Gender

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Gender Roles and Stereotypes
The issue of gender roles and stereotypes is specific to cultural groups. Even though globalization has created universal popular culture through the mass media, it is still possible to identify elements of gender roles and stereotypes that are confined to a given culture. I immigrated to the United States from Vietnam and can point to some of the gender issues that are common in the country.
In Vietnam, it is the exclusive role of women to take care of the children and perform house chores. From a young age, girls are taught that they are supposed to take care of the home while the male goes to work away from home. The Vietnamese also have the gender stereotype that men are stronger than women both physically and mentally. Therefore, leadership roles and manual jobs are a preserve of men in the society. It is not common to see women in community leadership or doing physically demanding jobs like construction and security roles.
Based on the above gender stereotyping and roles, Vietnam is a patrilineal-patrilocal Society. Men have control over both economic and cultural resources. Since the men go out to work while the women remain at home to take care of the children, they have control over the family resources. According to Frances and Black, communities that have unbalanced gender roles and negative stereotyping are bound to have extreme gender inequalities (84). An individual female gr…