Gender Identity Project

Gender identity Is something that has been a topic of importance for such a long time. We are assigned a sex the moment we are born, we are either born with a penis or a vagina and are consider to be a male or a female based on our body’s anatomy. From this point on society and even religion already have gender norms for men and women. Each gender has to behave and do certain things. Everyone is different some are happy with their gender either male or female while others feel like they are born in the wrong gender body and this is where gender identity is very important because it is a personal and you express those feelings by showing who you truly are and feelings comfortable with who you want to be.

Gender identity can influence everybody in different ways. In my situation I believe that what has influenced me the most is society, family  and their religious/cultural beliefs on certain norms, and my social life. Personally my gender identity is female I am considered to be cisgender because my personal identity and gender correspond with my birth sex. My sex at birth was female and I accept, love and feel comfortable with the sex I was given.

My family has influenced me because of their cultural beliefs. When it comes to cultural beliefs it is basically families customs and their views on different things. I grew up in a house hold where my grandparents had the same perspective as society has which Is that women are house wives, care takers while men are the head of the household, hard working and superior. My mom and my aunts were expected to do everything meaning, clean cook take care of younger siblings while my grandpa and their cousins went to work and everything had to be ready for them and they had to serve them. The moment my aunts wanted to work in order to pay for their education it was seen as bad and they weren’t allowed. My younger aunts had the opportunity to get an education, unfortunately my mom could not. Although my grandparents norms were very precise and strict, my mom  has shown me that women are capable of more than that. My mother is the head of the house hold and has been ever since my dad passed away and she has worked hard and cooked and clean for her kids in order to give us a better life and education. She has inspired me because now I work hard for what I want, and do and dress how I want as long I feel comfortable with myself.

While growing up, I was not only taught but also by choice to be in way “girly”, I played with dolls , my favorite colors were purple and pink which was what girls were expected to like. Meanwhile boys needed to play with cars and whose favorite color was blue. Now growing up with my brother things changed and in a social way. Since we both played whatever we wanted, for example I liked playing basketball and soccer with him and he would play with me when I wanted to play with dolls etc and this in other peoples eyes would not be right because my brother shouldn’t be playing with dolls and I shouldn’t have been playing basketball. Being judged for playing ‘boy games’ always made me feel upset because it made me happy to play those games and to be judged for it was not right.

Social life has influenced me a lot throughout the years since I have met a lot of people. Social learning theory refers to behaviors that are acquired by observing and imitating others for example I went from being “girly” into wanting to be in oversized t-shirts and sweat pants and barely putting makeup on which isn’t a bad thing but I like dressing both ways and dressing up whenever I feel more comfortable. Gender identity is said to be developing in infancy since it is parental expectations and the concept of mimicking behavior. According to Theories of sex/gender it states, “When children are positively rewarded for mimicking preferred behavior, the behaviors attached to prescribed social roles become internalized habits” . To a certain extent this Is true because kids learn when they are rewarded for behaving good and they realize that what they were punished for shouldn’t be done, but when we enter to our teen years and adulthood we socialize with other and we start liking different thing or experimenting with different things.

Societies expectations on gender roles and identities has not gotten in the way of me doing what I feel best doing. I have a boyfriend who supports me greatly and whom I help around since we live together and this to my grandparents was a surprise because they expect my man to take care of me financially and for me to do chores at home. Being able to break cultural and social norms has made my relationship stronger because we share things and have fun doing chores together and having our own personal life when it comes to work. I love being able to go to work, workout, dressing in sweats and long t-shirts no makeup or hair done sometimes, and then other times I love getting my makeup done and wearing something nice out and that all depends on what I feel most comfortable at the moment not depending on what society thinks a women should look like everyday.