Gender Expretation In Allan Johnson's The Gender Knot

In Allan Johnson’s The Gender Knot, he summarizes everything I was taught about men and women when he states, after giving a brief list of different traits belonging to a male and female that, “As this (referring to the list) shapes how we think about gender, it creates a great divide, with men on one side and women on the other. So long as everyone buys into the split, whether or not it actually describes them, all can have a relatively clear and stable sense of who they are and what’s what(61).” The definition of being a man or a woman in the world has been terribly molded by the social construct of gender. As a child, I was taught to distinguish men and women by certain factors. For example, women and men had different body parts and acted …show more content…
Besides just being a woman in a male-dominated society. A now common defining attribute to being either male or female is your sexual interest. Johnson made an assertion that challenges the thought of sexual preference defining gender saying that, “Homosexuality wasn’t even considered a basis for male or female identity, much less for distinction of subcultures, until the last century. Prior to that, it was identified as a type of sexual behavior, not a type of human being or lifestyle(65).” If I was to go home and tell my mother I liked girls, it would be detrimental. It is considered an evil to a lot of old and new school people who are homophobic. The thought of liking the same sex has ruined families and caused rifts in between family members. Such as it does in the relationship between mother and daughter in Kitty Tsui’s poem A Chinese Banquet. In the poem the narrator says to her mother, “tell her, mother I’m gay, mother I’m gay and happy with her. But she will not listen and shakes her head(554). ”People, who find happiness in being with someone of the same sex, are constantly unowned and excluded from their families every day because homosexuality and being true to themselves is wrong. If a female is someone who is attracted women, to popular belief she is no longer a woman. The woman becomes a “butch” or male wanna be. If a male is someone who is attracted to men, to popular belief he is no longer a man. The man becomes a “sissy” or “faggot”. These harsh and unnecessary terms are used as insults to not only homosexual but heterosexual people as well. Although it is becoming more acceptable, as time goes forward the stigma of being homosexual is still there and makes it even more difficult for me to find the true discernment of being a