Ethnic Variations in Gender Roles
Throughout this textbook we have focused primarily on gender assumptions that prevail in the traditional mainstream—White Americans of European origin. Here we look briefly at gender roles among three different ethnic groups: Hispanic Americans, African Americans, and Asian Americans.
Traditional Hispanic American gender roles are epitomized by the cultural stereotypes of marianismo and machismo. Marianismo derives from the Roman Catholic notion that women should be pure and self-giving—like the Virgin Mary. It ascribes to women the primary role of mothers who are faithful, virtuous, passive, and subordinate to their husbands and who act as the primary preserver of the family and tradition (Bourdeau et al., 2008; Estrada et al., 2011). The concept of machismo projects an image of the Hispanic American male as strong, independent, virile, and dominant—the head of the household and major decision maker in the family (Bourdeau et al., 2008; Estrada et al., 2011). Machismo also embodies the notion that it is acceptable to be sexually aggressive and to seek conquests outside the marriage. Thus Hispanic culture often expresses
Gender Issues
a double standard in which wives are to remain faithful to one man and husbands can have outside affairs (McNeill et al., 2001). This double standard has it origins in the early socialization of Hispanic youth, which encourages boys to be sexually adventurous and girls to be virtuous and virginal (Bourdeau et al., 2008; Estrada et al., 2011).
Of course, marianismo and machismo are just stereotypes, and many Hispanic Americans do not embrace these gender-role assumptions (Vasquez, 1994). Furthermore, assimilation, urbanization, and upward mobility of Hispanic Americans are combining to diminish the impact of these cultural stereotypes as they reduce gender-role inequities (McNeill et al., 2001). This is especially true of young Hispanic Americans, who often do not embrace their parents’ traditional gender-role beliefs (Cespedes & Huey, 2008).
In a second ethnic group, African Americans, women play a central role in families that tends to differ from the traditional nuclear family model of mother, father, and children (Bulcroft et al., 1996; Reid & Bing, 2000). African American women have traditionally been a bulwark of strength in their communities since the days of slavery. Because women could not depend economically on men under the system of slavery, African American men did not typically assume the dominant role in the family. This accounts, in part, for why relationships between African American women and men have tended more toward egalitarianism and economic parity than has been true of other cultural groups, including the dominant White culture (Blee & Tickamyer, 1995; Bulcroft et al., 1996). The historical absence of economic dependence also helps explain why so many African American households are headed by women who define their own status.
Another factor is the high unemployment rate among African American males— more than double the rate for Whites (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2012). The realities of high unemployment among African American males and their frequent absence from the family home often result in African American women assuming gender-role behaviors that reflect a reversal of the gender patterns traditional among White Americans.
A third minority group, Asian Americans, represents great diversity both in heritage and country of origin (China, the Philippines, Japan, India, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and others). Asian Americans tend to place more value on family, group solidarity, and interdependence than do White Americans (Okazaki, 2002; Yoshida & Busby, 2012). Like her Hispanic counterparts, the Asian American woman expects her family obligations to take higher priority than her own individual aspirations (Pyke & Johnson, 2003). Thus, although more Asian American women work outside the home than do women in any other American ethnic group, many spend their lives supporting others and subordinating their needs to the family (Bradshaw, 1994; Cole, 1992). As a result, achievement-oriented Asian women are often caught in a double bind, torn between contemporary American values of individuality and independence and the traditional gender roles of Asian culture.
Although no typical pattern exists, the diverse Asian cultures still tend to allow greater sexual freedom for men than for women while perpetuating the gender-role assumption of male dominance (Ishii-Kuntz, 1997a, 1997b; Pyke & Johnson, 2003). Asian culture also tends to promote a higher level of sexual conservatism in both sexes than is typical of other U. S. ethnic groups, including Whites (Benuto & Meana, 2008; Okazaki, 2002). However, culturally based gender-role stereotypes are less likely to be embraced by Asian American youth, who increasingly adhere to broader American cultural values (Ying & Han, 2008).
As these accounts illustrate, social learning and cultural traditions influence gender — role behaviors within American society. How does society convey these expectations? In the following sections we look at five agents of socialization: parents, peers, schools and books, television, and religion.