females, in a given social
group or system.
WordNet, it is the overt
expression of attitudes that
indicate to others the degree of
an individual maleness or
femaleness.

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 • Traditional gender
masculinity as having power and
being in control in emotional
situations, in the workplace, and in
sexual relationships
femininity as being nurturing,
supportive, and assigning high
priority to one's relationships.
• Talcott Parsons (1955), he believed
that male and female has different
role. In his view, feminine role was
an expressive, whereas masculine
role was instrumental.
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 Gendered Division of Labour
• Past……
– 19th Century, economy shifted from
agricultural to industrialization…
• Middle to Upper class family–man will
be the bread-winner for the family and
women will stayed at home as family
caretakers.
• Lower class, single mother, working
class family & immigrant women–find
paid employment as survival.
– ‘Women’s work’–Nurse, Teacher, Clerk,
Secretary
– ‘Men’s Work’–Lawyer, Engineer and
higher paid position
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 Gendered Division of Labour

• Present….
– Late 20th Century, due to globalization,
industrialization and urbanization…
• New job opportunities – especially those
with college qualification
• Roles of women – shifted as they work in
professional area.
– Roles of gender was quite equal as more
women was seen doing ‘men’s job’–
Doctors, CEOs and men’s participate in
‘women’s work’–Teachers, Nurses.
– Even if women work for wages outside
the home, they are still expected to take
primary responsibility for the care of
their home and children (Shelton, 1992).
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 Occupation Segregation
• Exists in two different levels:
1. Segregation by Occupation
• Women’s work and Men’s work
2. Within any occupations of women
and men their roles are not
distributed equally across the
occupational hierarchy.
• There is occupation with women
clustered at the lower levels and men
at the upper ones-even in occupations
which predominantly women. E.g.
teachers–male were dominant to be
headmaster..
• To simplify, men were more dominant
as leaders while women will work
under them.

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 Gender Equity
• Considered as a state of fairness and
justness
• Requires that the specific needs of
particular groups are considered
separately and acted upon
accordingly.
• e.g : All Malaysians are meant to be
equal in regards to their rights and
treatment by government and social
institutions, their needs, interests and
values will differ.
• Equity leads to equality.

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 Gender Equalization

• Defined as the nonexistence of

discrimination.
• Based on a person’s sex, in opportunities
and the part of resources or benefits or in
access to services.
• Concerned with treating everyone the
same.
• Acknowledge and addressing different
needs, interests and values, can help to
overcome inequalities and arrive at
equitable outcomes.

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 Theory of Gender Equity
• Adams’ Equity Theory calls for a fair
balance to be struck between an
employee’s inputs and an employee’s
outputs.
• Find fair balance to ensure a strong and
productive relationship which can result
contented and motivated employees.
• An employee will consider that he or she
is treated fairly if he or she perceives the
ratio of his or her inputs to his or her
outcomes to be equivalent to those around
him or her.

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 Approaches to Gender
Equalization
• Three broad approaches of gender
equality by Rees, 1998:

1) Equal treatment ensuring men and

women are treated the same.
2) Positive action special actions to redress
disadvantage.
3) Mainstreaming equality integrate
gender equality into systems, structures,
institutions, programs, policies and
practices.

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 Gender Stereotyping
• Definition
- sets of beliefs about groups. Stereotypes
may sometimes be accurate in the sense of
an average group difference but the
challenging aspect of stereotypes is to
believe that every member of a group has
all the features of the average group
member.
• Example :
In an individual career stereotyping
still happen when society categorize certain
group in particular features like work as
labor in contraction just for man and it
impossible to women take place this job.

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 Gender Discrimination
• Definition - Discrimination against a person
or group on the grounds of sex, sexual
orientation, or gender identity. Gender
discrimination in the workplace happens
when an employee is treated differently
because of his or her gender.

- Hiring
- Job Task
- Promotion
- Salaries
- Empowerment

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 Effects to HR

• Low performance
• Low motivation
• Productivity will decrease
• Vision and Mission of the
organization will be difficult to
achieve

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 HR Manager Roles in
Handling Gender Role
Issues

• Workplace Policy
• Leadership Skill
• Individualising
• Aware of men’s role and
women’s role

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 Conclusion

• gender role issue is much interrelated

to the stereotyping and discrimination.
The equality and equity that is not
equilibrium in the division of labor
causes the discrimination in gender
• dynamic changes in the society and
culture will result a dynamic gender
role issues or conflict in return

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 Conclusion

• discrimination in gender role should

be minimized or even better
eliminated together with the
stereotyping
• Distribution of work is no longer
looking at what gender you are, but
the big question is what are you able
to do.

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 Video

• Voice of her own

• Daughters of the veil

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 Reference:

• Advameg Inc. (2007). Gender issues in mental

health [On-line]. Retrieved March 6, 2007 from
the World Wide Web:
http://www.minddisorders.com/Flu-Inv/Gen

• Answers Corporation. (November 2006).

Gender role [On-line]. Retrieved March 6, 2007
from the World Wide Web:
http://www.answers.com/topic/gender-role-

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