Title: Overview of Human Geography: Gender and Sexuality
Headings: Gender and Sexuality
Gender and Sexuality
Content: But in fact gender roles are extremely variable between societies. For example, in contemporary US culture, giving great attention to one's appearance is considered a female trait. A truly feminine woman is considered to be one who uses makeup and carefully selects the most attractive clothes, and men who do this may be denigrated as effeminate or "metrosexual." However, in many other cultures, attention to appearance, makeup, and clothes are male practices ( Graeber 2001 ). There remains much debate about where to draw the line between what aspects of people's gender are the result of biology (physical sex) and which aspects are cultural (gender expression), but in general research has tended to expand the realm of culture. For example, it is widely believed that girls are not as good at math as boys, and that this difference is rooted in some biological difference between male and female brains. But in fact studies have shown that if girls are given the same amount of attention as boys, and are exposed to positive messages about their abilities rather than stereotypes that tell them they are bound to do poorly, girls' math achievement is equal to boys' ( Else-Quest et al. 2010 ). Mainstream US culture recognizes only two genders, male and female. However, many other cultures have additional gender categories, collectively referred to as third genders.