The Gendered Society - Hardcover

"Readers curious about what it means to say we live in a gendered society but confused by the trendy mixture of pop psychology, neo-Darwinism, and Mars-Venus theories will value this well-reasoned study."--Booklist"Comprehensive, current, and accessible...This is a book that you will want on your own shelf as a ready reference, but, more important, one that you will want your students to read for its compassion...Michael Kimmel has written a book in which we can all take great pride and comfort." --Beth B. Hess, Gender & Society, December 2000

Designed as a companion volume to "The Gendered Society", the overall purpose of these readings is to provide students with a sense of different discourses on gender that have been produced by a wide range of disciplines. In a series of readings, both classic and contemporary, from the biological sciences, anthropology, cross-culture studies, psychoanalysis, developmental psychology, and gender studies, Kimmel focuses on the two major issues in the study of gender - difference and domination - looking at such fundamental questions as: how are males and females different? What do these differences mean? why does it mean different things in different cultures to be male or female? why is it that virtually every society differentiates people on the basis on gender? why is that virtually every known society is also based on male domination? The first sections are organized by discipline, collecting classic statements of different theoretical perspectives and research inquiries. The final sections address various substantive issues such as: sex; gender and work; and love, sex, and the family.