Yes, Understanding Gender is a Professional Issue
Gender is a complex and frequently misunderstood topic. To some, this may not seem like something that you need to think about at work. For others, this deeply impacts their lives, including their experiences in the workplace and how they interact with their colleagues. I am going to break down why everyone should grasp the nuanced and complicated concept that is gender, and how it impacts your interactions with your peers, especially your transgender colleagues.
Before I go into further detail, I would like to preface that I’ll talk specifically about the English language and American culture. Gender is a deeply complicated subject matter. Culture and language impact gender in a number of ways, so the scope of this post will be specific to the experience that I can describe as an English speaker living in the United States. I will try to strike a balance between introducing concepts plainly and giving them the nuance that they deserve.
What is Gender?
Gender, simply put, is the social expectations that we associate with people based on biological sex. The idea that boys should play with toy cars and girls should play with dolls is a manifestation of gender. Describing girls who play outside, are willing to get dirty, or who play in the way that we associate with boys as “tomboys” (or girls who “behave like boys”) is a manifestation of gender. Restroom signs that depict women as stick figures that wear skirts or dresses with long hair and men as stick figures that wear pants and have no or short hair is a manifestation of gender.
Gender is inescapable and constantly enforced, both implicitly and explicitly.
Before we go further, it is worth defining some terms to expand our understanding.
Biological sex – Sometimes called anatomical sex (Read more...)
*** This is a Security Bloggers Network syndicated blog from Sonatype Blog authored by Sonatype Blog. Read the original post at: https://blog.sonatype.com/yes-understanding-gender-is-a-professional-issue
