Patriarchy and Women's Gender Ideology: A Socio-Cultural Perspective

Sultana Sultana

doi:10.3844/jssp.2010.123.126

Abstract

Problem statement: This research was designed to examine women's gender ideology in educating their children. It attempts to understand women's gender ideology as articulated by the women themselves based upon their own point of view. The study highlights that patriarchal norms has an influence on women's attitudes regarding their p rivilege rights and responsibilities towards educating children. Women's gender ideology appears to be constrained by patriarchal ideology that give priority to the masculine over the feminine in almost all environments, that is to say school, household, labor market and community. Due to patriarchal belief, parents give less priority on daughter's education. Approach: The objectives of this research are (a) to determi ne women's gender ideology concerning children's education; (b) to ex amine the influence of patriarchal norms on women's gender ideology. Results: Employing detailed descriptive quantitative result s, the work suggests that in Bangladesh most of rural women ten ded to follow traditional ideology regarding daughter's education. Conclusion: The study was conducted in one of the districts of Dinajpur in Bangladesh. Three villages namely Mashimpur, Mohiskotha and Jugibari which are situated under the Union of Auliapur at Sadar thana (sub-district) wer e chosen as study areas. The respondents of the study consisted of 340 women from the selected area s.

Highlights

The main aim of the article is to examine women’s gender ideology concerning daughter’s education among the rural communities of Bangladesh
For measuring patriarchal ideology of gender relations, most of researchers commonly used an accumulative index of multiple dimensions of gender relations like extent of adherence to the conventional ideas about gender inequality, rigid segregation of gender roles, male dominance against women (Ali and Khan, 2007; Olson, 2004)
In Bangladesh, gender ideology appears to be constrained by patriarchal ideology that give priority to the masculine over the feminine in almost all environments, that is to say school, household, labor market and community

Summary

Introduction

The main aim of the article is to examine women’s gender ideology concerning daughter’s education among the rural communities of Bangladesh. For measuring patriarchal ideology of gender relations, most of researchers commonly used an accumulative index of multiple dimensions of gender relations like extent of adherence to the conventional ideas about gender inequality, rigid segregation of gender roles, male dominance against women (Ali and Khan, 2007; Olson, 2004). Women’s gender ideology is viewed against the backdrop of ‘patriarchy’, which enables men to dominate women. This can be viewed in household relations (Naved, 1994; Hashemi et al, 1996). Women’s gender ideology appears to be constrained by patriarchal ideology that gives priority to son’s education over daughter’s education. Research on this issue in Bangladesh is still incipient. The present study is based on interviews of a large number of rural women

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion