All individuals are born with the capacity of becoming social beings. Our first social identities are predetermined; one is socialized even before being born. Socialization is an ongoing practice that continues to morph throughout the years of one’s life, in other words, the process of learning who we are as individuals and our place in the world is unsolidified. The experiences and interactions humans have with other members of society are contributing factors for how self-identity is internalized within that person’s world. Family is by far the first, and also an unceasing agent of socialization, critical to the first years of an individual’s life. How people identify early in life is based on what their care givers teach them and the surrounding
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Judith Lober (1994) describes gender as a major social institution in which people organize their lives. From an early age you learn what you are supposed to do, how you are supposed to act and present yourself as either being female or male. The extent to which one follows these rules depends on how people react to your actions, it is an unspoken system that is engrained into all social institutions and is organized around gender. ). Since before I was born my gender had already been assigned to me by my mother, she knitted a white blanket with pink ribbons as accents and proclaimed to her sisters that for the baby shower they were hosting for her she wanted all the decorations to be pink. However, she was not certain by any means other than her own beliefs from having prayed to the Virgin Mary to send her a baby girl that I was actually going to be born a girl. Gender roles serve as an important agent of socialization, even before I was out of the womb I was not given the choice, my gender had already been decided for me. Of course, had I been born with male genitalia I am certain my mother would have then corrected her assumptions, and then too assigned me to the gender she found corresponded best with my given genitalia. Gender becomes a division of people, either “man” or women”, “girl” or boy,” this gender social order is based on interactions with parents and or caretakers, like my own, it was in the home setting of my early years of frilly pink and lavender dresses, extravagant hair styles and laced socks that I started to learn and experience my gender role. Later this became supplemented by school dynamic while simultaneously dismantling my first impressions of the gendered culture I was presented in my house hold. While learning to be a lady and present myself as one, I also cultured that gender limitations remain prevalent even when stimulated to view the social
Judith Lober (1994) describes gender as a major social institution in which people organize their lives. From an early age you learn what you are supposed to do, how you are supposed to act and present yourself as either being female or male. The extent to which one follows these rules depends on how people react to your actions, it is an unspoken system that is engrained into all social institutions and is organized around gender. ). Since before I was born my gender had already been assigned to me by my mother, she knitted a white blanket with pink ribbons as accents and proclaimed to her sisters that for the baby shower they were hosting for her she wanted all the decorations to be pink. However, she was not certain by any means other than her own beliefs from having prayed to the Virgin Mary to send her a baby girl that I was actually going to be born a girl. Gender roles serve as an important agent of socialization, even before I was out of the womb I was not given the choice, my gender had already been decided for me. Of course, had I been born with male genitalia I am certain my mother would have then corrected her assumptions, and then too assigned me to the gender she found corresponded best with my given genitalia. Gender becomes a division of people, either “man” or women”, “girl” or boy,” this gender social order is based on interactions with parents and or caretakers, like my own, it was in the home setting of my early years of frilly pink and lavender dresses, extravagant hair styles and laced socks that I started to learn and experience my gender role. Later this became supplemented by school dynamic while simultaneously dismantling my first impressions of the gendered culture I was presented in my house hold. While learning to be a lady and present myself as one, I also cultured that gender limitations remain prevalent even when stimulated to view the social