scholarly journals ENGINEERING, DESIGN AND GENDER: A REVIEW OF APPROACHES AND POSSIBLE INFLUENCES

Author(s):  
Brian Burns

This paper is intended to promote discussion of the human processes involved in Engineering and Design. For the convenience of discussion, a distinction is proposed, between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ - ‘males and females’ and ‘masculine and feminine’. Recent work studying the participation of female students in the currently male dominated profession of engineering is reviewed. The paper thus explores engineering and design, left-handedness, hunting and gathering, communication, collaboration, sustainability, nurture, holistic thinking, the Kyoto Accord, and how developments in the masculine and feminine aspects of design and engineering may well be essential to the future of Design Engineering.

2019 ◽  
Vol 116 (25) ◽  
pp. 12220-12225 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Kantner ◽  
David McKinney ◽  
Michele Pierson ◽  
Shaza Wester

An understanding of the division of labor in different societies, and especially how it evolved in the human species, is fundamental to most analyses of social, political, and economic systems. The ability to reconstruct how labor was organized, however, especially in ancient societies that left behind few material remains, is challenged by the paucity of direct evidence demonstrating who was involved in production. This is particularly true for identifying divisions of labor along lines of age, sex, and gender, for which archaeological interpretations mostly rely upon inferences derived from modern examples with uncertain applicability to ancient societies. Drawing upon biometric studies of human fingerprints showing statistically distinct ridge breadth measurements for juveniles, males, and females, this study reports a method for collecting fingerprint impressions left on ancient material culture and using them to distinguish the sex of the artifacts’ producers. The method is applied to a sample of 985 ceramic sherds from a 1,000-y-old Ancestral Puebloan community in the US Southwest, a period characterized by the rapid emergence of a highly influential religious and political center at Chaco Canyon. The fingerprint evidence demonstrates that both males and females were significantly involved in pottery production and further suggests that the contributions of each sex varied over time and even among different social groups in the same community. The results indicate that despite long-standing assumptions that pottery production in Ancient Puebloan societies was primarily a female activity, labor was not strictly divided and instead was likely quite dynamic.


Author(s):  
Gerd Christensen

Gender markings as strategies in the students struggle for positioning. References to sex and gender can be employed in order to distribute legitimacy among participants in various situations. Through analyses of four stories, this article shows how this can be practiced among university students at project-oriented educations. On the one hand, the female students are referred to as talkative and often bursting into tears. Both conducts are considered as problematic in the project groups because they take time and focus from the work on the project. Thus, the consequence of the stories is a devaluation of the female students. The male students are on the other hand told as either poor group workers because of their preferences for playing or are having to navigate between the attractiveness of being the group leader and the illegitimate position of dominating their fellow students in the group. The conclusion of the analyses states that the stories are not only told in order to distribute legitimacy among the students, but are negotiations and reformulations of the norms of the contexts.


2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 351-352 ◽  

The prevalence, age of onset, and clinical symptoms of many neuropsychiatric diseases substantially differ between males and females. Factors influencing the relationships between brain development and function and sex or gender may help us understand the differences between males and females in terms of risk or resilience factors in brain diseases.


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 1620
Author(s):  
Naim Abu-Freha ◽  
Roni Gat ◽  
Aerin Philip ◽  
Baha Yousef ◽  
Liza Ben Shoshan ◽  
...  

Sex and gender can affect the prevalence and prognosis of diseases. Our aim was to assess similarities and differences for males and females who underwent an upper endoscopy, with regards to indications and results. We reviewed all upper endoscopy reports from 2012 to 2016. Data regarding demographics, indications, and procedure findings were collected. The upper endoscopy findings were compared regarding the most common indications: gastroesophageal reflux, abdominal pain, gastrointestinal bleeding, and anemia. We investigated 12,213 gastroscopies among males (age, 56.7 ± 17.4) and 15,817 among females (age, 56.0 ± 17.3, p = 0.002). Males who underwent an upper endoscopy for gastroesophageal reflux had higher rates of esophagitis (7.7% vs. 3.4%, p < 0.001) and Barret’s esophagus (4.4% vs. 1.5%, p < 0.001). Females who underwent an upper endoscopy for abdominal pain had a higher rate of hiatal hernia, whereas males had higher rates of esophagitis, helicobacter pylori infection, gastritis, gastric ulcer, duodenitis, and duodenal ulcer (p < 0.001). Gastrointestinal bleeding as an indication for upper endoscopy showed that helicobacter, duodenitis, and duodenal ulcers are more common among males compared to females (p < 0.001). Males with anemia who underwent an upper endoscopy had higher rates of esophagitis (p = 0.021) gastritis (p = 0.002), duodenitis (p < 0.001), and duodenal ulcer (p < 0.001). We found significant differences regarding the pathological gastroscopy findings between males and females in relation to the different indications.


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fransiska Rahayu Myrlinda

ABSTRACT             Being males and females is biologically constructed since human beings were born. Meanwhile, there is also strict distinction done by society to divide people into men and women or usually called as doing gender stereotype. It effects on different assumptions that are attached to them. As the result, people are categorized based on their own gender roles in society. Java, as the symbol of patriarchal society, is the ethnic which agrees with this social phenomenon. Its beliefs symbolize how men and women have different social status. It also results in different gender roles. SITI is the film which deals with this phenomenon. It shows that being “obedient” Javanese women will give effect on social status towards different genders. The theories of sex and gender and also patriarchal society were used to get the reliable data. Keywords: SITI, Sex and Gender, Inequality, Javanese’s beliefs ABSTRAK                 Menjadi pria dan wanita secara biologis dibangun sejak manusia dilahirkan. Sementara itu, ada juga perbedaan mendalam yang masyarakat lakukan untuk membagi manusia menjadi pria dan wanita atau biasa disebut sebagai stereotip di gender. Hal ini berpengaruh pada perbedaan asumsi yang melekat padanya. Sebagai akibat, manusia dikategorikan berdasarkan peran gender mereka sendiri di masyarakat. Jawa, sebagai simbol masyarakat patriarkal, adalah etnis yang setuju dengan fenomena sosial ini. Kepercayaan yang ada pada masyarakat Jawa melambangkan bagaimana pria dan wanita memiliki status sosial yang berbeda. Hal ini juga menghasilkan peran gender yang berbeda. SITI adalah film yang merepresentasikan fenomena ini. Film ini menunjukkan bahwa sebagai perempuan Jawa yang “taat” akan memberikan efek pada status sosial dari gender yang berbeda. Teori seks dan gender serta masyarakat patriarki digunakan untuk mendapatkan data yang sesuai. Kata Kunci: SITI, Teori seks dan gender, Ketidaksetaraan, Kepercayaan Jawa


2016 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 437-446 ◽  

Suffering related to dementia is multifaceted because cognitive and physical functioning slowly deteriorates. Advanced age and sex, two of the most prominent risk factors for dementia, are not modifiable. Lifestyle factors such as smoking, excessive alcohol use, and poor diet modulate susceptibility to dementia in both males and females. The degree to which the resulting health conditions (eg, obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease) impact dementia risk varies by sex. Depending on the subtype of dementia, the ratio of male to female prevalence differs. For example, females are at greater risk of developing Alzheimer disease dementia, whereas males are at greater risk of developing vascular dementia. This review examines sex and gender differences in the development of dementia with the goal of highlighting factors that require further investigation. Considering sex as a biological variable in dementia research promises to advance our understanding of the pathophysiology and treatment of these conditions.


1996 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hood-Williams

The sociological distinction between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ has been paradigmatic for twenty years and is still taken for granted within the discipline. However it is a distinction that will no longer serve. Doubts about its continued usefulness surfaced as a result of a variety of influences. This paper refers specifically to the history of sex and to recent work in genetics in order to demonstrate that sex, like gender is a discursive construction. I argue that the sex/gender problematic is wrong to assume biological differences are naturally given and that sex cannot operate as a natural base in a theory of difference.


1981 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-88
Author(s):  
Susan McLellan

In this essay I shall be dealing, first of all, with western categories of sex and gender and examining how these are dichotomised into a dualistic opposition of male and female. This dualism may even entail the surgical "correction" of bodies so as to·ensure a congruence of gender assignment, identity and role. Western dualism is opposed to 'anomalous' categories. It becomes evident that such classification rests on culturally specific views of both natural and social reality. Material will be presented here to show exactly how culturally relative these concepts are; in Bali for example, the religious and social order pivots on the unity of males and females which correlates with the unity and oneness of the Hindu gods. This oneness is also manifested by the important role that both male and female transvestites play as transactors between 'this world and the other world' in temple ritual and dances. With the decline of the Hindu pantheism and the rise of monotheistic Islam in Java, the former unity developed into a dichotomy of male and female. Here the only legitimate role for the transvetite is as a low status actor protraying old heroines and redundant gods. In Malaysia, the transvestite may be an actor or even a shaman dealing in 'unorthodox' religious categories which, somehow, equate with ambiguous roles in modern day society. Here again, with the rise of a theocentric Islam male and female roles became dichotomised in society, although both folk drama and shamanistic ritual performances are evocative and reminiscent of the former Hindu 'unity'. It is apparent that transvestites perform on the 'periphery' of society. A special 'liminal' niche is set aside and bounded, yet it is clear that the very context of "betwixt and betweeness" may also he functional for the wider society - be it of a religious, magical, dramatic or even a sexual nature. In South East Asia the recognised roles of the transvestite lends a legitimacy to potential ambiguity which contrasts, somewhat starkly, with the rigid insistence in western societies on the duality of gender, emphasis on conforminity, and a negation or intolerance of anomalous categories of gender.


2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 424-439 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janet W Rich-Edwards ◽  
Ursula B Kaiser ◽  
Grace L Chen ◽  
JoAnn E Manson ◽  
Jill M Goldstein

Abstract A sex- and gender-informed perspective increases rigor, promotes discovery, and expands the relevance of biomedical research. In the current era of accountability to present data for males and females, thoughtful and deliberate methodology can improve study design and inference in sex and gender differences research. We address issues of motivation, subject selection, sample size, data collection, analysis, and interpretation, considering implications for basic, clinical, and population research. In particular, we focus on methods to test sex/gender differences as effect modification or interaction, and discuss why some inferences from sex-stratified data should be viewed with caution. Without careful methodology, the pursuit of sex difference research, despite a mandate from funding agencies, will result in a literature of contradiction. However, given the historic lack of attention to sex differences, the absence of evidence for sex differences is not necessarily evidence of the absence of sex differences. Thoughtfully conceived and conducted sex and gender differences research is needed to drive scientific and therapeutic discovery for all sexes and genders.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document