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In addition to age and race, gender is one of the universal ways on which status differences are based. Unlike sex, which is a biological concept, gender is a social construct identifying the socially and culturally prescribed roles that men and women are to follow. (Mooney,Knox,Schacht 2002, pg222) According to Gerda Lerner in, gender is the "costume, a mask, a straitjacket in which men and women dance their unequal dance" (p. ... As Alan Wolfe observed in "The Gender Question" (The New Republic, June 6:27-34), "of all the ways that one group has systematically mistreated another, none is more deeply rooted than the way men have subordinated women. ... (Gender…Carribean. ... (Gender…Carribean, No.2, 2003)
In 1980, the United Nations summarized the weight of this inequality: Women, who make up half the worlds population, do two thirds of the worlds work, earn one tenth of the worlds income and own one hundredth of the worlds property. (Gender and Society, 2002) Actually, according to one “Current Population Survey” of the US Census Bureau, American women in 1999 earned approximately 77% of what men made, in 2000, according to the Department of Labor, their median weekly earnings were 76% of the male median.
Approximate Word count = 834
Approximate Pages = 3.3
(250 words per page double spaced)
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