Sex and Gender, Essay Example

Many people use the terms sex and gender interchangeably but they refer to different concepts. Sex refers to biological differences between men and women. This includes chromosome, hormones and the sex organs. The term gender refers to masculine and feminine or the way a society or culture defines masculine and feminine.

Sex is determined at conception but sexual organs don’t start to develop until the fourth month of pregnancy. This is when a fetus starts producing hormones. Males produce androgens and females produce estrogens. Although sex is determined by a person’s chromosomes, it is not generally believed to be changeable. However, there’s disagreement over whether those who have undergone sex reassignment surgery actually become the opposite sex since they sex chromosome doesn’t change although other characteristics of sex such as hormones and the genitals are changed (Fausto-Sterling, 2000.)

Gender refers to social roles, behavior, interests and characteristics that a culture finds acceptable or unacceptable for men and women.  This means that gender can vary widely across cultures.  What is considered appropriate for women or men in one society may not be considered so in others.  Gender is learned as one grows up and takes on the gender roles that are expected of them.  In many cultures those who act differently from what is expected for their gender are ignored or made fun of.

An example of the use of the term sex when gender would be more appropriate is referring to women having longer hair and men having shorter hair as a sex difference.  Sometimes it has been believed that men and women having the opposite hair lengths indicates homosexuality since it is decided that they look like members of the opposite sex.  This is something that is dependent on culture and beliefs about how men and women “should” look and members are judged negatively for acting against the cultural gender norms.

References

Fausto-Sterling, A. (2000). Dueling dualisms. In Sexing the Body, (pp. 4-29). New York, NY. Basic Books

Hammond, R., Cheney, P., Marenco, A., & Coleman, K. (2012). Sex and gender. In Introductory Sociology, (pp. 99-115). San Jose, CA: Open Doors Group.