During the course of our conversation on Monday night, we covered a lot of ground. We talked about: the chief characteristics of masculinity and femininity; the social construction of gender categories; possessing a gendered identity; and the consequences of different gender role expectations. Hopefully people benefited from
hearing one another’s informed opinions about how gender works in our daily lives.
During the discussion Monday night, I thought about starting a particular kind of conversation during class, but I ultimately held out.
And I’m glad I did, because I think it makes a nice prompt for your writing assignment this week…
Part of what it means to “think sociologically” is complicating elements of our daily lives we take for granted — those things to which we don’t dedicate much conscious thought. What on Earth am I talking about? I’m talking about going for a walk…
I want you to tell me how you do (or don’t) think about gender (and your bodily performance) while going for a walk. I want you to think about what you think about when you go for a walk. In other words, I want you to observe your own thoughts and report on them. When we go through our daily lives, we are engaged in a kind of practical action toward the world, and we often engage in a running commentary on what we are doing, what needs to be done, how we will present ourselves in certain social situations, etc. Typically, as we walk through life, we might not do a lot of conscious reflection. In most cases, we proceed habitually. But, when we encounter an obstacle, it is precisely those
moments when our conscious thinking intervenes and habit breaks down.
Say you’re a woman, and you need to walk home at midnight in downtown LA: how do you do that? Does your gender performance become significant then? How does how you “carry yourself” matter in that moment?
Similarly, say you’re a man, when and how does gender become significant during your daily walking around? Are you “looser” when traveling with a pack of young men? Do you carry yourself differently when you are by yourself? As men, what are the gendered obstacles you face in your daily
walks? Do you think about that stuff?
Stylistically, it might be a good move to highlight just one moment during your day when gender matters. Otherwise the writing is likely to be unwieldy. Also, in writing up this assignment, ideally you will draw on the Lerber and/or Bourdieu readings, as well as the documentary and class discussion that followed, in order to make a point.
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