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BDSM Dictionary : Gender role: history
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This entry is part of the BDSM Dictionary hosted by Informed Consent.
A gender role is the pattern of masculine or feminine behaviour or duties defined by a particular culture or social group. Every society has a gender system, although the components and workings of this system vary widely between societies.
In many ways gender identity and roles function as any other social identity and role. Every known human society presents individuals with a set of statuses by which members of the society identify themselves and one another and to some extent determine the interaction between them.
Gender role covers a wide spectrum of expectations from the trivial, such as what clothes are worn, to the vital, such as childrearing. It includes aspects of submissiveness and dominance although these are not typically followed in BDSM, where there is often a wider acceptance of variety than in the surrounding society.
There is much debate on the extent to which biological gender or gender stereotyping is connected with gender role. Most people accept that there are genuine psychological differences in behaviour and cognition between men and women while acknowledging that individual differences - sometimes very varied - also exist.External links
(This entry in the BDSM Dictionary incorporates text from the Gender role article in Wipipedia.)
This entry is published under the terms of the GFDL. People with profiles on Informed Consent can improve this entry: see the BDSM Dictionary help page for details.
