Relative Status Of Women Research Articles

Righteous Adam, Sinister Eve

ABSTRACT The symbolism of laterality in images implies that the virtuous figure is represented on the right of the scene whereas the sinful character is depicted on the left. In portraits of male and female characters this has reflected and reinforced stereotypes and inequalities down the ages. Given these premises, we hypothesized that the prototypical representations of Adam and Eve, as a man and a woman conflated with notions of virtue and vice, would show a non-random arrangement. We tested this hypothesis, sampling artistic depictions of the Garden of Eden, from the twelth century to the present day in three separately-collected series of 100, 99, and 142 images respectively. Eve is depicted to Adam’s left significantly more often than chance (between 70% and 83%), particularly in pre-1600 artworks. We interpret this asymmetry as reflecting the perceived lesser status of women in relation to men, since the allegorical incipit of humankind. We also provide experimental evidence that this asymmetry, although pervasive, has not been internalized by modern viewers. Cognitive sciences account for this spatial asymmetry in terms of preference for figures placed within the left visual field of the observer, i.e., within the right space of the objective scene.

Do Relative Status of Women and Marriage Characteristics Matter for the Intimate Partner Violence?

This article analyzes intimate partner violence (IPV) in a developing country context, namely, Turkey, which faces an enormous increase in femicide cases over the last decade. Analyzing a very rich nationwide representative survey on IPV, we show that it is not only the absolute status of women but also their relative status in terms of income and education that affects different types of domestic violence, ranging from emotional abuse to physical and sexual violence. Besides, factors related to marriage setting are found to have a significant role in the effect of women’s superior status on IPV. Overall, we provide evidence to support the relative resource theory and invalidate the intra-household bargaining model in the Turkish case.

‘Families of mankind’: British liberty, League internationalism, and the traffic in women and children

ABSTRACT The League of Nations’ long term interest in the traffic in women and children mirrored, in key ways, what I call the ‘familial internationalism’ of some of its most influential British founders. Grounded in their understanding of the British Empire as an institution uniquely able to reconcile ‘liberty and self-government’ with the denial of liberty and self-government to the colonies, this vision of internationalism recast nations as cultural ‘families of mankind’ rather than political units with a right to sovereignty. This article thus explores first the influence of British imperial thought on League internationalism and then moves on to an analysis of the League’s Advisory Committee on the Traffic in Women and Children. In contrast to most historical investigations of the Committee, I read these archives as multivocal sites of political and cultural contestation about the status of women in relation to the national ‘family’. Ultimately, I argue, the work of the Committee resulted in an international convention that restricted women’s liberty by making it more difficult for them to travel internationally.

Do Relative Status of Women and Marriage Characteristics Matter for the Intimate Partner Violence?

This paper analyses intimate partner violence in Turkey which faces an enormous increase in femicide cases over the last decade. Analyzing a very rich nationwide representative survey, we show that relative status of women in terms of income and education affect different types of domestic violence, ranging from emotional abuse to physical and sexual violence. Besides, factors related to marriage setting have a significant role in the effect of women’s superior status on intimate partner violence. Overall, we provide evidence to support the relative resource theory and invalidate the intra-household bargaining model in the Turkish case.

Investigating Gender on the Frontier: 19th-Century Crooked Creek Cemetery

This qualitative case study highlights the work of university students who participated in a service learning component of a sociological research methods course. Their complete documentation and analysis of all 477 gravestones in the abandoned Crooked Creek cemetery provide a cultural snapshot of life in the Western frontier in the 1800s. In contrast to existing literature on the analysis of gender indicators on gravestones, this study finds significant evidence that gender was related to social identity and that indicators of master status exist for both women and men. Furthermore, the significant role of women in the development of a pioneer village is represented in the epitaphs chosen by a woman’s surviving family members. The findings attempt to dispel assumptions that the use of terms such as “wife” and “mother” on gravestones of the period exemplified the lower status of women in relation to men. Implications for genealogical research include rethinking the way researchers consider the role of wife and mother to write more historically situated narratives of family and community histories.

Women and the Chinese Labor Market: Recent Patterns and Future Possibilities

While many economists have advanced potential future growth strategies for the Chinese economy, none to our knowledge have done so with a specific consideration of the impacts these policies may have on women’s welfare measured in terms of labor market outcomes. In this article, we first discuss the relative status of women’s position in the Chinese labor force from the perspective of their employment levels, occupational segregation, and wages. We then calculate segregation indices and present and interpret recent employment data from the National Bureau of Statistics of China to consider how the labor market has evolved for women in the last decade. Interestingly, we find that occupational segregation by gender has in fact intensified since the onset of the radical reforms in China in the mid-1990s. Next, we contribute to the literature by evaluating potential growth policies for their impacts on women’s relative welfare in terms of labor market outcomes using our unique criteria for evaluation. We find that switching to a service-centered growth strategy could work to increase women’s relative welfare if implemented concurrently with additional policies aimed at reducing the otherwise potential negative implications for women’s relative welfare. Finally, we provide our own gender sensitive growth strategy suggestions which include our argument that an education-led growth strategy, for example, may have the largest positive impact on both the Chinese economy and women’s relative welfare.

Women's Health in India: The Role of Body Mass Index

We examined the health status of women in relation to their body mass indices and waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) by analyzing data from a follow-up study of 325 women, selected from the Indian National Family Health Survey (NFHS-2/1998–99) Delhi samples, reinterviewed after 4 years (2003). Obese women were five times more likely (OR = 4.87; p <.0001) and women with a higher WHR (> 0.90) were two times more likely (OR = 1.70; p =.050) to perceive their health condition as worse than others. Arthritis, hypertension, and shortness of breath were found to be higher among obese women and women with a high WHR. Healthy lifestyle choices must be promoted to contain the growing burden of obesity-related health problems among Indian women.

Gender Inequality, Endogenous Cultural Norms, and Economic Development

AbstractIn this paper, I explore the joint dynamics between gender inequality and cultural norms along the process of development. Cultural norms regarding gender roles are shaped by the relative female labor supply, and thus depend on the gender gap in education. In turn, these norms influence the relative education provided to boys and girls. I show that this two‐way causality between the inegalitarian nature of norms and the educational gender gap might explain the emergence of high gender inequality and low development traps. The model also makes it possible to replicate a U‐shaped relationship between the relative status of women and the economic development.

Putting Women in their Place? Gender, Landscape, and the Construction of Landnámabók

This article attempts to gain a better understanding of the ways in which medieval writers used gender in their writing about the past. Taking Landnámabók as its case study, it discusses the depiction of Auðr in djúpauðga and the other female colonists proposing that the variety of representations of female settlers (as colonists of varied statuses and in different places in the physical and human landscape) could be connected with the way in which Landnámabók itself was compiled and thus that varied (competing?) ideas existed in medieval Iceland about the status of women in relation to men.

Gender Inequality and Economic Growth in Spain: An Exploratory Analysis

This paper compares the geometric variant of the Gender-Related Development Index with that of the Human Development Index for Spanish provinces (EUROSTAT Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics-3, NUTS-3) in 1959, 1981, and 1999. The main objective is to carry out an exploratory analysis of the relationship between these indices and two alternative indices of gender inequality—the Relative Status of Women and the Gender Inequality Index. An analysis of the relationship between these indices and economic growth at the provincial level is also conducted.

A Comparative Analysis of Various Factors Influencing Human Trafficking in India

This paper discusses the trafficking of women and children in India with its permanent and temporary influencing factors. It examines the history of human trafficking using descriptive statistics, trends, and the like in order to explain some theoretical facts for human trafficking, as well as to analyze the major influencing factors in detail, with specific emphasis on human trafficking as it takes place in and from India. It analyzes the issues related to impact of sex ratio, relative status of women (literacy and mean age at marriages), work force in rural and urban with various industrial categories (agriculture and non agriculture) and their income. This paper also identifies domestic consumption of textiles (trends in per capita consumption expenditures and shares on clothing in rural as well as urban at current prices) as one of the important factors causing human trafficking. It also discusses briefly about poverty, policy Issues related to immigrants and emigrants, political party’s decision role and the details of various communities and how they have been affected by human trafficking.

Predictors of Sexual Coercion Against Women and Men: A Multilevel, Multinational Study of University Students

Several explanations have been forwarded to account for sexual coercion in romantic relationships. Feminist theory states that sexual coercion is the result of male dominance over women and the need to maintain that dominance; however, studies showing that women sexually coerce men point towards weaknesses in that theory. Some researchers have, therefore, suggested that it is the extent to which people view the other gender as hostile that influences these rates. Furthermore, much research suggests that a history of childhood sexual abuse is a strong risk factor for later sexual victimization in relationships. Few researchers have empirically evaluated the first two explanations and little is known about whether sexual revictimization operates for men or across cultures. In this study, hierarchical linear modeling was used to investigate whether the status of women and adversarial sexual beliefs predicted differences in sexual coercion across 38 sites from around the world, and whether sexual revictimization operated across genders and cultures. Participants included 7,667 university students from 38 sites. Results showed that the relative status of women at each site predicted significant differences in levels of sexual victimization for men, in that the greater the status of women, the higher the level of forced sex against men. In addition, differences in adversarial sexual beliefs across sites significantly predicted both forced and verbal sexual coercion for both genders, such that greater levels of hostility towards women at a site predicted higher levels of forced and verbal coercion against women and greater levels of hostility towards men at a site predicted higher levels of forced and verbal coercion against men. Finally, sexual revictimization occurred for both genders and across all sites, suggesting that sexual revictimization is a cross-gender, cross-cultural phenomenon. Results are discussed in terms of their contributions to the literature, limitations of the current study, and suggestions for future research.

Women’s Status: Levels, Determinants, Consequences for Malnutrition, Interventions, and Policy

This paper uses a gendered conceptual framework of the determinants of child survival, growth, and development to organize a review of the latest evidence on the strength of causal linkages between child nutrition outcomes and the relative status of women in seven Asian countries. Using a variety of indicators, the paper demonstrates the considerable variation in the status of women relative to men in the seven countries. Of the seven study countries, the status of women relative to men is lowest in Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. The paper also reaffirms that equality in women’s status relative to men’s, controlling for a host of socioeconomic factors, has a positive impact on child growth and discourages the intergenerational perpetuation of gender-based discrimination. The paper explores some of the economic and cultural explanations for the relatively poor status of women in the countries in question and draws out implications for policy and project design. Efforts to modify policy and project design to counter gender discrimination will rely on the effective monitoring of the status of women and the supportiveness of the enabling legal environment.

The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late Antiquity (review)

Reviewed by: The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late Antiquity Constance E. McLeese Kate Cooper. The Virgin and the Bride: Idealized Womanhood in Late Antiquity. Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1996. Pp. xi + 180. $37.50. The meaning of ancient literature and its relationship to history is the fodder of many academic careers. When the literature pertains to women the interpreter faces the added difficulty of assessing how works produced by men influenced historical women’s lives. Kate Cooper proposes a novel theory concerning the meaning and purpose of Christian idealization of female virginity in its literature. She suggests that women functioned as a barometer for judging male moral character. This rhetorical strategy was common to many types of ancient literature. It is found in both the ancient Greek novel and the Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles. Cooper argues that the purpose of the ancient novel was to “mobilize . . . complicity in desire on behalf of the social order.” In other words the romance stories of the ancient novels were intended to promote the status quo in marriage and the city state. Romantic love is reconciled to the common good. [End Page 465] The Apocryphal Acts borrow types from the ancient novel, but invert the ideology. In this instance the common good is not the stability and fecundity of marriage but the apostle’s moral superiority. Cooper points out that the women such as Thecla recognize this, while their fiancées/husbands representing the status quo do not. Cooper devotes several chapters to the clash of ideologies between the ascetic movement and those who argued for the goodness of marriage. In both cases the common thread is the moral advantage. A virgin in the family added to its moral stature. Furthermore, by taking the veil a woman of low social status could claim a certain equality with even patrician virgins. Marriage, on the other hand, required alternative strategies of interpretation since woman bound in marriage had far less opportunity than virgins to accommodate a chosen religious identity. The Liber ad Gregoriam is an example of these alternative strategies. Marriage becomes a spiritual battle ground not unlike that of the ascetic or the martyr. The wife, through her spiritual superiority, manages to convert her husband. She is not only the instrument of his salvation but the preserver of the ancient Roman notion of concordia within the marriage, and therefore responsible for the preservation of conjugal unity. The implications of Cooper’s analysis for feminist history are as thought provoking as her initial theory. If female representations pertain to the moral stature of the male protagonist can the promotion of female virginity really be viewed as an improvement of women’s status? Cooper suggests that the ascetic movement allowed for shifts between various classes, while the relative status of women was not radically altered. As she points out, female sense of identity was probably more defined by social class than gender identification. Structually the book is divided by literary genres. The various chapters are devoted to particular literary genres and their representations of women. Cooper moves from the ancient Greek novel, to the apocryphal acts, the fourth- and fifth-century works promoting female virginity, the Liber ad Gregoriam and the Gesta. Underpinning her analysis is the continuity between Roman and later Christian rhetorical strategies, thinking patterns and values. Christian literature may modify more ancient forms but it does not alter them beyond recognition. Cooper provides some fascinating research to support her arguments. Her analysis of the Liber ad Gregoriam and her discussion of the Gesta of the Roman martyrs is lively and innovative. For anyone interested in gender issues the book is highly recommended. However the work is not only feminist in orientation. Cooper’s assessment of the Christian ascetic movement in particular invites a broader readership. Constance E. McLeese University of Montreal Copyright © 1997 The Johns Hopkins University Press

Measuring Socio-Economic GENDER Inequality: Toward an Alternative to the UNDP Gender-Related Development Index

This paper assesses the United Nations Development Program’s (UNDP) Gender-Related Development Index (GDI). Although the GDI has increased attention on gender equality in human development, it suffers from several limitations. A major problem is that it conflates relative gender equality with absolute levels of human development and thus gives no information on comparative gender inequality among countries. Using the same indicators as the GDI, the paper constructs a Relative Status of Women (RSW) index, which demonstrates how using a measure of gender equality that abstracts from levels of development results in very different country rankings. However, the RSW is not an ideal measure of gender inequality. The GDI indicators are not the most appropriate ones for measuring gender inequality and hence both the RSW and the GDI have limited validity. The paper concludes by offering a conceptual framework that provides the basis for an alternative measure of gender inequality.

Not Simple Arithmetic

As Miriam Peskowitz tellingly suggests, the use of a formulation like in ... reveals an approach to the past which sees women's experience as separate from or other than normative experience. Peskowitz carefully considers the problematic implications of adding Jewish women to a story of which they have always been a part. In so doing, she complicates the task of someone like me who is engaged in a study of the place of women in the development of American Judaism.1 Yet by pointing out the pitfalls of believing that we can either simply add women to Jewish experience or suddenly provide an integrated story by including gender as a category of analysis, Peskowitz provides a critical context for thinking about the gendered nature of Judaism even when the subject under study is the addition of women to male-defined realms. Much of my study focuses on the emergence of women's presence in the eighteenthand nineteenth-century American synagogue. Examination of the evolving status of women in relation to this realm, traditionally defined almost exclusively by male dominance and female marginality, unavoidably devolves into the kind of approach challenged by Peskowitz. And yet attention to and the synagogue, reveals the nineteenth-

Status of Women and Fertility in Iran

The determinants of gender inequality of women specifically access to education health and economic resources including paid employment of women at the community level are examined. The association between fertility and the relative status of women and development is analyzed with 1976 census data from 162 communities in Iran. Hypothesis 1 linked the higher the status of women to development; hypothesis 2 to the later the family formation and lower fertility; and hypothesis 3 postulated higher development in the community with later family formation of women and lower fertility. At the primary level the enrollment rate of females is 74% of the enrollment rate for male children; at the middle school level the rate is only 54%; at the high school level the rate is less than 1/2 of that of male enrollment. The rate of mortality for 1-4 old females was 18.9/1000 people while for males it was 14.7 according to 1977 Iran Statistical Centre data. The average ratio of female labor force participation to that of men aged 15-64 was 17. On the average 34.2% of women 15-19 were ever-married in 1976 in Iran. The standardized regression coefficients for the models on development and gender inequality variables support the hypothesis concerning a lower proportion of ever-married women aged 15-19. In model 3 the coefficient for paid employment means the higher the relative access of women to paid employment the lower the proportion of family formation below age 20 and the explained variance is statistically significant. In model 4 the health variable (female:male ratio ages 1-4) adds to the explained variance in the family formation variable. The mean value of child-women ratio in the analysis of fertility and gender inequality is 801 children under 5/1000 women 15-44. In the final model the early family formation variable adds significantly to the total variance explained. In addition the effects of relative access to education employment and health are transmitted through early family formation in model 5.

Nutritional status of pregnant Punjabi women in relation to education and economic level

Dietary intake of 108 pregnant Punjabi women was studied in relation to economic and educational status using the 24‐hour recall method for two days. Heights and weights were measured. Intakes of energy, protein, calcium and iron were calculated and compared to the recommended dietary allowances (RDA) for Indians. Energy intake of subjects was markedly low, cereals providing 35–39% of kilocalories. Calcium intake was adequate, whereas protein intake was 70 % of RDA. Iron intake was inadequate and not affected by economic or educational status. Energy and protein intakes of the subjects were significantly increased with improvement in educational status, whereas protein and calcium intakes of the subjects were significantly affected by economic status. Nutrition education needs to be stressed.

Fertility, family planning, and development: indirect influences.

This paper focuses on the indirect influences on changing fertility and on the direct and indirect influences on family planning effort. Complete data on the variables under consideration were gathered from a variety of sources for 65 developing countries. The results here should be generalized only to high fertility high mortality low education and low per capita gross national product nations. 1) Some social variables like education are more important than others for explaining fertility and family planning effort. The treatment of social setting as a single variable obscures the importance of lower level education (literacy primary and secondary school enrollment) for fertility and family planning. 2) Ignoring the indirect influences on fertility may lead us to understimate the importance of some variables on fertility and perhaps to overestimate the importance of others. When both direct and indirect effects (the latter through family planning effort) are examined the impact of education increases to nearly equal that of family planning effort in 3 of the 4 models developed here. 3) Program effort can be explained at least as well with a single variable (literacy or female school enrollment) as with the composite variable "social setting." 4) In addition to its importance in explaining fertility education may also be important in explaining mortality. 5) It appears that the absolute and relative status of women may be an important variable which has not yet been adequately measured. Overall the results of this study lend additional support to the position that in addition to family planning effort education may play a more crucial role than is obvious in fertility reduction in developing countries.

The development of social statistics and indicators on the status of women

In developing social statistics and indicators on the status of women, three requirements must be satisfied. First, existing measures of prevalent demographic, socio-economic, and socio-cultural conditions must be more fully utilized. Second, some improvements in these measures, together with certain new measures and data sets are needed. Finally, agreed standards of comparison for gauging the relative status of women must be established.