tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post5625630391246295625..comments2024-02-20T15:17:48.594+11:00Comments on A.E.Brain: Stanford: Gender Orientation: IS Conditions Within The TS BrainZoe Brainhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13712045376060102538noreply@blogger.comBlogger47125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-35451357812162737212014-08-13T01:37:54.292+10:002014-08-13T01:37:54.292+10:00Zoe Brain, I noticed you listed the Scott Kerlin s...Zoe Brain, I noticed you listed the Scott Kerlin study of DES exposure and trans women as an example of the kind of scientific evidence you are looking for.<br /><br />I think it's important to distinguish between good science and bad science. The Kerlin study is seriously flawed. He used an online sample of people who said they had DES. 60% of them were confirmed cases, the other 40% only suspected that their mother had used DES.<br /><br />I believe a later study looked at DES and sexual orientation and found that for confirmed cases of DES exposure, DES made no difference.<br /><br />There is a very good possibility that environmental pollution affects gender identity, but so far nobody has proven it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-56598516162588319902013-07-02T13:36:39.127+10:002013-07-02T13:36:39.127+10:00From Lisa Elliot's website:
" Presenting...From Lisa Elliot's website:<br /><br />" Presenting the latest science from conception to puberty, she zeroes in on the precise differences between boys and girls, reining in harmful stereotypes. Boys are not, in fact, “better at math” <b>but at certain kinds of spatial reasoning</b>. Girls are not naturally more empathetic than boys; just allowed to express their feelings more.<br /><br /><b>Of course, genes and hormones play a role in creating boy-girl differences</b>, but they are only the beginning. Social factors, such as how we speak to our sons and daughters and whether we encourage their physical adventurousness, are proving to be far more powerful than we previously realized."<br /><br />That seems to be what the evidence says, yes. But this does not affect either gender identity (nor, from what I can see, sexual orientation, though that's not my area of interest).<br /><br />One area I am interested in though is women with CAH. Rather than dismissing them as a negligible minority, I think my own objectivity here is questionable. I have the unusual 3BHSD form of CAH, and I guess I'm just a little tired of being told by those in positions of cisgender privilege that a) I don't matter and b) Their philosophy trumps my lived experience.<br /><br />Their attitude is rather like the Patriarchy's position on women throughout history, is it not?Zoe Brainhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13712045376060102538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-17847857589012148812013-07-02T13:21:54.257+10:002013-07-02T13:21:54.257+10:00I think we have a clash of cultures here: Psycholo...I think we have a clash of cultures here: Psychology as an Art, and as a Science.<br /><br />Most Psychology has historically been such a soft science it's not really been a science at all. Experiments weren't well-designed, with very nebulous criteria and even more nebulous conclusions that just didn't stand scrutiny.<br /><br />To give an example of the kind of evidence I'm looking at:<br /><br /><br /><b>Male-to-female transsexuals show sex-atypical hypothalamus activation when smelling odorous steroids.</b> by Berglund et al <i>Cerebral Cortex</i> 2008 18(8):1900-1908;<br /><i>...the data implicate that transsexuality may be associated with sex-atypical physiological responses in specific hypothalamic circuits, possibly as a consequence of a variant neuronal differentiation.</i><br /><br /><b>Dichotic Listening, Handedness, Brain Organization and Transsexuality</b> Govier et al <i>International Journal of Transgenderism</i>, 12:144–154, 2010<br /><br /><br /><b>Prenatal exposure to diethylstilbestrol(DES) in males and gender-related disorders:results from a 5-year study</b> Scott Kerlin. Proc. International Behavioral Development Symposium July 2005<br /><br />This shows a 500-fold increase in the rate of Transsexuality, not exactly a subtle effect.<br /><br /><b>Prenatal exposure to testosterone and functional cerebral lateralization: a study in same-sex and opposite-sex twin girls.</b> Cohen-Bendahan et al, <i>Psychoneuroendocrinology</i>. 2004 Aug;29(7):911-6.Zoe Brainhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13712045376060102538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-88376704659785377292013-07-02T03:18:26.525+10:002013-07-02T03:18:26.525+10:00Like comedian Elaine Boosler said in the mid-late ...Like comedian Elaine Boosler said in the mid-late 1980's,I'm Only A Person Trapped In A Woman's Body!I just looked up her phrase and it's on many different sites and blogs.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-59177217470525160852013-07-02T03:07:12.527+10:002013-07-02T03:07:12.527+10:00Sword between the Sexes?, A: C. S. Lewis and the G... <br /><br />Sword between the Sexes?, A: C. S. Lewis and the Gender Debates - Page 188 - Google Books Result<br />books.google.com/books?isbn=1441212671<br />Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen - 2010 - Religion<br />C. S. Lewis and the Gender Debates Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen ... indicates that women and men, boys and girls, are overwhelmingly more alike than different<br /><br /> <br /> And Dr.Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen is as I said both a Christian and Gender Scholar who teaches the philosophy and psychology of gender as well as religion at a Christian college and her husband is a biblical scholar.<br /><br /><br />I personally don't believe in any religion,so I just disgard that part of her articles and presentations,but she's not a conservative Christian she's a moderate and a feminist and her knowledge of what all of the abundant psychological research studies consistently show about how the sexes are more alike than different,with mostly small average differences many of which she points out have gotten even smaller over several decades because of some small changes(there is obviously still a long way to go and much more changes need to happen) in gender roles and gender stereotypes,is what is very great and valuable!<br /> <br /> <br />Randie<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> <br /> <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-6763305651205315072013-07-02T02:26:46.923+10:002013-07-02T02:26:46.923+10:00Yet there are differences in adults' brains, a...<br /><br />Yet there are differences in adults' brains, and here Eliot is at her most<br />original and persuasive: explaining how they arise from tiny sex differences<br />in infancy. For instance, baby boys are more irritable than girls. That<br />makes parents likely to interact less with their "nonsocial" sons, which<br />could cause the sexes' developmental pathways to diverge. By 4 months of<br />age, boys and girls differ in how much eye contact they make, and<br />differences in sociability, emotional expressivity, and verbal ability—all<br />of which depend on interactions with parents—grow throughout childhood. The<br />message that sons are wired to be nonverbal and emotionally distant thus<br />becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. The sexes "start out a little bit<br />different" in fussiness, says Eliot, and parents "react differently to<br />them," producing the differences seen in adults.<br /><br />Those differences also arise from gender conformity. You often see the claim<br />that toy preferences—trucks or dolls—appear so early, they must be innate.<br />But as Eliot points out, 6- and 12-month-olds of both sexes prefer dolls to<br />trucks, according to a host of studies. Children settle into sex-based play<br />preferences only around age 1, which is when they grasp which sex they are,<br />identify strongly with it, and conform to how they see other, usually older,<br />boys or girls behaving. "Preschoolers are already aware of what's acceptable<br />to their peers and what's not," writes Eliot. Those play preferences then<br />snowball, producing brains with different talents.<br /><br />The belief in blue brains and pink brains has real-world consequences, which<br />is why Eliot goes after them with such vigor (and rigor). It encourages<br />parents to treat children in ways that make the claims come true, denying<br />boys and girls their full potential. "Kids rise or fall according to what we<br />believe about them," she notes. And the belief fuels the drive for<br />single-sex schools, which is based in part on the false claim that boy<br />brains and girl brains process sensory information and think differently.<br />Again, Eliot takes no prisoners in eviscerating this "patently absurd"<br />claim. Read her masterful book and you'll never view the sex-differences<br />debate the same way again.<br /><br />*Begley is NEWSWEEK's science editor.*<br /><br />Find this article at http://www.newsweek.com/id/214834Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-47996301286863650032013-07-02T02:23:30.808+10:002013-07-02T02:23:30.808+10:00http://www.newsweek.com/id/214834 Pink Brain, Blue...http://www.newsweek.com/id/214834 Pink Brain, Blue Brain<br /><br />Claims of sex differences fall apart.<br /><br />By *Sharon Begley http://www.newsweek.com/id/183003 NEWSWEEK<br /><br />Published Sep 3, 2009<br /><br />>From the magazine issue dated Sep 14, 2009<br /><br />Among certain parents, it is an article of faith not only that they should<br />treat their sons and daughters alike, but also that they do. If Jack gets<br />Lincoln Logs and Tetris, and joins the soccer team and the math club, so<br />does Jill. Lise Eliot, a neuroscientist at Rosalind Franklin University of<br />Medicine and Science, doesn't think these parents are lying, exactly. But<br />she would like to bring some studies to their attention.<br /><br />In one, scientists dressed newborns in gender-neutral clothes and misled<br />adults about their sex. The adults described the "boys" (actually girls) as<br />angry or distressed more often than did adults who thought they were<br />observing girls, and described the "girls" (actually boys) as happy and<br />socially engaged more than adults who knew the babies were boys. Dozens of<br />such disguised-gender experiments have shown that adults perceive baby boys<br />and girls differently, seeing identical behavior through a gender-tinted<br />lens. In another study, mothers estimated how steep a slope their<br />11-month-olds could crawl down. Moms of boys got it right to within one<br />degree; moms of girls underestimated what their daughters could do by nine<br />degrees, even though there are no differences in the motor skills of infant<br />boys and girls. But that prejudice may cause parents to unconsciously limit<br />their daughter's physical activity. How we perceive children—sociable or<br />remote, physically bold or reticent—shapes how we treat them and therefore<br />what experiences we give them. Since life leaves footprints on the very<br />structure and function of the brain, these various experiences produce sex<br />differences in adult behavior and brains—the result not of innate and inborn<br />nature but of nurture.<br /><br />For her new book, *Pink Brain, Blue Brain: How Small Differences Grow Into<br />Troublesome Gaps—And What We Can Do About It,* Eliot immersed herself in<br />hundreds of scientific papers (her bibliography runs 46 pages). Marching<br />through the claims like Sherman through Georgia, she explains that<br />assertions of innate sex differences in the brain are either "blatantly<br />false," "cherry-picked from single studies," or "extrapolated from rodent<br />research" without being confirmed in people. For instance, the idea that the<br />band of fibers connecting the right and left brain is larger in women,<br />supposedly supporting their more "holistic" thinking, is based on a single<br />1982 study of only 14 brains. Fifty other studies, taken together, found no<br />such sex difference—not in adults, not in newborns. Other baseless claims:<br />that women are hard-wired to read faces and tone of voice, to defuse<br />conflict, and to form deep friendships; and that "girls' brains are wired<br />for communication and boys' for aggression." Eliot's inescapable conclusion:<br />there is "little solid evidence of sex differences in children's brains."<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-40481674296712386662013-07-02T02:08:51.087+10:002013-07-02T02:08:51.087+10:00http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/1994-09332-001
Ho...http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/1994-09332-001<br /><br />Home<br /> <br />Print<br />Email<br />Citation<br /><br />Database: PsycINFO<br />[ Journal Article ]<br /> <br />Pink or blue: Gender-stereotypic perceptions of infants as conveyed by birth congratulations cards. <br /><br />Bridges, Judith S. <br />Psychology of Women <br /><br />Quarterly, Vol 17(2), Jun 1993, 193-205. doi: 10.1111/j.1471-6402.1993.tb00444.x<br /><br />Abstract<br /><br />Examined societal gender stereotypes of infants by investigating the visual images and verbal messages present in birth congratulations cards. 61 girl and 61 boy cards from 18 establishments in 4 municipalities were subjected to a content analysis that revealed several differences between girl and boy cards. Visual images indicative of physical activity, such as action toys and active babies, were more prominent on boy than girl cards. Verbal messages of expressiveness, including sweetness and sharing, appeared on more girl than boy cards. In addition, more boy than girl birth cards presented a message of happiness for the parents and/or the baby. Findings are discussed in the context of gender stereotypes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reservedAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-17844020163846093362013-07-02T01:30:42.602+10:002013-07-02T01:30:42.602+10:00Feminist Letty Cottin Pogrebin's son didn'...Feminist Letty Cottin Pogrebin's son didn't reject playing with dolls and tea sets, just as her identical twin daughters didn't reject the non-gender stereotyped toys and behaviors she encouraged them to have. And her son didn't grow up gay he's married and I think has children,but he didn't grow up to be a macho football player either,as Letty said he's a chef and loves to cook.<br /> <br />And there is a lot wrong with sexist very limiting gender roles,gender myths and gender stereotypes that are mostly artificially created by the very sexist,gender divided,gender stereotyped,woman-hating male dominated family and society we all live in,which makes both sexes,into only half of a person,instead of full human people able to develop and express their full shared *human* traits,abilities,and behaviors etc. And then these artificial gender differences continue to re-inforce gender inequalites,male dominance and men's violence against women,children and even each other.<br /> <br />There is a great 2005 book,Sex Lies And Stereotypes Challenging Views Of Women,Men and Realtionships by social and cognitive British psychologist Dr.Gary Wood.He too shows plenty of great important research studies done over decades by many different psychologists that finds small average sex differences,and the sexes are much more sminilar than different.He also thoroughly demonstrates that gender roles,gender myths and gender stereotypes which are mostly socially and cultrually constructed,harm both sexes because they are very limting,cause conflicts and misunderstands between women and men,and only allow each of them to become half of a person which can cause mental and physical conditions and diseases.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-35949417360605144342013-07-02T01:28:26.316+10:002013-07-02T01:28:26.316+10:00Please consider reading the excellent thorough ...Please consider reading the excellent thorough book, Myths Of Gender:Biological Theories of Women and Men. by Brown University Biologist Dr.Anne Fausto-Sterling. <br /> <br /> <br />Also there is a lot of evidence from sociologists and anthropologists that there are androgynous cultures. Many anthropologists like Walter Williams author of the award winning,The Spirit and The Flesh,and many other anthropologists have done field work for decades in places like Tahiti and Malaysia, women and men are encouraged to have androgynous roles there and they are not polarized into "opposite" categories and gender roles,and they are more alike in their personalities and behaviors. This is thoroughly explained in the good book, <br />Manhood In The Making:Cultural Concepts Of Masculinity.<br /> <br /> <br />And the men there unlike in our very gender divided,gender stereotyped, sexist male dominated society ,aren't punished for being similar to women, they are encouraged and rewarded for it! And it's in the very gender divided, gender stereotyped sexist male dominated societies where the sexes are polarized into "opposite" categories and gender roles that makes *more* gender differences!<br /><br /><br /> As I already explained,here are also a lot of studies by good parent child development psychologists that clearly demonstrate that female and male babies are actually born biologically more alike than different with very few differences,yet they are perceived and treated systematically very differently right from the moment of birth on from parents and other care givers.<br /><br />There is also tons of psychological studies from decades showing that most psychological differences between the sexes are very small in most areas and that most large differences are actually individual people differences.<br /><br />And there are also plenty of very good academic studies by communication professors and experts that have actually found very small differences in communication between women and men.<br /><br />Women and men are actually biologically and psychologically more alike than different and gender is mostly an artificial socially consructed category.It's more like 90-95% not 80%!<br /><br />Our brains are actually more alike than different just(which is a miracle considering how the brain's structure and function are shaped and changed from different life experiences and different learning and environments even adult brains) as our external genitals are and plenty of research shows that the structure and function of the brain can actually be changed by the interaction with different life long enviornments,different life long experiences,and social and cultural conditioning.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-36553580652523953742013-07-02T01:21:00.797+10:002013-07-02T01:21:00.797+10:00Table of Contents
Introduction xv
Part I "Ha...<br />Table of Contents<br />Introduction xv<br /><br />Part I "Half-Changed World," Half-Changed Minds<br /><br />1 We Think, Therefore You Are 3<br /><br />Why You Should Cover Your Head with a Paper Bag if You Have a Secret You Don't Want Your Wife to Find Out 14<br /><br />3 "Backwards and in High Heels" 27<br /><br />4 I Don't Belong Here 40<br /><br />5 The Glass Workplace 54<br /><br />6 XX-clusion and xxx-clusion 67<br /><br />7 Gender Equality Begins (or Ends) at Home 78<br /><br />8 Gender Equality 2.0? 90<br /><br />Part 2 Neurosexism<br /><br />9 The "Fetal Fork" 99<br /><br />10 In "the Darkness of the Womb" (and the First Few Hours in the Light) 107<br /><br />11 The Brain of a Boy in the Body of a Girl ... or a Monkey? 118<br /><br />12 Sex and Premature Speculation 131<br /><br />13 What Does It All Mean, Anyway? 141<br /><br />14 Brain Scams 155<br /><br />15 The "Seductive Allure" of Neuroscience 168<br /><br />16 Unraveling Hardwiring 176<br /><br />Part 3 Recycling Gender<br /><br />17 Preconceptions and Postconceptions 189<br /><br />18 Parenting with a Half-Changed Mind 197<br /><br />19 "Gender Detectives" 207<br /><br />20 Gender Education 214<br /><br />21 The Self-Socializing Child 226<br /><br />Epilogue: And S-t-r-e-t-c-h! 233<br /><br />Acknowledgments 241<br /><br />Author's Note 243<br /><br />Notes 245<br /><br />Bibliography 289<br /><br />Index 329<br /><br />Read More Show Less <br />Customer Reviews<br />Average Rating 4<br />( 10 ) <br />dayzd89<br />Posted January 10, 2013<br /><br />Delusions of Gender had been on my to-read list for a very long <br />Delusions of Gender had been on my to-read list for a very long time, so I was more than happy to pick up a copy from my library. I really like how Cordelia writes in a way that is simple and easy to understand for the reader who might not be a neuroscientist. She writes with so much intelligence and isn't afraid to add humor in her discussion. I also like how she sprinkles a bit of sarcasm here and there. I find it extremely amazing that she was able to read The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine, which I attempted to read before but found to be extremely sexist and guilty of false claims. <br /><br />Of course, knowledge is power, but like the saying goes, the truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off. There are some parts in this book that made me pretty mad. Reading about women's experiences at work with sexual harassment and discrimination in the science and math fields is so infuriating and it's something I will never get used to. The fact that they are supposed to shut up about it or else they are seen as overly sensitive is just pure BS. <br /><br />The only thing that I'm disappointed about is the fact that she doesn't really talk about transgender women and transgender men. Sexism is definitely detrimental to the transgender community because it reinforced traditional gender roles, a topic that she spoke about extensively throughout the book. There is a mention of a transgender woman in the book, but it's a brief reference. I would have loved to see her discussion about how gender variant and transgender youth are affected by their environment and the media. But perhaps I will find that in another book. <br /><br />I really like how she tackles neurosexism and the gender binary by using hard science and a realistic, critical eye on information that is seen as golden and valid. <br /><br />1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.Terms of Use, Copyright, and Privacy Policy<br /><br />© 1997-2013 Barnesandnoble.com llc<br /> Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-17520126813004934962013-07-02T01:17:59.768+10:002013-07-02T01:17:59.768+10:00William Ickes
“Cordelia Fine has a first-rate int...William Ickes<br /><br />“Cordelia Fine has a first-rate intellect and writing talent to burn. In her new book, Delusions of Gender, she takes aim at the idea that male brains and female brains are ‘wired differently,’ leading men and women to act in a manner consistent with decades-old gender stereotypes. Armed with penetrating insights, a rapier wit, and a slew of carefully researched facts, Fine lowers her visor, lifts her lance, and attacks this idea full-force. Whether her adversaries can rally their forces and mount a successful counter-attack remains to be seen. What’s certain at this point, however, is that in Delusions of Gender Cordelia Fine has struck a terrific first blow against what she calls ‘neurosexism.’” <br />Katherine Bouton<br />…Cordelia Fine…is an acerbic critic, mincing no words when it comes to those she disagrees with. But her sharp tongue is tempered with humor and linguistic playfulness, as the title itself suggests. Academics like Simon Baron-Cohen and Dr. Louann Brizendine will want to come to this volume well armed. So would Norman Geschwind if he were still alive. Popular authors like John Gray (Men are from Mars), Michael Gurian (What Could He Be Thinking?) and Dr. Leonard Sax (Why Gender Matters) may want to read something else.<br />—The New York Times <br />Wray Herbert<br />…irreverent and important…Fine offers no original research on the brain or gender; instead, her mission is to demolish the sloppy science being used today to justify gender stereotypes—which she labels "neurosexism." She is no less merciless in attacking "brain scams," her derisive term for the many popular versions of the idea that sex hormones shape the brain, which then shapes behavior and intellectual ability, from mathematics to nurturance.<br />—The Washington Post <br />The New York Times<br />Delusions of Gender takes on that tricky question, Why exactly are men from Mars and women from Venus?, and eviscerates both the neuroscientists who claim to have found the answers and the popularizers who take their findings and run with them… [Fine] is an acerbic critic, mincing no words when it comes to those she disagrees with. But her sharp tongue is tempered with humor and linguistic playfulness… [R]ead this book and see how complex and fascinating the whole issue is.— Katherine Bouton <br />Katherine Bouton - The New York Times<br />“Delusions of Gender takes on that tricky question, Why exactly are men from Mars and women from Venus?, and eviscerates both the neuroscientists who claim to have found the answers and the popularizers who take their findings and run with them… [Fine] is an acerbic critic, mincing no words when it comes to those she disagrees with. But her sharp tongue is tempered with humor and linguistic playfulness… [R]ead this book and see how complex and fascinating the whole issue is.” <br />Read More Show Less <br />Product Details<br />ISBN-13: 9780393340242 <br />Publisher: Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc. <br />Publication date: 8/8/2011 <br />Edition description: Reprint <br />Pages: 338 <br />Sales rank: 93,006 <br />Product dimensions: 5.50 (w) x 8.10 (h) x 1.00 (d)<br />Meet the Author<br />Cordelia Fine, the author of A Mind of Its Own and Delusions of Gender, is a research associate at the Centre for Agency, <br />Values and Ethics at Macquarie University and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Melbourne’s Department of Psychology. She lives in Victoria, <br />Australia. <br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-35797579646619019542013-07-02T01:03:57.562+10:002013-07-02T01:03:57.562+10:00OPEN READER
Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, So...OPEN READER<br />Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference <br />by <br />Cordelia Fine <br /><br />Overview<br />“[Fine’s] sharp tongue is tempered with humor. . . . Read this book and see how complex and fascinating the whole issue is.”—The New York Times<br /><br /> <br /><br />Currently Viewing... Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference (Reprint) Pub. Date: 8/8/2011 Publisher: Norton, W. W. & Company, <br /><br />Inc. <br /><br />$7.90 <br />More About This Book<br />Overview <br />Editorial Reviews <br />Product Details <br />Meet the Author <br />Table of Contents <br />Overview<br /><br />“[Fine’s] sharp tongue is tempered with humor. . . . Read this book and see how complex and fascinating the whole issue is.”—The New York Times<br /><br />It’s the twenty-first century, and although we tried to rear unisex children—boys who play with dolls and girls who like trucks—we failed. Even though the glass ceiling is cracked, most women stay comfortably beneath it. And everywhere we hear about vitally important “hardwired” differences between male and female brains. The neuroscience that we read about in magazines, newspaper articles, books, and sometimes even scientific journals increasingly tells a tale of two brains, and the result is more often than not a validation of the status quo. Women, it seems, are just too intuitive for math; men too focused for housework.<br /><br />Drawing on the latest research in neuroscience and psychology, Cordelia Fine debunks the myth of hardwired differences between men’s and women’s brains, unraveling the evidence behind such claims as men’s brains aren’t wired for empathy and women’s brains aren’t made to fix cars. She then goes one step further, offering a very different explanation of the dissimilarities between men’s and women’s behavior. Instead of a “male brain” and a “female brain,” Fine gives us a glimpse of plastic, mutable minds that are continuously influenced by cultural assumptions about gender.<br /><br />Passionately argued and unfailingly astute, Delusions of Gender provides us with a much-needed corrective to the belief that men’s and women’s brains are intrinsically different—a belief that, as Fine shows with insight and humor, all too often works to the detriment of ourselves and our society.<br /><br /><br />Related Subjects<br />Gender Studies <br />Psychology - Theory, History & Research<br />Editorial Reviews<br />Boston Globe<br />“Forceful, funny. . . . These are the right questions to be asking.” <br />Dan Vergano - USA Today<br />“Fine turns the popular science book formula on its head. Chapter-by-chapter, she introduces ideas about innate differences between the sexes… and then tartly smacks around studies supposedly supporting them.” <br />Anna North - Jezebel.com<br />“Cordelia Fine’s thorough (and funny!) Delusions of Gender punches a giant hole in the idea that women's brains are somehow ‘hardwired’ for nurturing and domesticity.” <br />USA Today<br />“Fine turns the popular science book formula on its head. Chapter-by-chapter, she introduces ideas about innate differences between the sexes… and then tartly smacks around studies supposedly supporting them.”— Dan Vergano <br />Jezebel.com<br />“Cordelia Fine’s thorough (and funny!) Delusions of Gender punches a giant hole in the idea that women's brains are somehow ‘hardwired’ for nurturing and domesticity.”— Anna North <br />Uta Frith FBA<br />“In Delusions of Gender Cordelia Fine does a magnificent job debunking the so-called science, and especially the brain science, of gender. If you thought there were some inescapable facts about women’s minds—some hard wiring that explains poor science and maths performance, or the ability to remember to buy the milk and arrange the holidays—you can put these on the rubbish heap. Instead, Fine shows that there are almost no areas of performance that are not touched by cultural stereotypes. This scholarly book will make you itch to press the delete button on so much nonsense, while being pure fun to read.” <br />William Ickes<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-48356052903315258482013-07-02T00:53:02.519+10:002013-07-02T00:53:02.519+10:00This matters because the obsession with prenatal T...This matters because the obsession with prenatal T can easily become a distraction. It can make us forget how much gender norms have changed—think of all those female accountants, lawyers, and doctors who weren't around 50 or even 30 years ago—and how remarkably similar men's and women's brains and minds actually are. All this unwarranted hammering away at difference (and its putative explanations) causes real trouble, too. As a growing body of research shows, cues that foreground gender and bring stereotypes to mind can dampen men's performance on tests of social sensitivity, women's scores on math tests, and women's stated interest in quantitative pursuits Jordan-Young has done an enormous amount of work to untangle the gender claims. We ought to read her, cite her, thank her. And then, let's move on.<br /><br /><br /> <br /><br />Amanda Schaffer is a science and medical columnist for Slate<br /><br /><br />Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Division of the Washington Post Company<br />All contents © 2013 The Slate Group, LLC. All rights reserved.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-66533374740840253952013-07-02T00:48:22.873+10:002013-07-02T00:48:22.873+10:00Research on people with intersex disorders comes i...Research on people with intersex disorders comes in for similar needed scrutiny. A large number of studies look at women and girls with congenital adrenal hyperplasia, a genetic disorder that involves the overproduction of androgens like testosterone. Because these females' hormonal exposures are closer to males', the theory is their behaviors and interests ought to tend toward the "masculine" as well. And in fact, some data suggest that CAH females may be more likely than their sisters to play with vehicles and construction-related toys as children. They may be "less likely to prioritize marriage and motherhood over career," writes Jordan-Young. Also, they may be more likely to express an interest in male-dominated careers like engineer and airline pilot. This evidence has played a starring role in debates over whether fewer women hold tenured positions in these fields because they are innately less interested in the subject matter. Why push for parity in any male-dominated field if you will just run up against nature, as inscribed by fetal T?<br /><br />But it's never been clear how relevant the research on CAH girls and women is to other females. Many CAH patients are born with masculinized genitalia. That might make them feel freer to express preferences that are less common or acceptable for girls, like a desire to fly planes for a living. CAH girls also go through extensive medical monitoring and treatment, and that, too, may make a difference. Jordan-Young cites an intriguing experiment from the mid-1980s in which researcher Froukje Slijper looked at girls with diabetes, as well as girls with CAH and girls without either condition. What she found was that "both groups of girls with chronic illness scored in the more masculine range" than the normally healthy girls. Whatever the reason, the finding should give us pause: It's tricky to link up girls with CAH and those who don't have a serious, T-related disease.<br /><br />So where does this leave us? In light of Jordan-Young's meticulous synthesis, it's hard to name any specific feature of male-typical or female-typical behavior that consistently matches up with prenatal T levels across several models of research. No measure holds up: not aggressiveness, or masturbation habits, or even the ability to rotate objects in the mind, long viewed as the gold standard of sex-difference research because it is a skill on which average men and average women reliably differ. There are studies to cite for all of these claims. But what's missing is corroboration across approaches—from studies that look at different kinds of people (say, those with a disorder like CAH or those without), or that try to gauge prenatal hormone exposures in different ways (say, through amniotic fluid or maternal blood or finger-digit ratio). After decades of determined research, if robust links between prenatal hormones and "male" or "female" minds really exist, shouldn't we see those links across lots of different kinds of studies?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-6016736020958551952013-07-02T00:43:51.460+10:002013-07-02T00:43:51.460+10:00This presumption has led to some strange contortio...This presumption has led to some strange contortions and flip-flopping. In the early 1970s, for instance, one study reported that boys whose mothers took a synthetic estrogen, which was thought to prevent complications in pregnancy, tended later on to show less masculine behavior like lower assertiveness or aggression. Soon, however, animal research found that testosterone converted to estrogen in the brain actually seems to do the opposite—to make boys act more typically masculine. And soon after that, the reversal showed up in human research, too: Another study suggested that boys exposed prenatally to a synthetic estrogen might show more masculine behavior, according to Jordan-Young. The data on synthetic estrogen and progesterone exposures are complicated. But what's striking, in Jordan-Young's telling, is that the researchers' findings tended to dovetail suspiciously well with their assumptions. <br /><br />The red flags only multiply as Jordan-Young compares more-recent results. Of course, scientists cannot go in and vary prenatal exposure to hormones and then see what happens in a controlled experiment. Nor can they measure anything directly in the fetal brain. Instead, they must rely on "quasi-experiments" and proxy variables for hormone levels.This puts particular pressure on how well different findings fit together, Jordan-Young argues.To take one example: Psychologist Melissa Hines has measured testosterone in pregnant women's blood and linked higher levels of the hormone to more masculine behavior in 3½-year-olds, measured as "involvement with sex-typical toys, games and activities." Meanwhile, psychologist Simon Baron-Cohen has measured testosterone in amniotic fluid and linked higher levels of hormone to tendencies he deems typical of males (less eye contact at age 1, poorer social relationships and more restricted interests at age 4). The only problem is that Hines found her link for girls but not for boys. On some measures, Baron-Cohen has found a relationship just for boys and on other measures for boys and girls taken together. For play behavior, he reports no link with T levels for either gender. So it's hard to put these projects together and come up with a consistent story. Instead, it's a mishmash. <br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-70780786788922591222013-07-02T00:35:57.309+10:002013-07-02T00:35:57.309+10:00HOME Doublex : What women really think about ne...HOME Doublex : What women really think about news, politics, and culture. <br /><br />The Last Word on Fetal T<br /><br />Rebecca Jordan-Young's masterful critique of the research on the relationship between testosterone and sex difference.<br /><br />By Amanda Schaffer Posted Thursday, Oct. 21, 2010, at 10:30 AM<br /> <br /><br /> <br /> Try talking about whether single sex education is better for boys, or why there aren't more female science professors at Harvard, or whether male financiers are innately more aggressive, and sooner or later someone will evoke that handy, biological explanation of sex difference: fetal testosterone. The usual argument is that early hormonal exposures mold "male" and "female" minds. That is, a prenatal marinade helps shape men and women's later sexual desires, intellectual talents, personality traits and career interests—in ways that typically differ by gender. A loud chorus of researchers and popular writers, including psychologists Simon Baron-Cohen, Susan Pinker and Steven Pinker, psychiatrist Louann Brizendine, and therapist Michael Gurian, frequently invoke prenatal hormones to explain male and female behavior.<br /><br />At first glance, the science seems to offer strong backup: Hundreds of articles report a relationship between prenatal hormone levels and, say, which toys girls and boys like as kids or how aggressive they are or how easily they can mentally rotate objects or (when they're a bit older) how much they masturbate. The usual assumption is that since males have more prenatal T, and T is the male hormone, of course it must explain the hallmarks of maleness in the mind.<br /><br />This view sucks up a lot of oxygen, and it takes painstaking effort to refute it. I tried to in a Slate series on psychological sex differences that sent me deep into the weeds for months. (Every writer I know who's taken on this literature shudders a little at the memory.) So it was with appreciation verging on glee that I read Barnard professor Rebecca Jordan-Young's devastatingly smart and definitive critique: Brain Storm: The Flaws in the Science of Sex Differences. Jordan-Young argues that the science of prenatal hormones, gender, and the mind "better resembles a hodgepodge pile than a solid structure." And she knows of what she speaks.<br /><br />Advertisement<br /><br />An expert on measures and study designs, Jordan-Young has spent the last 13 years combing the literature on brain organization, unpacking assumptions, questioning methods and statistical practices, holding one paper up against another. She stresses that fetal hormones must matter to the brain—somehow. But after picking apart more than 400 studies that try to understand the genesis of particular psychological sex differences (real or supposed), she concludes that fetal T looks like an awfully anemic explanation. <br /><br />Prenatal hormones are, indisputably, important to genital development. But the more controversial question has always been whether the mind is also shaped in categorically "male" or "female" ways, by testosterone or estrogen. For decades, a series of researchers have doggedly tried to prove that it is, treating the brain as an "accessory reproductive organ," as Jordan-Young writes.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-6122847282977058632013-07-02T00:22:55.095+10:002013-07-02T00:22:55.095+10:00Hi Zoe,
Thank you for the appreciation,but it'...Hi Zoe,<br /><br />Thank you for the appreciation,but it's *not* just Dr.Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen's "view point(or anyone elses either!) she explained what decades of tons of great research studies have consistently found as she said,we have abundant data that shows that the sexes are much more psychologically(and biologically too!) alike than different,and that in most eras of traits,abilities and behaviors the sexes overlap almost totally and most of the differences found are small average differences that as she explained many have shrunk to even smaller,and that they find much greater differences between individual *people* differences!<br /><br />Psychologist Dr.Janet Shibley Hyde's meta-analysis<br /> that I posted about on here was very extensive and thorough,she reviewed over 7,000 studies from 20 years! And the finding are exactly what Gender and Christian Scholar Eastern Psychology Professor Dr.Mary Stewart Van Leeuwen explains,and she's very knowledgeable about all of this.<br /><br />Are you by any chance a transgengered person yourself if you don't mind I ask? I don't hate or fear transexuals and I don't want them to be discriminated against or harmed, <br />Except "feminine" and "masculine" are really *HUMAN* traits,thoughts,feelings and behaviors! Unfortunately transexuals both reflect and re-inforce these artificial socially constructed categories in the very sexist,gender divided,gender stereotyped,woman-hating male dominated society we all live in!<br />And there is plenty of decades worth of great psychological research studies by many different psychologists that shows that the sexes are much more alike than different in most traits,abilities and behaviors with a very large overlap between them,and that most of the differences between them are really small average differences,many of which have shrunk even smaller,and they find much greater individual *people* differences! Biologically the sexes are more alike than different too! Transexuals don't help people learn and understand this!<br /> <br /> <br />Feminists(such as Robin Morgan,Janice Raymond,Gloria Steinem,Germaine Greer etc) who have rightfully pointed this fact out,are not afraid of transexuals or prejudiced against them,the issue is what I said it is. The only transexual woman who actually debunks these common sexist gender myths,and gender stereotypes is Kate Bornstein author of Gender Outlaw:On Men,Women And The Rest Of Us,Gender Outlaws,My Gender Workbook etc. She was a heterosexual man who was married and had a daughter,then had a sex change and became a lesbian woman and then decided not to idenitify as a man or a woman.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-9690322614640402562013-07-02T00:06:32.108+10:002013-07-02T00:06:32.108+10:00
POGREBIN: Exactly.
PAYNE: So…I wanna shift the ...<br /><br />POGREBIN: Exactly.<br /><br />PAYNE: So…I wanna shift the conversation more towards feminism in general.<br />You wrote in your book, Deborah, Golda and Me, “every woman is the author of her own emancipation.” I love that. How would you describe<br />your own emancipation?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well certainly it was through my research. I researched feminism in a<br />way that freed me to become who I was and also freed me from the<br />scriptures of old thinking. I was an executive in a book publishing<br />company, but I would have spent my life in a very naïve universe had I<br />not come to understand the condition of other women.<br /><br />END OF INTERVIEW<br /><br />Transcribed by Allison Payne, 2008.<br />© Sophia Smith Collection 2008Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-56237738170431175182013-07-01T23:56:59.736+10:002013-07-01T23:56:59.736+10:00PAYNE: No…
POGREBIN: Well go right out—run, do no...PAYNE: No…<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well go right out—run, do not walk—and get Free to Be You and Me.<br />You will…really, you will be so charmed… And you know, Stories for<br />Free Children, the stories that were in every issue of Ms. Magazine, I<br />put together a book of those stories and they were all about, you<br />know…girls becoming adventurers and boys discovering their feelings<br />and mommies can be anything and all of that. And that became a<br /><br />fascination, almost an obsession of mine, and I wrote about called<br />Growing Up Free, which is on nonsexist childrearing, published in<br />1980.<br /><br />PAYNE: Just a quick question… Did you find that your nonsexist childrearing<br />ever conflicted with the messages your children were receiving from the<br />media—<br /><br />POGREBIN: Oh, yes.<br /><br />PAYNE: How did they deal with that?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well it was completely counter to the received wisdom all around them,<br />which was that boys don’t play with dolls. But everyone who came to<br />this house—we had consciousness raising meetings in this room and<br />they would be up there sitting on the balcony listening, so it was<br />normalized in our family. But they would see me on—every year I used<br />to do a review of the toys on the market, and this room would be full of<br />sample toys, because I would write about them in the magazine. You’ll<br />see if you look back at the December issues every year, toys for free<br />children. And so my kids would see me testing toys and I would say,<br />Look at this package…[CAN’T UNDERSTAND]… And it really<br />makes girls feel odd, choosing. Same with pink and blue. So they kind<br />of came along with me, and we would all try out the toys. First of all,<br />most of it was junk. I would rate them based on safety, quality,<br />packaging, and sexism. And they [my children] were tuned in. The rest<br />of the culture would be sending them messages and they would feel<br />sorry for the rest of the kids who weren’t allowed to play with certain<br />toys. They were allowed to play with anything! I never said, You can’t<br />play with that because you’re a boy, or You can’t play with that because<br />you’re a girl. So…they started to feel sorry for kids who were limited<br />by parents who were, like…nuts. Why doesn’t their mom let them do<br />that? You know, and we would have discussions about it.<br /><br />PAYNE: Yes, they sound much freer.<br /><br /><br />POGREBIN: They were much freer.<br /><br /><br />PAYNE: OK. What were some difficulties in raising children—sons in<br />particular—to be nonsexist?<br /><br />Letty Cottin Pogrebin, interviewed by Allison Payne Tape 1 of 1 Page 10 of 14<br />Women’s Activism and Oral History Project Smith College<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well, only that he had the safety in this house of being whoever he<br />wanted to be. And when he went out into the world he<br />was…unconventional. So he would have to answer for himself. And<br />that was very strengthening for him. My son loves to cook, he ended up<br />going to chef school, he became a chef, now he’s in the restaurant<br />business.<br /><br />PAYNE: Does he have a restaurant in the city?<br /><br />POGREBIN: He works on the West Side. He’s a general manager. <br /><br />POGREBIN: OK. I’ll always remember when—I don’t know if you’ve ever been to<br />summer camp……we were listening and we were all sitting around<br />here….And at one point he said we have a wonderful man-made lake, a<br />great art program…. The guy leaves, it sounded like a really wonderful<br />camp, and my son says, “I’m not going to that camp.” So we said,<br />“Why? What’s wrong with it?” And he said, “it’s sexist.” And we<br />said, “Well how do you know it’s sexist?” “He said they had a manmade<br />lake!” … He would never say man-made, he would say artificial.<br />Because when a kid hears “man-made” they see men making something.<br />And he knew enough—he was very tuned-in to language… Another<br />time, he was with his class somewhere—in the Botanical Gardens, I<br />think—and he said, “Oh, that’s such a lovely flower!” And his friends<br />made fun of him for saying lovely.<br /><br />PAYNE: That’s sad!<br /><br />POGREBIN: I know, it’s awful. But he talked back. He knew enough to say, “I use<br />all kinds of words. I use all the words that I know. And that is a lovely<br />flower.”<br /><br />PAYNE: It shows that feminism can liberate men too.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-38206039655476180712013-07-01T23:34:55.417+10:002013-07-01T23:34:55.417+10:00
PAYNE: I don’t know about Redhook or McCalls, but...<br />PAYNE: I don’t know about Redhook or McCalls, but you can read it in Oprah,<br />definitely.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yeah. So Ms. doesn’t have to have any CANT UNDERSTAND that we<br />did. And I don’t think you can buy it on a newsstand. But I think it’s<br />useful for college people to see international feminism.<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah, definitely.<br /><br />POGREBIN: What school are you from?<br /><br />PAYNE: I go to Mount Holyoke.<br /><br />POGREBIN: How did you come to me in the first place?<br /><br />PAYNE: I’m taking a class at Smith called Oral History and Women’s Activism.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Mmhmm.<br /><br />PAYNE: And we each have to find someone who we would like to do an oral<br />history on. So I chose to get in touch with you because I’m very<br />interested in journalism and you worked with Ms. and I love Ms.<br /><br />POGREBIN: I see.<br /><br />PAYNE: Um…So, back to the questions. So much of your work has been about<br />non-sexist childrearing. I was wondering if you could talk about how<br />you came to this subject…I’m guessing you had children?<br /><br />POGREBIN: (laughs) Good guess.<br /><br /><br />PAYNE: Go me…<br /><br />POGREBIN: In 1971 the first issue—um…the first issue came out—actually, January<br />of ’72, but we were working on it in 1971. In 1971 I had two six year<br />old girls and a three year old boy. So my kids were raised on my—I<br />was educating myself as I was raising them—and, if you get to read that<br />article you’ll see how it made me stop and think about everything I was<br />doing. And it basically happened when I was coming home from<br />work—I worked 3 days a week, a ten hour day, so by the end of the<br />week I had worked maybe 30 hours or 36 hours, and then of course I<br />brought work home and I wrote and so on. But the point is that I was<br />working at Ms. and I was able to do both. And the other four days—or<br />the two days of the weekend—I was really like a full-time mom. So…I<br />never kind of looked at my life in any sort of—Well, what should I<br />change or what should I challenge or what would a feminist do except<br />where my own life was concerned. I never looked at it where my kids<br />were concerned. So one day I come home from work with a basketball<br />set that you attach to a closet door and it comes with a little nerve door<br />that dosn’t beak the lamps…And I put it on the door of my son’s closet.<br />And my husband came home and said, “Why did you put it on David’s<br />door, he’s 3 years old!” You can’t do this. (laughter) And it was like, a<br />light when off in my head—Yeah, I have two six year old girls, very<br />athletic, they’re very active, they do everything, and I put this on my<br />son’s door. It was like this unconscious boy equals basketball. That I<br />will always remember was my first moment of…epiphanic moment, and<br />I started to look at everything I did that was so unthinking. You know I<br />mean, ‘Have the boys do this and the girls do that,’ and it had nothing to<br />do with age, it had nothing to do with reality, it had everything to do<br />with pink is girl and blue is boy. And so I started to, in their rooms, I<br />would make sure that the girls had every kind of toy—trucks and action<br />toys and books about adventure—and the boy’s room would have tea<br />sets and dolls. That’s why you see in that painting, he has two dolls, he<br />also has a rocket. (laughs) You know what I mean? They were a<br />product of the open-opportunity childhood…In 1976, my girls were<br />eleven, so they had had many years of our changed way of childrearing.<br />I became fascinated by how we track and brainwash children and don’t<br />let them become who they are, who they’re meant to be. So I started to<br />kind of…blow that all open and…You know Free to Be You and Me?<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-76864161265996451942013-07-01T23:30:43.317+10:002013-07-01T23:30:43.317+10:00POGREBIN: So you have a problem there. Who’s going...POGREBIN: So you have a problem there. Who’s going to represent a constituency<br />of lesser-educated, economically, you know, challenged people? So<br />that was tough.<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Um…did group dynamics change after<br />Gloria Steinem’s rise to fame?<br /><br />POGREBIN: She was already very famous.<br /><br />PAYNE: At that point?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yes. Famous enough to get people to raise money by her having lunch<br />with people. She was famous, she was beautiful, she was smart, I mean,<br />I think the magazine really benefited from all the things she brought to<br />the table.<br /><br />PAYNE: How did working with Gloria Steinem and the whole Ms. team<br />influence your ideas on feminism?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well, I think by the time I joined Ms. I think I had become a pretty<br />committed feminism from everything that I’d read. I’d read myself into<br />feminism, and I, you know, I became an editor immediately, and…what<br />I’d probably brought to the table, I think I was one of the few that had<br />children. So I brought a kind of awareness of the family woman’s<br />issues and the challenges of the home and raising kids and also having a<br />job. I brought that. I also started the Stories for Free Children section<br />in the magazine, which every month ran children’s stories, which was<br />pretty ironic because one of the claims was that feminists didn’t like<br />children and were anti-family. You know, they would like to defame us<br />in any way that they could. So that was one of the charges…<br />Meanwhile, we were the only magazine that had a childrens’ stories<br />section. We who hated children had devoted at least four pages a month<br />to children…. We had many articles on childrearing and marriage and<br />house work…you know, and the inequities of the homemaker’s role… I<br />think we were remarkable in that we were so ahead of the game.<br />PAYNE: Definitely. And that is very important, especially then—at any time,<br />really—because so many members of your audience probably also had<br />children.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yes they did.<br /><br />PAYNE: And so—<br /><br />POGREBIN: It’s a full time job.<br /><br />PAYNE: A struggle…<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yeah.<br /><br />PAYNE: What do you think was your most well-received article at Ms.?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Um…I did a piece on motherhood… Um…that was talked about a lot,<br />because I really looked at the structure of motherhood and sort of the<br />sociology of motherhood… Um…I did a piece called, Do women make<br />men violent? Which was talked about a lot.<br />PAYNE: I’m sure.<br /><br /><br />POGREBIN: I did a piece on the power of beauty…so I kind of deconstructed beauty<br />to be more honest about it, because as feminists we like to believe that<br />beauty doesn’t count, it doesn’t matter, no make-up, no this, no that,<br />but that was never a general rule, we simply unpacked it, we picked it<br />apart, we looked at it in our lives, like what role it played in getting<br />hired, not just in getting boyfriends or husbands but you know, in<br />lesbian relationships it figures just as much, in jury selections—up and<br />down the line beauty plays a role and people didn’t really wanna look at<br />it frankly or analytically and we did.<br /><br /><br />PAYNE: It’s a symbol of your worth.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yeah. Still is.<br /><br />PAYNE: What do you make of the evolution of Ms.?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well, I think it’s gone through a lot of incarnations, and now it’s<br />operated by the Feminist Majority, and I think it’s fine. It doesn’t have<br />a real kind…populace…mass market feeling, which we at that point, we<br />really did. You could pick us up a the newsstand, but you can’t do that<br />anymore. And we were able therefore to appeal to a very broad<br />spectrum. Now, Ms. appeals to committed movement women and<br />people in college. Which is fine, because you know what, all the other<br />women’s magazines now run stuff that we used to be the only ones that<br />ran, things on sexual harassment or rape or poverty, I mean, you can<br />read that now in Redhook and McCalls. If there is a Redhook and<br />McCall now.<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-78434061586714189572013-07-01T22:51:36.920+10:002013-07-01T22:51:36.920+10:00POGREBIN Well I should first probably tell you abo...POGREBIN Well I should first probably tell you about how I got involved in the<br />women’s movement. From my career in publishing to my becoming an<br />active feminist on a day-to-day basis was a, a sort of a giant step. When<br />my first book was published, I left my job in publishing to become a<br />full-time writer. Why? Because I got asked to write a column for the<br />Ladies Home Journal called “Working Woman,” and I also got many<br />assignments from them. That’s not how it works, usually. Writers<br />scrounge and claw and I was just very fortunate that I got a good review<br />for my first book. People reached out to me, so I started writing on<br />women’s issues, and next thing you know I get a call from Betty<br />Freidan. I don’t remember if this is in Deborah…<br /><br />PAYNE I don’t think so.<br /><br />POGREBIN I got a call from Betty Freidan, and um she said we’re gonna be starting a<br />National Women’s Political Caucus and we’re having a conference in<br />Washington, and I want you to come down and help me. So that was<br />the sort of way Betty Freidan operated—“You will do this, you will do<br />that,” and you did it! And when I got down there to this conference I<br />met Gloria Steinem, and I found that I was much more compatible with<br />her and her kind of feminism, which was more inclusive and less white<br />middle-class.<br /><br />PAYNE Yeah. That’s a good point.<br /><br />POGREBIN So then I got friendly with Gloria, and she asked if I wanted to help start<br />Ms., and so that how I got into kind of professional feminism.<br /><br />PAYNE: About Ms. Magazine, um…What was the environment like in the early<br />days among the founders and the writers?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well, very…ultra-egalitarian. In other words, everyone was assumed to<br />have authority and everyone was assumed to be equal and of course that<br />wasn’t true, it was idealized because who were incapable of doing<br />things were given jobs on the grounds that women have been suppressed<br />and if you give them a chance they can do it—and they all were not able<br />to be editors or writers. So that took us a while to sort out. We were<br />using shoestrings, my desk was the carton from a dishwasher that<br />somebody had thrown out. I cut a little hole in the carton for me knees,<br />put my typewriter on it.. It wasn’t even an electric typewriter, it was a<br />manual. And we, we were five women who started Ms. Magazine and<br />we were in two tiny offices, adjoining offices. It was very low-key,<br />low-budget…<br /><br />PAYNE: So…it was a garage band, then.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yeah, it was, it really was. And you know, we were so low-budget we<br />would have published on mimeographs. But somebody came along and<br />advised us that it would be cheaper to publish a real magazine, in the<br />long run…We professionalized….Well, I should tell you, when we first<br />published, we assumed that the magazine would be on sale for six<br />weeks, eight weeks…and it sold out in 8 days all over the country.<br /><br />PAYNE: Wow.<br /><br />POGREBIN: And that’s when we knew we really…<br /><br /><br />PAYNE: There was a real interest.<br /><br />POGREBIN: There was a movement.<br /><br /><br /><br />PAYNE: Yes, there was. Ms. Magazine founders were of all different<br />backgrounds, just across race, class, um, religion, sexual orientation,<br />and so on. How did this influence, contribute to, perhaps even disrupt<br />group dynamics, if at all?<br /><br />POGREBIN: The fact that people were all different things?<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah, or how did it change or represent the magazine as a whole?<br /><br />POGREBIN: It being the diversity?<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Um…well we were aware of the need for diversity. We had, we had,<br />you know, black women—not the original first five. The original first<br />five were two Jews, two Protestants—no, yeah Christians, I’m not sure<br />what kind—and Gloria who was half and half. But we didn’t have any<br />black women or any Latino women in the first five. But we were very<br />aware of that and our editors were all different kinds, and our—and in<br />our articles we were always very aware of it, and—you know, the<br />hardest issue was class. Class is a very tough issue still to this day.<br />Because you want to acknowledge the authentic experience of everyone,<br />but…you’re not going to be able to have a high school drop out as an<br />editor.<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah.<br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-77996756666745641072013-07-01T22:45:29.326+10:002013-07-01T22:45:29.326+10:00Some relevant reading:
Women in IT
An Essay on Ge...Some relevant reading:<br /><a href="http://aebrain.blogspot.com.au/2009/04/women-in-it.html" rel="nofollow">Women in IT</a><br /><br /><a href="http://aebrain.blogspot.com.au/2011/02/essay-on-gender-sex-self-identity-and.html" rel="nofollow">An Essay on Gender, Sex, Self, Identity and Brains</a><br /><br /><i>So it’s not that simple. There’s no such thing as a “male brain” or a “female brain”, any more than there’s a “male height” or “female height”. (Yet men tend to be taller than women).<br /><br />Height isn’t a social construct, but the concepts of “Tall” and “Short” are. 5' 5" is tall for a woman in Thailand, short for a woman in Kenya. And tall for a man anywhere in Europe in the middle ages.<br /><br />Looking at Gender… 80% or so is a social construct. It differs from place to place and time to time. Pink was a “traditionally masculine” colour in the 19th century. There are few “traditionally gendered” behaviours that have any biological basis at all, and fewer still that are strongly based on biology.<br /><br />A lot of the ones thought to be based on biology – as they pretty much all were in the 19th century – aren’t. That doesn’t mean to say that none are, we have to look at the actual evidence. Mathematical ability – sexually isomorphic. Instinctive ballistics calculations – sexually dimorphic. And it’s all statistical anyway, we have to treat people as individuals.</i>Zoe Brainhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13712045376060102538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5573426.post-26197821703540783682013-07-01T22:36:06.424+10:002013-07-01T22:36:06.424+10:00POGREBIN Well I should first probably tell you abo...POGREBIN Well I should first probably tell you about how I got involved in the<br />women’s movement. From my career in publishing to my becoming an<br />active feminist on a day-to-day basis was a, a sort of a giant step. When<br />my first book was published, I left my job in publishing to become a<br />full-time writer. Why? Because I got asked to write a column for the<br />Ladies Home Journal called “Working Woman,” and I also got many<br />assignments from them. That’s not how it works, usually. Writers<br />scrounge and claw and I was just very fortunate that I got a good review<br />for my first book. People reached out to me, so I started writing on<br />women’s issues, and next thing you know I get a call from Betty<br />Freidan. I don’t remember if this is in Deborah…<br /><br />PAYNE I don’t think so.<br /><br />POGREBIN I got a call from Betty Freidan, and um she said we’re gonna be starting a<br />National Women’s Political Caucus and we’re having a conference in<br />Washington, and I want you to come down and help me. So that was<br />the sort of way Betty Freidan operated—“You will do this, you will do<br />that,” and you did it! And when I got down there to this conference I<br />met Gloria Steinem, and I found that I was much more compatible with<br />her and her kind of feminism, which was more inclusive and less white<br />middle-class.<br /><br />PAYNE Yeah. That’s a good point.<br /><br />POGREBIN So then I got friendly with Gloria, and she asked if I wanted to help start<br />Ms., and so that how I got into kind of professional feminism.<br /><br />PAYNE: About Ms. Magazine, um…What was the environment like in the early<br />days among the founders and the writers?<br /><br />POGREBIN: Well, very…ultra-egalitarian. In other words, everyone was assumed to<br />have authority and everyone was assumed to be equal and of course that<br />wasn’t true, it was idealized because who were incapable of doing<br />things were given jobs on the grounds that women have been suppressed<br />and if you give them a chance they can do it—and they all were not able<br />to be editors or writers. So that took us a while to sort out. We were<br />using shoestrings, my desk was the carton from a dishwasher that<br />somebody had thrown out. I cut a little hole in the carton for me knees,<br />put my typewriter on it.. It wasn’t even an electric typewriter, it was a<br />manual. And we, we were five women who started Ms. Magazine and<br />we were in two tiny offices, adjoining offices. It was very low-key,<br />low-budget…<br /><br />PAYNE: So…it was a garage band, then.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Yeah, it was, it really was. And you know, we were so low-budget we<br />would have published on mimeographs. But somebody came along and<br />advised us that it would be cheaper to publish a real magazine, in the<br />long run…We professionalized….Well, I should tell you, when we first<br />published, we assumed that the magazine would be on sale for six<br />weeks, eight weeks…and it sold out in 8 days all over the country.<br /><br />PAYNE: Wow.<br /><br />POGREBIN: And that’s when we knew we really…<br /><br /><br />PAYNE: There was a real interest.<br /><br />POGREBIN: There was a movement.<br /><br /><br /><br />PAYNE: Yes, there was. Ms. Magazine founders were of all different<br />backgrounds, just across race, class, um, religion, sexual orientation,<br />and so on. How did this influence, contribute to, perhaps even disrupt<br />group dynamics, if at all?<br /><br />POGREBIN: The fact that people were all different things?<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah, or how did it change or represent the magazine as a whole?<br /><br />POGREBIN: It being the diversity?<br /><br />PAYNE: Yeah.<br /><br />POGREBIN: Um…well we were aware of the need for diversity. We had, we had,<br />you know, black women—not the original first five. The original first<br />five were two Jews, two Protestants—no, yeah Christians, I’m not sure<br />what kind—and Gloria who was half and half. But we didn’t have any<br />black women or any Latino women in the first five. But we were very<br />aware of that and our editors were all different kinds, and our—and in<br />our articles we were always very aware of it, and—you know, the<br />hardest issue was class. Class is a very tough issue still to this day.<br />Because you want to acknowledge the authentic experience of everyone,<br />but…you’re not going to be able to have a high school drop out as an<br />editor.<br /><br />Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com