Deck 4: Performance

Question 1

The way that children do gender is

A) increasingly inflexible as they learn ever more rules about doing gender correctly.
B) more flexible and less binary than their parents typically expect.
C) a reflection of greater biological predispositions toward fashion and nurturance among girls and for guns and trucks among boys that most parents have to acknowledge.
D) more rigid and binary than adults because they are still learning the rules in all their complexity.

Answer 1

D

Question 2

Which one of the following statements most accurately describes doing gender?

A) We become so used to using our bodies in certain gendered ways that we don´t have to think about doing gender most of the time, even though we do it.
B) Doing gender entails that women, but not men, are forced to do gender every day and in every context of their lives.
C) Doing gender means following a universal script that demands men and women to be opposites of each other all the time.
D) When we become conscious of doing gender, both men and women can freely choose what gender rules they want to follow.

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Gender policing works on women because

A) unlike men, they have to pay attention to what others think of their performance of gender.
B) just like men, they have to pay attention to what others think of their performance of gender.
C) women find it harder to come up with explanations for their behavior than men do.
D) the gender rules that apply to women are more consistent than those that apply to me.

Answer 3

B

Question 4

Which of the following best describes how gender rules work?

A) Gender rules allow for few exceptions and usually carry serious penalties when they are broken.
B) People who strictly follow a single set of unambiguous gender rules are usually considered the ideal man or woman of their society.
C) We stop doing gender whenever we break gender rules.
D) Sometimes we break gender rules because it is impossible to follow them, no matter how hard we try.

Question 5

Which of the following best characterizes gender policing?

A) Policing is malicious and cruel and like other forms of bullying should never be tolerated.
B) Gender policing is not done to high-status people like celebrities and politicians.
C) Gender policing is something we sometimes do to ourselves and our best friends with the best of intentions.
D) Gender policing is harmless because it is often done with jokes and affection.

Question 6

According to the authors of your textbook, American men usually don't deliberate about whether to pee sitting down or standing up. This is an example of

A) how gender rules become internalized as habits.
B) how gender rules are learned over an entire lifetime .
C) how gender rules in the United States are unfair to women.
D) how following gender rules can be a source of pleasure.

Question 7

Which one of the following statements best describes the claims of the learning model of socialization?

A) There is a lifelong process of learning and re-learning gendered expectations and how to negotiate them.
B) There is a learning process in childhood that fits us to our particular culture and which we then use for the rest of our lives.
C) The children who learn how to do gender well at home won't need to try as hard to learn the gender rules once they enter school.
D) Playing with Barbies and baby dolls or trucks and guns as a child will have lifelong effects on the way the child will do gender as an adult.

Question 8

Around age six, children become very concerned with doing gender correctly. What does this rigidity tell us about gender norms?

A) It is strong evidence that there is a biological predisposition toward binary male and female identities.
B) They are learning that gender rules are important, but haven't yet figured out whether and how to break them.
C) It is strong evidence that early childhood socialization is the most powerful force shaping adult gender roles.
D) It is a symptom of non-egalitarian parenting.

Question 9

A woman who doesn't do femininity finds her gender identity constantly questioned by suspicious clerks. Why is that?

A) Not doing gender in ways that make sense to others is a communicative crisis for these others; they don't know what to think or do.
B) Heterosexism is so widespread that store clerks just automatically challenge anyone that looks homosexual.
C) Gender policing has completely gotten out of hand in U.S. society.
D) Good people will conform to the gender rules as much as they can.

Question 10

The injection model of socialization fails to explain how people learn to do gender because

A) it ignores how the gender rules change, not only as children grow up but as societies change.
B) it assumes there is one coherent set of gender rules that children learn and apply throughout their lives.
C) it suggests that socialization is provided in greater or lesser doses and we have to live with what we have been given.
D) all of the above.

Question 11

The authors of your textbook argue that hate crimes against gays, lesbians, and bisexual people can be understood as an especially violent form of gender policing because

A) most hate crimes are committed by men.
B) sexual minorities are a third gender in the United States.
C) sexual attraction is subject to gender rules, so people who are attracted to the same sex are breaking a gender rule.
D) none of the above.

Question 12

Why are guys who dress up like women at Halloween unlikely to be victims of hate crimes?

A) Dressing up like a woman for Halloween is temporary.
B) The guys can use Halloween to account for their behavior.
C) Guys dressed up like women on Halloween are so masculine that they would never fool anyone.
D) No gender rules apply on Halloween.

Question 13

When the authors emphasize that, when a child gets a pair of gender binary glasses, it's just their first pair, they mean to say that

A) parents are the primary sources of information showing children that gender matters.
B) children can't see gender at all until they are actively taught to follow the gender rules of their culture.
C) adults expect even very young children to follow rigid gender binary rules.
D) young children perceive gender in their society but differently than they may when they are adults.

Question 14

Which of the following descriptions best conveys the meaning of the phrase gender policing?

A) culturally specific instructions for how a man or a woman of a certain social status should appear and behave
B) conformity-promoting responses to violations of the gender binary in particular situations
C) the process by which something becomes coded as masculine or feminine
D) that we all have been socialized to fit gender binary roles

Question 15

Which of the following statements is TRUE of gender policing?

A) Gender policing is only problematic when it is done violently.
B) Gender policing is less influential if it comes from someone you care for (like your girlfriend or boyfriend).
C) We can´t gender police ourselves, so we gender police others.
D) We gender police ourselves and others, and even recruit others to help us police ourselves.

Question 16

Many women enjoy dressing up, dancing, and flirting at a club. This is an example of

A) how gender rules become internalized as habits.
B) how gender rules in the United States are unfair to women.
C) how gender rules reflect biological predispositions.
D) how following gender rules can be a source of pleasure.

Question 17

According to the claim that we "do gender,"

A) we do gender all the time.
B) we do gender when we interact with people of the opposite sex.
C) we do gender whenever we are being policed.
D) we do gender whenever we are consciously aware of gender-specific expectations.

Question 18

Which of the following is an example of gender policing?

A) not being hired for a job you are qualified for because you are a woman
B) a woman being told that she looks attractive in an evening gown
C) calling a guy cute rather than handsome
D) asking a guy why he shaves his legs

Question 19

Which of the following descriptions best convey the meaning of the phrase doing gender?

A) That we all have been socialized to fit gender binary roles.
B) Culturally specific rules for how a man or a woman should appear and behave.
C) The ways in which we actively obey and break the gender rules of our society.
D) Conformity-promoting responses to violation of the gender binary in particular situations.

Question 20

Which of the following best conveys the meaning of the phrase gender rules?

A) that we all have been socialized to fit into masculine and feminine roles
B) culturally specific instructions for how a man or a woman of a certain social status should appear and behave
C) conformity-promoting responses to the violation of the gender binary in particular situations
D) the process by which something becomes coded as masculine or feminine

Question 21

When one preschooler told another that "anybody can have a penis, only girls wear barrettes," the former child was

A) offering an account for breaking a gender rule.
B) revealing how little he knew about biology's effects on behavior.
C) showing how kids can say the silliest things.
D) revealing how meaningful gender performance is, no matter what bodies we have.

Question 22

If men and women aren't naturally opposite, then why do they act so differently so much of the time?

Question 23

Why do men and women act so differently so often if gender differences aren´t biological predispositions? If a man really can "pass" as a woman or a woman as a man, why is this kind of transgender performance so rare?

Question 24

Use an example of a back-and-forth interaction between two individuals to distinguish among (a) gender policing, (b) giving accounts for breaking gender rules, (c) resisting gender policing, and (d) anticipatory gender self-policing. Clearly label each piece of the interaction you describe (real or imaginary) with the appropriate term for what their words/actions represent.

Question 25

Rebellion against gender rules will have what character?

A) It will persist until it reaches the natural limits that biology imposes.
B) It will be recognizable as rebellion only if the rule breaker doesn't provide accounts for breaking the rules.
C) It will be limited by how individuals were socialized during their childhood.
D) It will avoid gender policing by staying underground or at the margins of society.

Question 26

Provide an example of two strongly contrasting gender performances by women (or by men), both of which American culture defines as fully acceptable and following gender rules adequately, but which seem to be the reverse of each other. Explain how such divergent roles can exist if there are gender rules that people are following.

Question 27

How do gender performances that are explicit and exaggerated about flouting gender rules (as in drag shows or Halloween costumes) relate to the gender binary? In what ways do they support and/or subvert and/or ignore the gender rules of daily life?

Question 28

Which of the following is a conclusion offered in this chapter?

A) Higher social status is a result of avoiding gender policing.
B) Breaking gender rules is typically painful and comes with significant social costs.
C) Gender rules are easily broken since most of them are unconscious and not policed.
D) Accounts we give for breaking gender rules make it seem like everyone agrees with them, even when they don't conform.