Undoing gender

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Undoing gender is a concept introduced by sociologist Stefan Hirschauer that he developed as an antithesis to doing gender . Hirschauer is concerned that the socially assigned and then internalized gender role through lifelong action should be overridden again by "practiced gender indifference". In doing so, he is in opposition to the “doing gender” concept, for which gender representation is inevitable (“doing gender is unavoidable”).

Doing gender

The starting point of the considerations is the sociologist Harold Garfinkel's approach called ethnomethodology . According to this approach, a gender role and gender identity is not given by nature, but made as a process through years of practice, usually not consciously used but rather second nature patterns of movement and action. The (social) gender, in contrast to the predominantly physical gender characteristics (sex) called gender , is thus first made in physically anchored routines, through actions (doing). The ethnomethodological approach of Garfinkel was then further developed by Candace West and Don H. Zimmerman to their theory of "doing gender" (a related thesis, especially connected with Judith Butler , is that of the performativity of gender). The gender is only built up by the individual himself in “situational acts”. According to the theory, building a gender role is an individual act. However, this is organized socially. Gender is not a role that a person could take on and change or discard if necessary; it is too deeply anchored in memory, including body memory . It generally works by itself through physical routines, without conscious thought. The assumption of a gender is also not an assignment of roles that an individual person could elude. It is deeply anchored in cultural traditions and is therefore demanded by the environment. This “institutionalization” begins with linguistic codes such as grammatical gender (which forces speech and address as “he” or “she”) and continues in the gender stereotypes of clothing, fashion and the conventions of social interaction (e .g Friendships and cliques and their rituals of attachment, or the rules of politeness). The gender difference is thus culturally reproduced.

Hirschauer regards all elements of this theory as essentially correct description that he does not want to question.

Undoing gender

However, according to the doing gender theory of West and Zimmerman, acting in a gender role is the only socially adequate possibility of acting within a certain culture. Because it is anchored in the unconscious and in the body, it is also impossible to abandon one's gender role in a conscious decision. A refusal is just as impossible, since the role is always presupposed and demanded by others and their expectations; it is therefore inevitable. This last conclusion is now disputed by Hirschauer. For him, individual options for action arise from the fact that it is possible to refrain from this gender, which was first generated by doing, at least in certain contexts. It is just possible to practice not only gender but also gender indifference and thus neutralize gender. This is made possible by the fact that our society is deeply permeated by the gender distinction, but not completely shaped by it. Gender could become boring, meaningless, incidental and uninteresting and thus gradually lose its relevance for practical action. We could not demonstratively refuse gender attribution (which would always be a provocation and would be socially sanctioned), but simply make it uninteresting, forget it again socially.

This "overlook" of the gender role does not mean that the gender identity is no longer perceived by other people. This is always present as a background expectation. But then it is simply no longer relevant as a social order category.

According to Hirschauer, it must then be possible, at least in the long term, to actually unlearn and forget the social gender that has been learned. If gender is addressed less and less in social interactions, it does not immediately disappear as a fundamental concept, but becomes less and less important until it can be completely disregarded in certain situations, for example in the world of work. In contrast, incorporating the gender differences in interaction structures leads to their perpetuation.

It is also possible that institutions that stimulate the creation of gender can also guide its neutralization. Examples would be state institutions that do not treat people with different gender roles differently, such as the right to vote. But it also depends on the interactions: The different roles of the sexes on the labor market can also be traced back to social rules such as rules for pair formation and the division of labor in partnerships. A social change in the private sector can therefore result in a change in the public labor market.

Judith Butler

Undoing Gender (German The power of gender norms and the limits of the human ) is also the title of a book by Judith Butler published in 2004 . Among other things , Butler uses concrete examples to explain her concept of performativity using the fate of David Reimers .

Sources and literature

  • Stefan Hirschauer: The practice of gender (in) difference and its infrastructure. In Julia Graf, Kristin Ideler, Sabine Klinger (editors): Gender between structure and subject. Theory, practice, perspectives. Barbara Budrich Verlag, Opladen, Berlin, Toronto 2013. ISBN 978-3-86649-464-0 .
  • Ruth Ayass: Communication and Gender: An Introduction. Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart 2008. ISBN 978-3-17-016472-7 . therein chap. 9.1 “Doing gender” revisited: “Undoing gender”.
  • Brigitte Aulenbacher , Michael Meuser, Birgit Riegraf : Sociological Gender Research: An Introduction. Springer-Verlag, Berlin etc., 2010. ISBN 978-3-531-92045-0 . therein chap. 4: Construction of gender.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Harold Garfinkel: Studies in Ethnomethodology . Polity Press, Cambridge 1967.
  2. ↑ Stefan Hirschauer: Forgetting the sex. On the praxeology of a category of social order. In: Cologne journal for sociology and social psychology. Special issue 41, 2001, pp. 208-235, p. 215.
  3. ↑ Erving Goffmann: The arrangement of the sexes. In: H. Knoblauch (Ed.): Interaction and Gender. Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2001, pp. 105–158.
  4. ↑ Stefan Hirschauer: Forgetting the sex. On the praxeology of a category of social order. In: Cologne journal for sociology and social psychology. Special issue 41, 2001, pp. 208-235, p. 228.
  5. ↑ Judith Butler : The power of gender norms and the limits of the human from the American. by Karin Wördemann and Martin Stempfhuber. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-518-58505-4 .