'Stereotype' - Gender Studies, Key Concepts

 

Gender Studies: KEY CONCEPTS

 

STEREOTYPE

 

            In regular usage of language or in a layman’s use of the term, Stereotype refers to a characteristic or a defining feature about a person or a thing that is more often than not incorrectly presumed. Such stereotypes are in abundance in our daily life. A good example to further simplify the term would be the notion that,

           Women are generally considered as bad drivers but official fact-based studies show that women are as good drivers as men( if not better). This is a stereotype that women cannot drive, because it is engraved in our minds that such works as driving which has to do with skills are not suitable for women.

          Another example would be., it is a stereotype that rich people are rude and unkind but this may not be true in every (or most) case. There are people in this world who are extremely rich and do great philanthropic work.

           These stereotypes are not built overnight, rather it is a result of the societal construct which may have developed over the course of decades or centuries.

 

Why do we (humans) need stereotypes?

              Stereotypes play an essential role in the process of understanding new things or information. Stereotyping is a cognitive procedure or a method that our mind uses to simplify things or information. Unfortunately, this process of simplification of the information is often done at the expense of the removal of context, validity, and accuracy. That is, it is very easy for a person to form opinions about another person based on his appearance, characteristics, or external information provided by friends or colleagues without really verifying whether his/her presumptions are factually correct or not. It is simply more convenient for a man to conclude that women largely are lazy, less intelligent, and hardworking compared to men than to verify whether these stereotypes are valid or not.

           Stereotyping is also used to categorize or group people based on some common characteristics. For example, if a community has some people who engage in illegal activities it is stereotyped that every single person belonging to that community is a criminal.

 

What is the nature of Stereotyping?

                   Stereotypes can be of varied types. They can be negative or positive, accurate or inaccurate, and justified or unjustified. Generally, positive stereotypes are not a thing to be worried about, it is the negative or the unjustified stereotypes that are an area of concern.

Stereotypes and Gender :

                If one compares who is being more affected by the unjust stereotyping and labeling, one can find that it is women who are the subject of stereotyping which can be (under specific conditions) extremely harmful.

               As discussed in brief earlier, it is clear that stereotyping is not an individual process but rather a collective one and it can reflect the thought process or the general notions of people in any given community of people.

              

           Schneider states a few examples of gender stereotypes that are a result of this collective process of stereotyping,

              “that women are emotional and unpredictable, are bad drivers and like chocolate, or that men are rational and instrumental, bad at housework and like sport”

               Hence it can be said that a person’s preferences, likings, and duties are already pre-decided by society based upon their gender. Based on the gender of the person an image is created in the mind. For example, if I tell you to imagine a nurse and a doctor you will probably imagine a female nurse and a male doctor. It is because of the norm created in society, a kind of stereotype that men cannot be nurses and women cannot be doctors. Although, in reality, both men and women can be excellent nurses and very able doctors. But it is the stereotype in our mind that limits us from thinking out of the box or reversing the roles.

 

                This gendered bias can be found in every field. Even in literature, where female characters are always portrayed in a certain way and rarely otherwise. We see women being restricted to pursue their careers after marriage or pregnancy to fulfill their familial duties. But no such restrictions are ever placed upon men. Most female characters in mainstream movies and literature are always portrayed as domestic beings and supporting characters to men.

 

                 Hundreds of such examples and instances could be found, where because of gender stereotyping the entire lives of men and women are so contractually categorized that there can be no overlapping or exchange without breaking off the stereotypes.