Gender and Sexuality We will keep gender and sexuality separate from one another; including separate from physical sexual characteristics

Cultural construction of gender Physical sex characteristics and gender are different Different roles, behaviors, personality characteristics, emotions, and development of men and women not universal and not a function of physical sex differences. Gender as performative Some cultures recognize more than two genders: a third gender (hijra of India, xanith of Oman, mahu of Tahiti, two-spirit among Native Americans. A gender identity, not a sexual identity.

Caster Semenya, South African 800m runner

Hijras of India: A Third Gender Hijras born as men but dress and live as women (including in sitting and walking posture) Their genitals are removed as a sign of religious devotion. They are followers of a Hindu goddess and members of a religious cult. They earn their living performing at life cycle rituals (marriages, births)

Two-spirits among Native Americans: A Third Gender Man who dressed in women’s clothing, engaged in women’s work, and had special supernatural powers and privileges Some women also were two-spirits, but less likely to happen Documented among 130 Native American groups Different special roles: conveyors of oral traditions and songs; foretellers of the future; conferrers of lucky names on children or adults; matchmakers; makers of feather regalia for dances; special role players in the Sun Dance

“Female Husbands” in Africa Among Igbo (of W Africa) and Nandi (of East Africa) Usually, a post-menopausal, childless wealthy women married a woman to gain status and children to whom to pass on their wealth In a sense these women became men

Men and Women in Nicaragua MenWomen

“Gender is not only the social construction of social difference, that is, of distinctions between male and female, but also a primary site for the production and inscription of more general effects of power and meaning, a source of tropes that are key to the configuring of domination and subjection.”----Ana Maria Alonso, Thread of Blood (1995), p. 76

Questions: Dulce Mendez Andrew Campbell Sara-Ashley Kinney

What views of formal marriage illustrate about gender relations Mckayla Justice

What desmoche illustrates about gender relations

What Zelmira illustrates about gender relations

Cultural construction of sexuality Diversity in sexual practices, explicit discussion or silence around, sexuality and marriage, as well as same-sex or other-sex partners In the West: homosexuality/heterosexuality (gay/straight) as opposites; later modification with LGBTQAI (recognizing a plurality of sexualities) In Nicaragua: cochón

Spanish coming into American villages were shocked to see men dressed like women They justified conquest through native Americans’ sodomy (as a sin) An example of how sexuality can be intertwined with dominance The cochón is due to syncretism between Iberian and indigenous sexual role systems What is a synonym for syncretism?

Cochón How does this sexual identity differ from “gay” in American usage? Does “homophobia” exist? p. 269 Normally stigmatized but different kind of stigma than “homosexuals” in the West E.g., they have a prominent role in annual festival of Santo Domingo Lancaster’s sexual status: Qs by Mary Ellen LaRosa and Anon

Did the Revolution change norms about gender and sexuality? Question by Julio Clemente

Western worldview on sexuality as a form of globalization Are Western conceptions over- running local conceptions? Lancaster’s view, p