Gender & Identity - an overview - Englisch Abitur, Oberstufe - Abiturthemen
Mr V Englisch und Sport
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8FnPSoNypU

Transkript (automatisch erstellt)

0:00 hi in this video we'll talk about the topic of gender and identity to prepare for the German Abby tour now I'll tell you what a lot of people do not like
0:09 this topic very much and some of my colleagues say well we're not really educated to teach this topic but then I recently talked to a friend of mine
0:18 who's not a teacher and he said well you know what talking about this would have helped me a lot more in my job in an office than talking about Shakespeare so
0:26 I accept that and I think we need to deal with this topic so let's go I'll give you an overview about what exactly I'll talk about in this video first of
0:35 all these key terms sex and gender need to be clearly differentiated so you know what the difference is and how to talk about it we'll talk about some gender
0:43 stereotypes that are common about gender equality or inequality depending on your perspective we'll talk about sexual orientations and gender identities and
0:53 about gender neutral language and finish off with some discussion questions now remember for the topic for the content here in this context of the German
1:05 abitur it's not so much to be an expert on this whole topic you would need to study for that but I think it's important to know the language to have
1:14 the language to express yourself the vocabulary to talk about these topics to know at least the main ideas and it's more about being aware of these
1:24 discussions than having a certain opinion you need to create and form your own opinion but but you need to know these arguments when if you're
1:32 confronted with them so you can deal with them let's talk about these terms gender and sex and here English is very precise and clear more so than German I
1:42 would say you can already see the pictures up here uh show something about what this difference could be and let's start with the term sex sex normally
1:52 refers or has the categories male female and Inter seex and it's important here that this is something biological and physical that you can like measure in a
2:03 person you can test them for it or you can observe it as a scientist as a doctor these are chromosomes for example these are hormones and this is of course
2:12 your anatomy of course as you can see up here from in this um illustration from a Biology book your reproductive Anatomy but also other aspects of your Anatomy
2:23 like how much muscle mass you have your bone shapes and so forth important here is to note that this is assigned at Birth basically when you're born a
2:33 doctor will look at you and will say okay this is a male person this is a female person and in very rare cases of course interex so which means doesn't
2:42 have all the typical characteristics of one sex or the other let's contrast that to the idea of gender gender we have the categories of man woman or other
2:54 categories I don't want to go into detail on that at this point but the important thing to remember is that this is a social and cultural
3:03 construct what is a social and cultural construct that means something that is not biologically given that doesn't exist as such on Earth but that we have
3:15 created as humans to give you another example for a social construct think of money if you have a bank note everybody will believe that it's worth something
3:25 which is why it is worth something and you can buy something with it but the doesn't mean that money as such this piece of paper is really to everybody
3:35 everywhere worth something and it's similar with these roles with these gender roles that everybody knows them everybody knows about these ideas even
3:45 if they don't support this concept maybe but they will know about it and everybody will refer to it and so will be self
3:54 reinforcing we have different roles behaviors and expectations that are associated with being man or being a woman for example the role of a father
4:03 or a brother is different from the role a typical standardized role of a mother or a sister as a teacher you often expect boys and girls to act differently
4:14 to behave differently and we expect different things from them in the lessons too we expect for example maybe as teachers that in languages women or
4:26 females girls will be better and that in the science subject maybe boys will be better it's important also to remember that because this is a construct is is
4:39 shaped by our culture our specific culture in the country we live in for example and it's sort of a tradition so it's within a family it's handed down
4:49 this role of what it means to be a man or to be a woman it's handed down from one generation to the next which is also shows how difficult it is or would be to
4:59 try to stop this kind of thing and you personally of course can shape this too by showing to somebody else what you think a gender role should be or what it
5:09 should not be let's move on to gender stereotypes which is connected to this idea of gender of course and it's the very
5:18 stereotypical uh things that we think about this is a man this is a woman and I want to put them down here as such as stereotypes a woman is supposed to be
5:30 more emotional and sensitive than a man we think or people often think they should prioritize family over career and they are less capable in leadership
5:41 roles and in the whole stem field so stem is science technology engineering math um so they don't they're not that talented in that area in contrast a man
5:52 should be strong and unemotional they are natural leaders and providers and more logical and less nurturing in their thinking and their
6:04 actions now if you look at this that your first reaction probably will be to start to think of is that true or is that not true and that is maybe not the
6:14 most important point you could argue forever how much of this is socially constructed and how much of it is linked to some biological qualities that males
6:25 and females really do have but the point is if you really stick to these gender stereotypes very strongly it's a form of discrimination you will look at a girl
6:37 and at a woman and think that she will be less capable in a leadership role or in in the stem Fields you will look at a man and think that he's not um emotional
6:47 responsive and that he's not nurturing and cannot care for let's say children and this will limit people's freedom severely and this is why it's a form of
6:57 discrimination and should be stopped let's look at gender equality or gender inequality depending on the perspective and I'd like to only give some examples
7:09 here and don't don't want to go into too much detail where we can see that progress has been made but is by no means complete let's look at the right
7:17 to vote for example obviously women have gained the right to vote in many count it's crazy to think that this is a very a relatively recent development 100
7:28 years ago this wasn't the the case in most countries but today women are still still don't have the same power in politics um as men and not only in
7:38 politics also in other leadership roles of course but here the point is in politics let's look at laws and legal protection now there are laws now that
7:48 protect against gender based discrimination so basically you're not allowed to simply not accept somebody for a job explicitly because they are a
7:58 man or a woman this is not allowed but of course if something is not allowed it doesn't mean that Nobody Does it anymore so we still
8:06 have a gender pay gap for several reasons also because the um jobs that women traditionally do are often paid less and of course also sometimes
8:16 because doing the same job a woman actually does get less money for it and as promoted less than um a male counterpart also there is still the
8:29 expectation that women will do some unpaid um labor for example in the family or even at work then gender representation and
8:38 Norms in our society there is an achievement we do have more women in leadership roles in many companies we do have politicians like Angela Merkel who
8:48 are very very successful um leading big countries so there has been development in that field but there are still biases that sort of stop and hinder this
8:59 development still more difficult for women to get to the same point and we still have things like sexual harassment that women much more often have to deal
9:10 with than men now I talked when I talked about sex versus gender i' said that there is more to it than just male and female or man
9:21 and woman I'd like to go into detail on that a little bit here at this point now this term lgbtqia a plus has developed from being
9:29 shorter from being lgbtq to include more gender identities and let's start with the sexual orientations and then move on to
9:39 the gender identities we have lesbian gay bisexual queer asexual and then we come to the gender identities remember the difference between the terms gender
9:50 and sex and here we have transgender and intersex and then the plus exists simply to show that often this is a spectrum and you it's difficult to say A or B and
10:01 sometimes you need a point somewhere in the middle or there might be complete other identities that are not listed in these letters a nice illustration that
10:10 sort of helps understand the complexity of this topic is the gender bred person that a colleague suggested to me it's of course a pun on gingerbread man that you
10:18 can eat and the genderbread person shows the complexity of this topic so the brain represents identity when you think of yourself what kind of gender identity
10:27 do you think of and um do you think you're a woman or man or maybe neither maybe it's not on that scale at all um then there's gender expression towards
10:38 the outside what do people see do they see a person that dresses like uh in a feminine way or in a masculine way and expresses that or does not and tries to
10:48 avoid gender expression in their clothes and from your Anatomy you can be either male or female or but of course you could be you have could have different
10:57 qualities from different sexes and you could be somewhere on a scale there too and your attraction the heart symbolizes attraction you could be attracted to
11:07 males or females or you could not be attracted to anybody at all so quite complex and I think this illustration will help you to understand the
11:16 different levels that this debate and identity is based on now there is gender neutral language and attempts have been made to spread that more in the past and
11:25 this topic is extremely controversial but some people will go crazy about it because they support it some people will go crazy because they are against it
11:35 let's try to talk about this in a calm way and I think it's good when I talk about the main concepts of this idea of gender neutral language to consider that
11:45 you could be for or against this for specific reasons but I think it's important to know what is asked in the first place what is the idea that gender
11:55 neutral language has let's start with one point the idea is to eliminate gender terms in professional and Public Communication so not restrict private
12:05 communication everywhere but public professional so that for example the government could talk about a police officer rather than talking about a
12:14 polic man also the pronouns could be used to express that everybody is meant for example they them in the singular so in a sentence like if a student has lost
12:28 his or her textbook you will say his or her refer to um this gender identity you could simply say if a student has lost their textbook also in the singular to
12:39 avoid making this gendered Choice by the way I've made a video on um gender neutral language in English that you can watch
12:47 also then the idea is to avoid unnecessary gender distinctions for example when uh people say ladies and gentlemen why not say everybody and why
12:58 limit it to these two choices then the the it asks for inclusive language in laws and policies so that simply if you have a form there's not only a box male
13:09 or female to take but that there are some way to represent other options also and this is particularly interesting if you speak a language
13:19 different than English how about gendered grammar what do you do with that the only contact that um English with has with that are very few words
13:28 for example the word Latino is a word that is usually used to show that somebody's from Latin America and here of course you would have to say she's
13:35 Latina or he's Latino and to avoid this people have suggested saying something like Latin X and um of course as a German this is very clear how this can
13:46 be a problem like in German when we build the plural traditionally you use the male form but that is now very much under discussion and people are trying
13:55 to change it to use gender neutral forms simply remember this topic this is what asks what is asked what people suggest that you should do and there are reasons
14:06 for and against that you can and should consider if you want to practice and prepare for this topic I think it's a great idea to discuss this with a couple
14:16 of people you could also do this in a written way which would help you with your vocabulary but I've got some um discussion questions here that you could
14:24 use for example how does society influence the way individuals Express their identity and gender remember we talked about gender the term gender and
14:35 stereotypes which influences this here can true gender equality ever be achieved why or why not remember how I talked about achievements in gender
14:44 equality versus the inequality that Still Remains or what role does media play in challenging or reinforcing gender Norms which examples can you
14:53 think of again with the stereotypes about genders think for example about the last films that you watch watched how did they reinforce or maybe
15:01 deconstruct one of these stereotypes should transgender women compete in women's sport very controversial Topic at the moment with
15:10 very good reasons in both directions should gender neutral language be encouraged and in official and professional settings as said before
15:21 also very controversial topics with mer very many good Arguments for and against I hope this video has helped you understand this broad topic a little bit
15:32 more I have other videos on a number of different topics please check on my channel I hope I'll see you again here soon have a great day
15:41 goodbye English [Music]