MALE-FEMALE RELATIONSHIP

 

People‘s ideas about appropriate behavior for men and women are deeply held and having been planted within them from a very early age. People tend to believe strongly that their own ideas on the subject are correct and other ideas are wrong or somehow inferior. People‘s ideas about what is proper in male

female relationships do not change easily. Foreign visitors usually find that American pattern in

the male-female relationships are different from the ones to which they are accustomed. If they become involved with members of the opposite sex, as lovers or friends, they are likely to have strong, negative reactions. At the very least, they will be confused and unsettled. Besides this strongly-held idea about what is and is not acceptable, there is another obstacle in understanding the men-female relationships namely stereotype. People‘s stereotypes about gender might become a great barrier in understanding male-female

relationship.

A. Stereotype about American Men and Women

As stated in the previous chapter, stereotypes are

generalizations of people groups that are deep-rooted in the psyche of the people. People stereotype others based on what they see, their experience, or maybe from the media. Foreigners typically hold two stereotypes about American men and women. American women are stereotyped as inhibited women due to their sexual activity with a variety of men. The other common stereotype is that they are domineering. Related to this, American men are stereotyped as weak because they let themselves to be dominated by

women. However, this stereotype is not representative of the whole society.

B. Women and Gender Discrimination

Many of the stereotypes that result in gender discrimination are not only descriptive but also prescriptive

beliefs about how men and women. For example, women who are considered to be too assertive or men who lack physical strength are often criticized and historically faced societal backlash. They can also facilitate or impede intellectual performance, such as the stereotype threat that lower women's performance on mathematics tests, due to the stereotype that women have inferior quantitative skills

compared to men's, or when the same stereotype leads men to assess their own task ability higher than women performing at the same level.

C. Women Liberation

The term ‗women liberation‘ refers to the collection of opinions and developments that seek to end discrimination against women. Equal right for women is the goal. Adherents of the women‘s liberation movement urge that school textbooks and teachers take note of women's contributions to history, science, and other fields. They argue for an end to what they see as stereotyping of women on television and

other media.