The very first reading for this class gives many examples of how society constructs a person's gender. In many of the researches, the biological makeup or appearance was not a clear way of distinguishing the sex, which lead to social identities problems. Such as those with Turner Syndrome, "they are reared as females because their external genitals appear to be female. It may be that parents of Turner Syndrome girls, determined to compensate for the missing X chromosome, [which] intensified the feminine socialization of their daughters (p.37)." Those who were born with only one X cannot be considered male or female. Since there is no Y, they cannot develop as a male and vice versa for a

As we have seen, men and women have been socially trained at what gender they must identify with. As young boys and girls, we have once been given the chance to play with the opposite gender toys. Did we take that chance and been given the same respect? No, certainly not, or else we would not be shy or timid from "acting" or taking on attributes of a woman or man. Have people tried to socially act like the opposite sex? Sure, and now on some slight occasions they have been able to be accepted in the norm. This is not true unfortunately in most of the cases. Society has place boundaries and will consider a person taking on the role of the opposite sex, as offensive and outrageous.

The same kind of observation was placed upon Native American Tribes. Richardson states, "A family that had all female children and desired a son to hunt for them would select a daughter to be 'like a man.' Though in different tribes the socializing process varied, girls achieved the cross-gender role in each instance through accepted cultural channels (p.143)." People in other societies also achieve their gender socially like that of an all female household. This cross-gendered female ultimately, "dressed in masculine attire, did male allocated tasks, often developing great strength and usually becoming an outstanding hunter (p.143)."

In the movie, "What Sex Am I?" a person that was born as a male could not identify with the male gender. They knew they were born in the wrong body and proclaimed it was a birth defect. It was then that the medical profession entered into the picture. These doctors that performed the surgery was stated

Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1094
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)