Given the key thresholds concepts regarding feminist analysis, the conditions that need to be changed the most is that of the social construction of gender. According to Power (2011), this relates to how a person’s behaviour is considered appropriate based on their gender and the roles they ought to play. There is need to change this because it allows for the society to put limits on women in consideration to what they can and cannot do. As such, social constructions of gender tend to determine the possibility that a person, regardless of their gender can achieve specific goals and or behave in whichever manner that they like. If the conditions were to evolve, gender roles and privileges, especially for women, will improve significantly. Furthermore, the idea of feminism evolved from the need to have equal opportunities for women and by having the society judge them on what to do, the principality of feminists will never achieve its desired objectives. It can, therefore, be said that through the social construction of gender, both men and women get the power to consider the roles that they have to play to be ideal. That is why, women have for long lived their lives as a reflection of what others, more so men, want from them and women, have been okay with it because it is how the contemporary society is designed to function.
Question 2
While thinking about parenting and workplace issues, other additional problems that include more than just gender to include race, class and sexual identity are those of cultural perspectives. We are all from different cultures if not multi-cultured in some ways. Culture influence people behaviour based on how things ought to be done based on the acceptable norms of an ethnic group, particular race, class, and even sexual identity. Bornstein (2012) explains that our cultures force us to behave in regards to what is expected and this further impact on parenting roles between men and women. This also becomes the problem with workplace issues. In one way or the other, a person’s culture will directly dictate which experience if not the role they have to play in both family and workplace environment. As such, cultural perspective as observed from different races, class and ethnic groups tend to contribute towards some of the social problems experienced across the globe because of the powerful role culture plays in our lives.
Question 3
An intersectional analysis is important in understanding how people experience oppression differently as it helps to explain the role of gender and how it overlaps with several other aspects such as race, social class, ethnicity and sexual identity amongst others (Waylen, 2013). As emphasized by Waylen (2013), intersectional analysis allows for the description of the role privilege and lack of it is reflected based on the social identity a person has. For example, a person who is considered privileged within the society is most likely to be male, heterosexual and from the upper class and as such will experience the least kind of oppression. On the other hand, someone who is black, from the middle or lower economic class, female and lesbian recognizes less societal privileges thus experience oppression differently. Therefore, an intersectional analysis helps to define the social attributions a person has to help determine the kind of privileges they are likely to benefit from and as a result, how and what kind of oppression they will experience.
References
Bornstein, M.H. (2012). “Cultural Approaches to Parenting.” Parent Science Practice 12(2-3). Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3433059/
Power, M. (2011). The Social Construction of Gender. Retrieved from http://www.personal.psu.edu/bfr3/blogs/applied_social_psychology/2011/10/the-social-construction-of-gender.html
Waylen, G. (2013). The Oxford Handbook of Gender and Politics. New York: OUP USA
