According to anthropologist Ruth Benedict, we are “creatures of our culture” and I cannot agree more. Culture is more than the color of our skin, race, and our ethnic back ground; it is a part of our identity. Our cultural identity deals with our gender, sexual orientation, age, etc. When we add all these things together, we get one whole person that is able to take characteristics, beliefs, and traits from each aspect we identify with.
For example, I am a woman so the cultural identity I identify with is from what society feels is expected from a woman. They are to be care takers, bear children and etc. For a woman, obtaining a high position is more difficult than a man and when and if she is able to reach this level of success, there is a negative attachment that comes along with it. This is an example of an impossibility that comes from gender identity.
Also, women have habits that identify only with their group. Women talk, act, dress as society sees fit. This may change over time, but we are creatures of our culture.
The only way I see that we could breakthrough from limitations from our culture is by creating equality. Perhaps this is easier said than done however, if there was no defining characteristic that made an individual superior or inferior over the other, then limitations may not be such a big problem.
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Hi Janejolie,
ReplyDeleteI like how you use the example of how you identify with being a woman. Being a woman was much harder back in the old days, but now they have gotten many acknowledgments and rights from society, but there definitely room to improve. I can say that there are more ways to breakthrough the limitations of being a women than just equality. It's changing the way other people view women. I believe that the way to reframe other people's perspective on what a woman is like, woman must act properly, rationally, and respectfully. It's like that with any other culture or individual, to gain respect, you have to earn it. I am a woman myself, and yes we are delicate, we are important, and we do have significant things to add to society. We have to work at it just like everyone else in the world. But the world also needs to give us a chance to do so.
Signing out,
Events Dreamer