Very recently, a television advertisement for a major global car brand was trying to sell its product by illustrating the changing social role of women. A young woman in business attire would come home from a day at work and greet her husband, who was busy preparing the family meal. To the surprise of this man, who “commanded” the kitchen and took care of his daughters, his wife would present him with a new car. From this scene, briefly described here, the following question may arise: would this commercial make sense decades ago? Certainly not. However, this answer lacks a less simplistic explanation, and requires a greater understanding of what are called issues of gender and social roles.
Women and men throughout much of human history played very different social roles. But what is the social role about? According to Sociology, it is about the functions and activities performed by the individual in society, mainly when performing their social relationships when living in a group. Social life presupposes expectations of behavior between individuals, and of individuals with themselves. These functions and these behavioral patterns vary according to several factors, such as social class, position in the social division of labor, level of education, religious belief and, mainly, according to the sex. Thus, gender issues relate to social relations and social roles played according to the individual's sex, being the the role of women the most studied and discussed within this theme, given the existing sexual inequality with damage to the figure. female. Thus, while a person's sex is linked to the biological aspect, gender (ie, femininity or masculinity as behaviors and identity) is a cultural construction, the result of life in society. In other words, the things of boys and girls, men and women, can vary temporally and historically, from culture to culture, according to socially elaborated conventions.
Sexual differences have always been valued over the centuries by different peoples around the world. Some cultures – such as the Western one – have associated the female figure with the sin and corruption of men, as can be seen in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Likewise, the female figure was also associated with the idea of a greater fragility that would put her in a situation of total dependence on the male figure, be it the father, the brother, or the husband, giving rise to the molds of a patriarchal and male chauvinist. Thus, this model suggested the constant tutelage of women throughout their lives by men, before and after marriage.
As a matter of fact, marriage as a ritual would mark the origin of a new family in which the woman assumed the role of mother, passing from the “hands” of her father to her fiancé, as seen in the act of the ceremony.
But as already discussed here, if the notions of femininity and masculinity can change throughout history as the social transformations occurred, this is what happened in western culture, cradle of the capitalist mode of production. With the emergence of industrial society, women assume a position as a worker in factories and industries, leaving the domestic space as the only locus of their daily work. If in the past the woman should only serve her husband and children in household chores, or just limit herself to field tasks - in the In the case of European peasant women, the Industrial Revolution would bring a new economic reality that would lead them to work with the machines of loom. Obviously, there were many problems faced by women, especially when considering the context hostility of an exhaustive work regime at the beginning of the industrialization process and formation of the great centers urban areas.
After a long period of oppression and discrimination, the passage from the 19th to the 20th century was marked by the resurgence of the movement feminist, which would later gain political voice and representation throughout the world in the fight for women's rights, among them the right to vote. This fight for citizenship would not be easy, dragging on for years. Proof of this is the fact that the participation of the female vote is also a recent phenomenon in the history of Brazil. Although the proclamation of the Republic took place in 1889, it was only in 1932 that Brazilian women were able to vote effectively. This restriction on voting and female participation in Brazil would be a consequence of the predominance of a patriarchal social organization, in which the female figure was in the background. Even with some advances, even in the beginning of the second half of the 20th century, women suffered the consequences of prejudice and inferiority status. That American family model was at its peak, in which the female figure was imagined wearing an apron and with hair curlers, in the middle of the kitchen, surrounded by a blender, mixer, stove, among other utensils household appliances. It would only be in the course of the 50s, 60s and 70s that the world would witness fundamental changes in the social role of women, changes that are significant for today. The countercultural movement led by young people (such as the Hippie movement) transgressors of Western cultural patterns that were once prevalent advocated a revolution and sexual liberation, breaking taboos for women, not only in relation to sexuality, but also with regard to divorce.
Do not stop now... There's more after the advertising ;)
As is well known, the development of new technologies for production requires less and less manual labor, requiring more and more intellectual work. Consequently, increasingly favorable conditions are created for the insertion of women's work in the most different fields of activity. By studying more and more, women are preparing to assume not only other functions in the market of work, but to assume those of command, leadership, positions in which the suit and the necktie. This shift in their social role reflects not only on work relationships per se, but fundamentally on social relationships with men in general. This means that changes in the role of women require changes in the role of men, who undergo an identity crisis by having to share a space in which they once reigned absolute.
Women with higher education levels decrease birth rates (have fewer children), marry at older ages advanced, have longer life expectancy and can take charge of the family as in the example of car advertising cited. Obviously, it is worth saying that women's aspirations vary according to their level of enlightenment, but also according to the culture in which the woman is inserted.
However, it is necessary to think that even with all these changes in the role of women, there is still no equality of salaries, even if they perform the same professional functions, there is still what is called prejudice of gender. In addition, the woman still ends up accumulating some domestic functions culturally assimilated as if they were her obligation and not the man's – housewife functions. Likewise, unfortunately the issue of violence against women is still one of the problems to be overcome, although the “Maria da Penha Law” means an advance in the fight to defend the integrity of women Brazilian.
But the main question comes up: what is the role of women in today's society? It can be said that women today have greater autonomy, freedom of expression, as well as emancipated their body, ideas and positions that were once suffocated. In other words, the 21st century woman is no longer a supporting role to assume a different place in the society, with new freedoms, possibilities and responsibilities, giving voice to its sense critical. No longer believe in a woman's natural inferiority to the male figure in the more different spheres of social life, inferiority is often accepted and assumed by some women.
Today women are not just restricted to the home (as housewives), but they run schools, universities, companies, cities and even countries, such as President Dilma Roussef, the first woman to assume the most important position in the Republic. Thus, if on the one hand the inversion of social roles illustrated by the advertising campaign (cited at the beginning of the text) of a automobile is in dissonance with a not-so-distant past, on the other hand it shows the signs of a new time that has already started. However, advances aside, it must be said that gender issues in Brazil and in the world should always be on the agenda of discussions at the civil society and the State, given the importance of defending rights and equality between individuals in building a more fair.
Paulo Silvino Ribeiro
Brazil School Collaborator
Bachelor in Social Sciences from UNICAMP - State University of Campinas
Master in Sociology from UNESP - São Paulo State University "Júlio de Mesquita Filho"
Doctoral Student in Sociology at UNICAMP - State University of Campinas
Sociology - Brazil School
