Gender Roles- Abbey Dahl

Just this week in my World Religions class, we discussed how Christianity was a defining factor for gender roles in that specific religion. It is believed that in Christianity because Eve made Adam eat the forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden woman were deemed to be inferior to men after that. The man was the one who provided for his family, and the women were to have children, look over the house, cook, and clean. So this is just one example of how religion can affect the views of gender roles. Over time though, it is amazing to see the perception over gender roles change immensely.

We must realize that America is a young, and industrious country compared to Europe and all the other countries. So we do have a narrow mindedness about gender. When people first migrated to America, there was a culture already formed. As I said before men made sure their was a shelter over his families head, and the mother kept the children in line, and the home. Unlike, the berdache in the Native American culture, we did not have a specific name for a person like that. To us it was sadly "abnormal" because it was "normal in our culture". Also in the article, "Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving," the author throughly discusses how just because the woman wore burqas we automatically were under the impressed they were oppressed by the Taliban men. It actuality, it was simply their culture, something we need to learn to respect and not try to change.

I believe that the perception of gender roles has been and is still under way for change. Fifty years ago, women might have gone to secondary school. Since the Civil Rights Movement, and an ample amount of feminists change is inevitable . Now there are statistically more women attending college then men. I am not at all trying to put down the male gender they are still powerful, but currently woman are single for a longer time, we are accepting different kinds of sexuality, and becoming more accepting and respectful to different cultures.