NATURE THEORIES (ESSENTIALIST THEORIES, BIOLOGICAL
DETERMINISM)
Various theories on biology have been advanced to justify inequalities
between men and women. There are those for instance which seek to
explain these differences on the brains and intellectual capacities of men
and women.
In the 19th century, arguments were advanced to justify the exclusion of
women in higher education. The arguments ranged from reasons to the
effect that (1) women had lesser brains and hence could not compete
men in the intellectual fields, to arguments that (2) overindulgence in
intellectual work would affect women’s childbearing capacity (since
there is a direct link between the womb and brain - Sayers J – “Biological
politics”). Such arguments rendered women being deliberately left out
to pursue their intellectual potentials. For example, a board of a British
University decreed that women should not be left to pursue University
education because “doing so will inflict them with the disease of the
womb” (“it is better for the future matriarchs of this country to be
robust than inflicting them with the disease of the womb”).
Anne Moir and David Jessel in “Brain sex” (1989) have recently
popularized this views. To them, the sexes will never be equal because
‘their brains are simply different’. The two attempt to provide scientific
rationalization for the inevitability for women subordination. The
differences in the brains of men and women are to be found in their
‘wiring’, they say. ‘They (men and women) are equal only in the
membership of the same species, humankind. To maintain that they are
the same in aptitude, skill and behavior, is to build a society out of
biological and scientific lie. The sexes are different because their brains
are different…..the brain processes information in different ways, which
results in different perceptions, priorities and behavior’
Frank York in ‘Gender Differences are Real’ NARTH 2008, and supporting
this view – says that Males and females are not only markedly different
in the hormones that drive them, but they are also different in the way
they
think. The brains of men and women are actually wired differently.
George Mason University professor Robert Nadeau, the author of S/he
Brain: Science, Sexual Politics, and the Feminist Movement, describes
significant differences between male and female brains. In an essay on
this subject in The World & I, (November 1, 1997), Nadeau observes:
"The human brain, like the human body, is sexed, and differences in the
sex-specific human brain condition a wide range of behaviors that we
typically associate with maleness or femaleness."
Nadeau says that the sex-specific differences in the brain are located both
in the primitive regions, and in the neocortex--the higher brain regions.
The left hemisphere (in the neocortex) controls language analysis and
expression and body movements while the right hemisphere is responsible
for spatial relationships, facial expressions, emotional stimuli, and vocal
intonations.
According to Nadeau, studies have shown that problem-solving tasks in
female brains are handled by both hemispheres, while the male brain only
uses one hemisphere.
Men and women process information differently because of
differences in a portion of the brain called the splenium, which is
much larger in women than in men, and has more brain-wave
activity.
Differences in the ways men and women communicate is also a
function of sex-specific areas of the brain. Women seem to have an
enhanced awareness (sensitive) of "emotionally relevant details,
visual cues (signals), verbal nuances (slight differences not
recognizable), and hidden meanings," writes Nadeau. Similarly, while
male infants are more interested in objects than in people, female
infants respond more readily to the human voice than do male
infants.
Apart from the splenium, another example lies in the amygdala, the
organ that interprets the emotional content of an experience. Larry
Cahill, a neurobiologist at the University of California, found that the
amygdala works differently in men and women, which may help explain
why women are more likely to develop mood disorders, and men are
more prone to alcoholism and drug abuse. In one experiment, Cahill
showed that when men and women watched the same emotional
movie, the right side of the amygdala was more active in men, and the
left amygdala was more active in women.
According to Ronald Kotulak in Gender and the Brain (2006), new
evidence shows how hormones wire the minds of men and women to
see the world differently. That women and men think differently has little
to do with whether they are handed (socialized) dolls or trucks to play
with as infants. After all, when infant monkeys are given a choice of
human toys, females prefer (innate/inborn) dolls and males go after cars
and trucks. The differences, researchers are beginning to discover,
appear to have a lot more to do with how powerful hormones wire the
female and male brain during early development and later in life.
The difference between the male and female brain is not evidence of
superiority or inferiority, but of specialization. Michael Levin, writing in
Feminism and Freedom, notes that, in general, males have better spatial
and math skills than females. While feminists often claim that these
differences are due to social expectations--and if girls were encouraged
to be mathematicians, they would have the same ability as boys--there is
evidence that these differences are inherited and appear in childhood,
actually increasing during puberty (development of brain in childhood).
On the other hand, girls tend to be more vocal than boys, are better at
hearing higher frequencies, and do better than boys in reading and
vocabulary tests.
Edgar Berman, (1919 – 1987) a personal physician to the Vice- President
Herbert Humphrey of the US in the 1970’s, wrote to the ‘New York
Times’ of 26th July 1970 in relation to the 1962 Cuban crisis: “there are
physical and psychological inhibit ants’ that limit a female’s potential. I
would rather have a JF Kennedy make the Cuban crisis decision than a
female of the same age who could possibly be the subject to the raging
hormones and curious mental aberrations of the same age’.
Genetic make-up is also thought to contribute towards differentiations
in gender roles. Dawkins Richard ‘The selfish genes’ (1976) explains the
division of labor in child rearing as arising from a gene’s instinct of
survival. Dawkins argues that the ‘battle of sexes’ arises from attempts
by women and men to try and get each other to invest, parentally, in
their offspring. Women are disadvantaged in this by virtue of carrying
the offspring for 9 months (gestation period), thereby investing much
more. On the contrary, men ensure that their genes are spread out as
much as possible by involving themselves in philandery. The more they
impregnate the women, the more successful their genes. Women are
therefore bound to be the primary caretakers by virtue of their greater
biological investment in the child. However, they also develop a
strategy of ‘coyness’ in order to persuade the man to invest in the child
by making a permanent union.
John Bowlby (espoused the Attachment Theory – the most important
tenet here is that a young child needs a secure relationship to a single
primary caregiver for normal, social development to take place)
expresses more less the same sentiments. He argues that there is a
genetically based psychological need for a close and intimate mother-
child relationship (lend credence to separated/divorced women staying
with children among Kikuyus for instance). That’s, the mother role is
imminently attached to the female, thereby leaving the man to be
preoccupied with activities outside the home (domestic versus public
debate/domain)
From a functionalist perspective, - George Peter Murdock in Social
Structure (1949) suggests that biological differences such as man’s
superior strength and the woman’s physiological ‘burden’ of pregnancy
and nursing, lead to gender roles out of ‘sheer practicability’. He says
that men’s superior strength enables them to undertake strenuous tasks
while women are restricted by their physiological status to carry out
light duties which can be performed in or near the home (domestic
versus public).
The mother-child relationship is grounded in the physiological fact of
pregnancy and lactation and supported by an innate mechanism. The
mother’s pleasure or tension is released through suckling the infant. The
father becomes involved in the care of the child indirectly through the
sharing of tasks with the mother.
These roles are however complimentary – men and women should be
seen as cooperating unit rather one being seen as superior to the other.
Talcott-Parsons, another functionalist, argues that gender divisions arise
from industrialization. It is assumed that in industrial societies, women
are not involved in paid employment. Rather, their roles remain in the
family – to socialize children and to provide a stable emotional
environment that entails cushioning the hardworking husband from
psychological stress. On the other hand, the man’s role is to work in the
paid employment – to earn money and support the family. Parsons
refers to the women’s role as expressive while that of the man is
instrumental. The expressive provides warmth, security and emotional
support to members of the family, while the instrumental is
accompanied by stress and anxiety. The biological difference between
the sexes provides the foundation upon which the roles are based. The
roles should however be seen to be complementary and provide family
solidarity.
Steven Goldberg ‘Male Dominance: The Inevitability of Patriarchy’ (1979
attempts to demonstrate that male dominance is universal. The theory
proposed by Goldberg is that social institutions that are characterized by
male dominance can be explained by the biological differences between
men and women, hence suggesting male dominance (patriarchy) is
inevitable. He says that throughout history, hierarchical authority has
always been associated with men (except for a few cases like M.
Thatcher – add Sirleaf of Liberia, Merkel of Germany). The reasons for
the dominance is some physiological factor, which derives from the
neuroendocrine system (the interaction between the stimulation of the
nervous system and the production of hormones), which differs in men
and women.
He disputes the assertion that gender related behavior and role is learnt
through the process of socialization. For him, socialization is in
conformity with behavioral patterns rooted in biology. Hence, boys are
socialized to play with guns and fight (and adopt to this) because they
have a greater biological predisposition to do this. Socialization merely
responds (or adapts/is an elaboration) to physiological tendencies rather
than causing differentiations. Biology will reject inappropriately
socialized behavior that is not in line with one’s sex.
