Ambivalent Gender Research Articles

Gender attitudes and the new cultural divide in Europe

This paper investigates how gender attitudes relate to the new cultural divide between cosmopolitans and communitarians in Europe, defined by immigration and EU attitudes. We examine how gender attitudes vary across this divide, how large and diverse the ideological groups are, and differences between Western Europe and Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Using data from the European Values Study 2017, we conduct a latent profile analysis to investigate the most common of nine possible combinations of attitudes regarding gender, immigration, and the EU. In Western Europe, we find substantial divisions over gender attitudes across profiles, but not over immigration and EU attitudes. In CEE, we find disagreement over immigration attitudes coupled with centrist EU attitudes and ambivalent gender attitudes. In both regions, gender attitudes appear to cross-cut attitudes relating to the new cultural divide. These findings have implications for understanding how socio-cultural values shape political behavior and preferences in Europe.

Prevalence of Gender Dysphoria by Gender and Age in Japan: A Population-Based Internet Survey Using the Utrecht Gender Dysphoria Scale

BackgroundSeveral studies have attempted to estimate the prevalence of gender dysphoria (GD) from a general population sample. However, no previous studies used reliable questionnaires. AimTo estimate the prevalence of GD in Japan by gender and age using the Utrecht Gender Dysphoria Scale (UGDS). MethodsA cross-sectional observational study was conducted with 20,000 respondents between the ages of 20 and 69 who were registered with an internet research company. The study consisted of two phases. First, the participants were asked to self-identify their gender on two 5-point Likert scales. Second, the screened participants completed the UGDS. OutcomesSelf-identified gender and GD were defined as follows: ambivalent gender (equally feeling like the birth gender and another gender), incongruent gender (a stronger sense of the latter vs the former), narrow GD (incongruent gender + UGDS score ≥ 41), and broad GD (ambivalent or incongruent gender + UGDS score ≥ 41). ResultsAmong the eligible participants, the age-adjusted proportions of those classified as male (n = 7827) and female (n = 8903) at birth were 6.0% and 5.9%, respectively, for ambivalent gender, and 0.93% and 1.0%, respectively, for incongruent gender. The age-adjusted prevalence of GD was 0.27% (95% confidence interval, 0.18–0.42) and 0.35% (95% confidence interval, 0.25–0.50) for narrow GD and 0.87% (95% confidence interval, 0.69–1.1) and 1.1% (95% confidence interval, 0.86–1.3) for broad GD, respectively. No significant gender differences were found within the age groups, except for broad GD in respondents in their 50s (P = .016). However, for both genders, significant differences were found between age groups such that GD was more prevalent in younger vs older respondents, except for broad GD in respondents classified as female at birth (P = .063). Clinical ImplicationsClinicians should be aware that the prevalence of GD is not negligible and that it varies with age. GD should be assessed in detail from various perspectives in addition to self-identified gender. Strengths & LimitationsThis study used a reliable questionnaire to examine the prevalence of GD in a large population. However, the participants did not represent the general population because this was an internet survey. ConclusionThe prevalence of GD was much higher than previously estimated by clinic-based studies, and was more frequently associated with participant age vs gender.Oshima Y, Matsumoto Y, Terada S, et al. Prevalence of Gender Dysphoria by Gender and Age in Japan: A Population-based Internet Survey Using the Utrecht Gender Dysphoria Scale. J Sex Med 2022;19:1185–1195.

Heterotopian Disorientation: Intersectionality in William Oldroyd’s Lady Macbeth

This article reads William Oldroyd’s Lady Macbeth (2016) through the lens of Michel Foucault’s concept of the heterotopia to explore the film’s ambivalent gender and racial politics. The country house that Katherine Lester is locked away in forms a quasi-heterotopia, mediated through a disorienting cinematography of incarceration. Although she manages to transgress the ideological boundaries surrounding her, she simultaneously contributes to the oppression of her Black housemaid, Anna. On the one hand, the film suggests that the coercive space of the colony—another Foucauldian heterotopia—may threaten white hegemony: While Mr Lester’s Black, illegitimate son Teddy almost manages to claim his inheritance and, hence, contest the racialised master/servant relationship of the country house, Anna’s voice threatens to cause Katherine’s downfall. On the other hand, through eventually denying Anna’s and Teddy’s agency, Lady Macbeth exposes the pervasiveness of intersectional forms of oppression that are at play in both Victorian and twenty-first-century Britain. The constant spatial disorientation that the film produces, this article suggests, not only identifies blind spots in Foucault’s writings on heterotopian space as far as intersectionality is concerned, but also speaks to white privilege as a vital concern of both twenty-first-century feminism and neo-Victorian criticism.

Are Benevolent Attitudes More Closely Related to Attitudes toward Homosexuals than Hostile Ones? Cases of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia

ABSTRACT Previous studies have shown that ambivalent gender attitudes are associated with attitudes toward homosexuals. However, most of these studies have primarily considered ambivalent attitudes toward women and attitudes toward gay men, and have been carried out in countries with progressive laws regarding homosexuality. In this study, we examined the connection between ambivalent attitudes toward men and women and attitudes toward gay men and lesbian women in countries with conservative sexual legislation. In the first study, participants were residents of Russia (N = 163) and Kazakhstan (N = 194), while the second study used residents of Russia (N = 496) and Belarus (N = 123). Results indicated that benevolent attitudes predicted attitudes toward gays and lesbians better than the hostile ones. At the same time, attitudes toward men and women similarly predicted attitudes toward gays and lesbians. These patterns were manifested among different components of attitudes toward homosexuals. The results are discussed within the social context of the countries.

Gender and “Race” Enigmatic Signifiers: How the Social Colonizes the Unconscious

ABSTRACT This article highlights the process by which cultural messages relating to the contingent categories of gender and “race” manage to infiltrate the individual unconscious. The author first discusses the introduction of gender into French psychoanalysis by Jean Laplanche and its original expression with the sexual drive theory. He thus explores the ambivalent gender assignments implanted in the child’s body ego by a constellation of seducing caregivers and other invested adults who, as cultural purveyors, inscribe the social. These prescriptions, which are contaminated by the adult’s drive-fueled and overknowing unconscious, are enigmatic for both the sender and the receiver. Hence, they need to be deciphered through the psychic work of translation by drawing on relational, anatomical, and social codes. The author subsequently calls on the contributions of feminist and gender studies as well as contemporary American psychoanalysts in order to propose an “overinclusive” model of the enigmatic messages “to be translated.” This model underscores an intersectional approach to identity categories by considering power relations and cultural patterns of oppression. The suggested analytic grid is then extended to the paradigm of “race” by reading skin-color bias in the light of clinical, artistic, and theoretical examples.

»Das Weibliche umschließt den starken Mann« (Jer 31,22). Geschlechterkonstruktionen im Jeremiabuch im Licht feministischer Hermeneutik

Abstract This essay explores variant concepts of gender in the book of Jeremiah from a feminist perspective that includes insights of post-colonial studies, trauma studies, and queer theory. It discusses the female personification of Jerusalem and Judah, the laboring woman metaphor used in the context of war, the complexity of gendered addressees in Jer 2:1-4:2, and gender aspects in the characterization of God and Jeremiah. At first glance, the Jeremiah tradents use traditional gender stereotypes. A closer inspection, however, reveals an ambivalent gender performance of female and male protagonists. In this context, the enigmatic statement in Jer 31:22 »the female encompasses the strong man« also signifies the ambivalence of gender concepts in Jeremiah.

“Wonderful but Weak”: Children’s Ambivalent Attitudes Toward Women

According to ambivalent sexism theory, prejudice toward women has two forms: hostile (i.e., antipathy toward women) and benevolent (i.e., patronizing and paternalistic attitudes toward women). We investigated whether 5- to 11-year-old children’s gender attitudes exhibit this bipartite, ambivalent structure. Consistent with this possibility, latent variable modeling on a new developmentally appropriate instrument revealed that children’s (n = 237) hostile and benevolent attitudes were two distinct but positively associated factors. Using this instrument, we then explored age and U.S. regional differences in ambivalent gender attitudes, as well as whether these attitudes predicted self-evaluations and preferences associated with traditional gender roles. Stronger agreement with hostile and benevolent gender attitudes was found among younger children, except for boys’ benevolent attitudes, which did not vary with age. Children also reported lower agreement with benevolent gender attitudes in a more gender-egalitarian region of the United States (New York vs. Illinois). Finally, children’s benevolent and hostile attitudes differentially predicted their self-evaluations (e.g., boys’ benevolent vs. hostile attitudes predicted higher vs. lower self-evaluations of warmth, respectively). No evidence emerged for links between gender attitudes and traditional career or relationship expectations. These findings provide the first known evidence that children’s gender attitudes are ambivalent—comprising distinct, but positively related, dimensions of subjective positivity and negativity.

Negotiating Ambivalent Gender Spaces for Collective and Individual Empowerment: Sikh Women’s Life Writing in the Diaspora

In order to examine gender and identity within Sikh literature and culture and to understand the construction of gender and the practice of Sikhi within the contemporary Sikh diaspora in the US, I analyze a selection from creative non-fiction pieces, variously termed essays, personal narrative, or life writing, in Meeta Kaur’s edited collection, Her Name is Kaur: Sikh American Women Write About Love, Courage, and Faith. Gender, understood as a social construct (Butler, among others), is almost always inconsistent and is related to religion, which, too, is a construct and is also almost always inconsistent in many ways. Therefore, my reading critically engages with the following questions regarding life writing through a postcolonial feminist and intersectional lens: What are lived religions and how are the practices, narratives, activities and performances of ‘being’ Sikh imagined differently in the diaspora as represent in my chosen essays? What are some of the tenets of Sikhism, viewed predominantly as patriarchal within dominant cultural spaces, and how do women resist or appropriate some of them to reconstruct their own ideas of being a Sikh? In Kaur’s collection of essays, there are elements of traditional autobiography, such as the construction of the individual self, along with the formation of communal identity, in the postcolonial life writing. I will critique four narrative in Kaur’s anthology as testimonies to bear witness and to uncover Sikh women’s hybrid cultural and religious practices as reimagined and practiced by the female Sikh writers.

Minna Keene: a neglected pioneer

Born in Germany in 1861, Minna Keene lived in Cape Town during a prolific phase of her photographic career. Whilst at the Cape (1903-1913), she achieved international acclaim as a pictorialist photographer. Her photographs of South African subject matter were shown at exhibitions across the world. She was quick to recognise opportunities to translate her photographic success into financial profit and was one of very few women to operate a photographic studio in early-twentieth century South Africa. Keene actively circulated reproductions of her photographs as self-published postcards and in popular publications. Through these interventions, she made a substantial contribution to popular visual culture at the Cape and was celebrated by local and international audiences. Despite her pioneering status, she has been overlooked in the existing literature on South African photography, and, although she has received limited attention in Euro-American histories of photography, much remains unknown about her life and work, especially in relation to her time in Cape Town. Drawing on multisited research, I present a biographical account of Keene which analyses the ambivalent gender politics in her photographs as well as her uncritical adoption of colonial categories of race.

ПОВЕЗАНОСТ СТАВА ПРЕМА РОДНИМ УЛОГАМА И РОДНИХ ПРЕДРАСУДА КОД СТУДЕНАТА У СРБИЈИ

The idea of ambivalence in gender prejudice, as one of the modern forms of prejudice, has been in the spotlight of social psychologists for the last two decades, sometimes even more than most of the well-explored, traditional forms of prejudice such as ethnic or race prejudices. The central problem of this paper is the level of ambivalent gender prejudice toward men and women in students, as well as what the relation of attitudes towards gender roles is, as well as some other variables, and the level of gender prejudice. For research purposes, several scales were applied: Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI), the Ambivalence toward Men Inventory (AMI), and Attitudes towards Gender Roles scale (ATGR). The sample consisted of 715 students of 34 faculties of the Universities in Novi Sad and Belgrade, as well as students of the Academy of Criminalistics and Police Studies and Military Academy in Belgrade. The results show that gender prejudices (although there are smaller differences with respect to the type of prejudice) are most strongly predicted by the attitudes towards gender roles, the respondents’ gender and the type of faculty (almost consistently students of social and human sciences expressed less prejudices). Also, the most prominent were the benevolent prejudices toward women, confirming that in our culture, this kind of behaviour is still not considered as a problematic treatment of the opposite (but also own) gender.

Re-Configuring the New Women - Female Screenwriters and Street Films in Weimar Republic

This article traces the history of early female screenwriters in Germany and highlights the influence of professional female screenwriter Ruth Goetz and her movie Die Dirnentragödie (also: Women without Men, 1927). It shows how the movie represented certain political, cultural and legal debates on the New Woman and reconfigured the myth by implementing ambivalent gender roles in the plot. Furthermore, the representation of the role of female sex workers in Weimar society in Weimar street films is described and the way of transforming cultural and political discourses about gender equality into silent movies is discussed. Ruth Goetz and her professional screenwriting work is revisited through the lens of New Film History and the importance of the early professional female screenwriters’ contribution in Weimar cinema is underlined.

Ambivalent gender power in interstitial space: The case of transnational South Korean mothers

ABSTRACTThis article describes the maintenance of transnationally split families and the creation of new relationships in the new social space occupied by Korean mothers. During two years of ethnographic field-work in four cities in New York State in the US, I examined how family members communicated with each other in order to maintain long-distance relationships through physical co-presence and virtual communication via information and communication technologies (ICTs). Transnational actors used these selectively based on socioeconomic and cultural practices. In the case of the South Korean mothers, mutual (financial) surveillance and communication filtering were selected differently, depending on socioeconomic factors. Gendered power relations surrounding ICTs and transnationalism cannot be seen as unidirectional, but represent a rather complex and ambivalent picture. This study investigates women’s strategies for managing family affairs, mutual surveillance by spouses, communication filtering and accumulation of social capital in the interstices of a transnational social space.

Diamonds at the meeting of her thighs: Representations of gender and sexuality in U-Carmen eKhayelitsha

Abstract The heroine of Prosper Mérimée’s 1845 novella, Carmen, appears as an archetypal femme fatale who lures unsuspecting men to their destruction by means of her manipulative sexuality. While Georges Bizet’s 1875 opera, Carmen, reveals the psychology of masculine anxieties, sexual jealousy and murderous rage, his character, Carmen, expresses her credo of autonomous sexuality, and can be seen as a prototypical modern woman. My article examines the representations of the female protagonist’s sexuality in a contemporary South African film that re-works the Carmen story in an African context. I argue that U-Carmen eKhayelitsha/Carmen in Khayelitsha, directed by Mark Dornford-May (2005), does not realize the potential significance of Carmen’s sexuality. I trace the ways in which dance is not used to good effect in the film. In addition, I show that the film highlights traditional masculinity in various ways, such as offering disturbing parallels between the ritual slaughter of a bull and the murder of Carmen. I conclude that U-Carmen eKhayelitsha displays revisionist and ambivalent gender politics.

Ambivalent Gender Identities in Contemporary African Literature: A Butlerian Perspective

<p>This paper is an attempt to examine the way male and female participants perform gender in 03 novels, <em>Everything Good Will Come</em> (2006), <em>Swallow</em> (2010) and <em>A Bit of Difference</em> (2013), by a contemporary Nigerian writer called Sefi Atta. The study draws on Gender Performative Theory as developed by the feminist Butler (1990/1999). This theory considers gender identities as being socially constructed. The study highlights the multiple ways in which male and female participants perform gender according to established social norms in the selected novels. Regarding the existing social norms in Nigeria, the findings by scholars like Fakeye, George and Owoyemi (2012), Mejiuni and Awolowo (2006), Bourey et al (2012), Gbadebo, Kehinde and Adedeji (2012), Okunola and Ojo (2012) exude that men are traditionally portrayed as career people, assertive, powerful and active, independent and violent while women are stereotypically depicted as housewives, submissive, powerless and passive, dependent and non-violent (or victims). Based on the above dichotomies between men and women, the study unveils the ideology that underpins gender performances in the novels.</p>

Description of Idiomysis diadema sp. nov. (Mysida, Mysidae, Anisomysini), associated with Diadema urchins in the Red Sea; with nomenclatorial notes on its genus

The mysidIdiomysis diademasp. nov. is described from small swarms hovering between the spines of the sea urchinDiadema setosum(Leske, 1778) at the reef flat of Dahab, Red Sea. The most striking characters within its genus are the subdivided antennal scale, endopod of uropods longer than exopod, and a pair of minute spines on the terminal margin of the telson. With this first description, a total of sixIdiomysisspecies are now known, two of which are associated with cnidarians and only the new one with echinoids. An updated definition is given for the genusIdiomysisW. M. Tattersall, 1922, in order to match the current species inventory. To avoid previously incorrect and ambivalent gender attribution, I propose using the feminine gender for this genus throughout. Consequently, the spelling of two of its taxa,I. mozambicaDeprez, Wooldridge & Mees, 2001, andI. robustaConnell, 2008, is changed.

Ambivalent Gender Accountability. Male Florists in the Swiss Context

This article investigates the ways in which male florists mobilise, neutralise or challenge sex category membership in the course of their daily activities. Our main interest lies in the idea that individuals invest gender norms with varying levels of salience in specific social contexts. We therefore focus on the ways in which male florists account for their professional activities in normative gende­red ways, whilst also stressing the opportunities for challenging gender norms that are associated with the minority status of being a man in a highly feminised occupation. Our findings will suggest that the concept of “accountability”, combining the dimensions of orientation to sex category, gender assessment and enforcement (Hollander, 2013), provides a useful framework for analysing situations that apparently do not correspond to gender accomplishment in the normative sense of the term. In conclusion, we show that the accountability of male florists to sex categories and gender norms varies considerably, according to the particular dimension of their experiences studied and that in this sense, sex category membership is activated, neutralised or challenged with varying levels of intensity on the different scenes of professional florists.

God’s World Is Not an Animal Farm—Or Is It? The Catachrestic Translation of Gender Equality in African Pentecostalism

Building on scholarly debates on Pentecostalism, gender and modernity in Africa, this article engages a postcolonial perspective to explore and discuss the ambivalent, even paradoxical nature of African Pentecostal gender discourse. It analyses the conceptualization of gender equality, in particular the attempt to reconcile the notions of ‘male–female equality’ and ‘male headship’, in a sermon series delivered by a prominent Zambian Pentecostal pastor, and argues that the appropriation and interruption of Western notions of gender equality in these sermons can be interpreted, in the words of Homi Bhabha, as a catachrestic postcolonial translation of modernity. Hence, the article critically discusses the Western ethnocentrism in some scholarly debates on gender and Pentecostalism in Africa, and points to some of the fundamental questions that Pentecostalism and its ambivalent gender discourse pose to gender-critical scholarship in the study of religion.

Exploring sexual harassment and related attitudes in Beninese high schools: a field study

Sexual harassment severely impacts the educational system in the West African country Benin and the progress of women in this society that is characterized by great gender inequality. Knowledge of the belief systems rooting in the sociocultural context is crucial to the understanding of sexual harassment. However, no study has yet investigated how sexual harassment is related to fundamental beliefs in Benin or West African countries. We conducted a field study on 265 female and male students from several high schools in Benin to investigate the link between sexual harassment and measures of ambivalent sexism, gender identity, and rape myth acceptance. Almost half of the sample reported having experienced sexual harassment personally or among peers. Levels of sexism and rape myth acceptance were very high compared to other studies. These attitudes appeared to converge in a sexist belief system that was linked to personal experiences, the perceived probability of experiencing and fear of sexual harassment. Results suggest that sexual harassment is a societal problem and that interventions need to address fundamental attitudes held in societies low in gender equality.

Gender Identities and Gender Dysphoria in the Netherlands

Several studies estimate the prevalence of gender dysphoria among adults by examining the number of individuals turning to health services. Since individuals might be hesitant to seek medical care related to gender dysphoria, these studies could underestimate the prevalence. The studies also lack information regarding the variance among different aspects of gender dysphoric conditions. Therefore, the current study estimated the prevalence by examining self-reported gender identity and dysphoria in a Dutch population sample (N = 8,064, aged 15-70 years old). Three measures assessed aspects of gender dysphoria: gender identity, dislike of the natal female/male body, and wish to obtain hormones/sex reassignment surgery. Results showed that 4.6 % of the natal men and 3.2 % of the natal women reported an ambivalent gender identity (equal identification with other sex as with sex assigned at birth) and 1.1 % of the natal men and 0.8 % of the natal women reported an incongruent gender identity (stronger identification with other sex as with sex assigned at birth). Lower percentages reported a dislike of their natal body and/or a wish for hormones/surgery. Combining these figures estimated the percentage of men reporting an ambivalent or incongruent gender identity combined with a dislike of their male body and a wish to obtain hormones/surgery at 0.6 %. For women, this was 0.2 %. These novel findings show that studies based on the number of individuals seeking medical care might underestimate the prevalence of gender dysphoria. Furthermore, the findings argue against a dichotomous approach to gender dysphoria.

The Challenges of Writing in Irish in “I-Land”: Subverting the Western and Irish-Language Canons in Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill's “Oiléan/Island”

In the collections Pharaoh's Daughter (1990) and The Water Horse (2000), poet Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill considers the implications of (post)colonial cartography by reconstructing individual bodies as fig...