Womanpower
I'm sorry to write another Gender Issues post amid the current proliferation of them, but my marvellous little sister made another interesting observation last night that I thought was post-worthy (nothing to do with punctuation - fear not).
Margaret observed that these days we tend to still call females between the ages of about 20 and 30 'girls' rather than 'women', and males are likewise not 'men' but 'guys' or sometimes 'boys'. In earlier times, a girl would 'come out' at around 17 or 18, and be formally introduced to adult society, and a boy would be considered a man once he started working I guess, at around 19/20 or so. There would be corresponding changes in dress, behaviour and the treatment one might expect from others, upon this transition.
We wonder, Margaret and I, why this is no longer the case, and what the effects are, if any. Probably it's to do with the trend towards getting married later in life, I suppose, and people not wanting to 'settle down' till they've done plenty of study (which is becoming more and more necessary these days), had some fun, seen the world etc. Are we avoiding the adult gender terms because they imply responsibility that we are trying to postpone?
For my own part, at age 20, I guess I still feel more like a girl than a woman. In some ways anyway. I kind of feel like a potential woman - like I haven't really been tried and tested, or had to act like an adult in society, though I (hopefully) could if I had to. This is perhaps mostly in terms of my economic function in society; spiritually I feel somewhat more womanly, and intellectually...well, sort of. Actually in both those areas I feel very much like I'm still in the 'listen and learn' phase of life. [heh, what's with me and compartmentalising my life like this in my recent posts? Evidence of the Greek influence on Western thought?] I guess it's not till you start giving of yourself and having to teach rather than just listen, that you become an adult. Yes, that sounds about right, because it's in things like my roles as a youth group leader, employee, church member and mentor to my younger sister, that I feel like an adult, because I need to be one in those situations.
I'm rather undecided, too, about whether I want to 'grow up'. It's fun being young, being able to be spontaneous, hanging out with my friends till ridiculous hours because I can easily catch up on sleep later, heading off on random roadtrips and things, dressing as casually as I like, sitting with my feet on the furniture [don't tell Dad], being giggly with my sisters. Being 5'1" and looking about 16 possibly has something to do with it.
On the other hand, I would like to be, you know, a grown-up and graceful lady with good posture, good social skills, and an air of composedness and ease - one of those people who is always appropriate and equal to any situation; and I would like to be responsible and useful in society. I've always been aware of this toss-up between liking to be casual and liking to be elegant. And of course I want to marry a man, not a boy; but why would a man want to marry a girl? Unless it does turn out that I somehow flourish into womanliness upon finding myself loved by a man. Which I sort of think would be the case. Blah.
Or maybe I'm more 'grown up' than I think, having been raised with, and actively pursued, such spiritual good sense that I am wise about life in some ways that others may never be in all their years. Surely this kind of wisdom is superior to worldly wisdom of other kinds. And I do take life very seriously, after all, as my choice of uni papers and the focus of my thought-life demonstrates; the 'fun' of life, much as I love it, is incidental to me in many ways. And maybe 'potentially a woman' is as good as being a woman. Or maybe I should just carry on having fun and not be too eager for the more difficult things in life to start to dominate. And maybe adults still feel like kids more than I realize.
But to bring the discussion away from myself again [gah! talking about self], I wonder if our generation actually will always be more casual than our parents and grandparents, even once we're older. Will we ever grow out of sitting with our feet on the furniture? Will we always see things like table manners and keeping the house immaculate for guests as rather less important than our parents consider them? Will our families eat their meals together? Heh, will we end up with haircuts like our grandmothers'? How long will we [and I use the term loosely] keep our crazy body piercings and such things? How long will it take us all to 'settle down' and think of ourselves as adults? And what, help us all, will the country be like when we are the old and responsible ones?
Hm, this hasn't really been a gender issues post after all.
Happy days everyone.
Margaret observed that these days we tend to still call females between the ages of about 20 and 30 'girls' rather than 'women', and males are likewise not 'men' but 'guys' or sometimes 'boys'. In earlier times, a girl would 'come out' at around 17 or 18, and be formally introduced to adult society, and a boy would be considered a man once he started working I guess, at around 19/20 or so. There would be corresponding changes in dress, behaviour and the treatment one might expect from others, upon this transition.
We wonder, Margaret and I, why this is no longer the case, and what the effects are, if any. Probably it's to do with the trend towards getting married later in life, I suppose, and people not wanting to 'settle down' till they've done plenty of study (which is becoming more and more necessary these days), had some fun, seen the world etc. Are we avoiding the adult gender terms because they imply responsibility that we are trying to postpone?
For my own part, at age 20, I guess I still feel more like a girl than a woman. In some ways anyway. I kind of feel like a potential woman - like I haven't really been tried and tested, or had to act like an adult in society, though I (hopefully) could if I had to. This is perhaps mostly in terms of my economic function in society; spiritually I feel somewhat more womanly, and intellectually...well, sort of. Actually in both those areas I feel very much like I'm still in the 'listen and learn' phase of life. [heh, what's with me and compartmentalising my life like this in my recent posts? Evidence of the Greek influence on Western thought?] I guess it's not till you start giving of yourself and having to teach rather than just listen, that you become an adult. Yes, that sounds about right, because it's in things like my roles as a youth group leader, employee, church member and mentor to my younger sister, that I feel like an adult, because I need to be one in those situations.
I'm rather undecided, too, about whether I want to 'grow up'. It's fun being young, being able to be spontaneous, hanging out with my friends till ridiculous hours because I can easily catch up on sleep later, heading off on random roadtrips and things, dressing as casually as I like, sitting with my feet on the furniture [don't tell Dad], being giggly with my sisters. Being 5'1" and looking about 16 possibly has something to do with it.
On the other hand, I would like to be, you know, a grown-up and graceful lady with good posture, good social skills, and an air of composedness and ease - one of those people who is always appropriate and equal to any situation; and I would like to be responsible and useful in society. I've always been aware of this toss-up between liking to be casual and liking to be elegant. And of course I want to marry a man, not a boy; but why would a man want to marry a girl? Unless it does turn out that I somehow flourish into womanliness upon finding myself loved by a man. Which I sort of think would be the case. Blah.
Or maybe I'm more 'grown up' than I think, having been raised with, and actively pursued, such spiritual good sense that I am wise about life in some ways that others may never be in all their years. Surely this kind of wisdom is superior to worldly wisdom of other kinds. And I do take life very seriously, after all, as my choice of uni papers and the focus of my thought-life demonstrates; the 'fun' of life, much as I love it, is incidental to me in many ways. And maybe 'potentially a woman' is as good as being a woman. Or maybe I should just carry on having fun and not be too eager for the more difficult things in life to start to dominate. And maybe adults still feel like kids more than I realize.
But to bring the discussion away from myself again [gah! talking about self], I wonder if our generation actually will always be more casual than our parents and grandparents, even once we're older. Will we ever grow out of sitting with our feet on the furniture? Will we always see things like table manners and keeping the house immaculate for guests as rather less important than our parents consider them? Will our families eat their meals together? Heh, will we end up with haircuts like our grandmothers'? How long will we [and I use the term loosely] keep our crazy body piercings and such things? How long will it take us all to 'settle down' and think of ourselves as adults? And what, help us all, will the country be like when we are the old and responsible ones?
Hm, this hasn't really been a gender issues post after all.
Happy days everyone.
posted by Kat | 10/21/2004 08:09:00 pm
11 Comments:
I guess we're part of a peter pan society - we don't want to grow up. Its not good - we easily reach our peak physiologically (musclar, most basic mental faculties, etc...) by early twenties, yet we're still thinking we're kids. So you get a whole lot of wanting to appear grown up which creates a whole lot of problems.
It also creates a problem in mid-life - if your childhood is pretty long, then you will have less adult achievements when you reach the mid-life crisis. Then you start to worry that you haven't achieved a thing.
So yeah. I think we should attempt to treat people as adults round about when they start to shave. (That time, not that particular sign) And so, you're an adult, and I'm an adult! hurrah! Welcome to young adulthood.
How to enter adulthood / treat people as adult - I think you're onto it - adults are productive (both productive to society - career-wise, and productive in terms of people - making new ones (marriage), and inputting to other ones(mentoring/teaching)). So we want to be productive, and encourage teenagers be productive. perhaps.
Anyway, thats all very hand wavey, but thats my 3 cents worth
I've wondering the same thing! I definitely consider myself a girl and I would consider all my male friends as boys/guys. I'm not a woman and none of them are men!
But then again, sometimes it's nice to think of myself as a woman, as all grown up (sort of).
Hmm. Good Post!
Yes interesting, it brings to mind a problem I had a month or two back when trying to right a post and needing to choose a word to describe Female humans of the age 19-25ish.
All the various words I could think of were associated (at least in my own mind) with different ages.
Girl made me think 18 or younger.
Woman 30+.
Ladies 30+ and archaic.
And so forth.
Leaving me to eventually settle on the "fairer sex". Seeing I thought female to be to clinical etc.
It's interesting also to look at ones self.
I'd personally call my self a "young man", and looking at my friends male and female I'd probably use the words "young men" and "young women" to describe you people.
Girl, Gal, Guy and Boy all seem to associate them selves with younger eg 17-18 or younger to me. Though in some cases depending on a persons nature I might use them to describe someone older than that.
I guess part of the problem might be that Woman and Man are also associated with people working and generally Married. While the olthers are associated with Children leaving me to grab the young men and women view.
Though there are distinct cirumstances when I'd consider my self an adult and when I wouldn't. When dealing with younger people, or teaching or making suggestions to people around my age (20) and people older I'd consider my self Adult. Most of the rest of the time though I'd consider my self neither Adult, Child or Teenager but somewhere inbetween.
As for earlier times there certainly were more distinct seperations between the adult and child status, but depending on the time period and culture they varied quite alot from 14 to late 20's.
As to why this is I guess it could be due to the greater range of Adults around these days 100 years back how many people did you see arround at the age of 70+? With the aging poplulation we look at those we consider adults and the range is large and there is a much more significant difference between a 20 year old and 80 year old. While in earlier times it would have been 20 vs 60 or so with a lesser gap. Don't think I'm explaining this point to well much easier to do so talking.
Any way finally I'd like to say you seem, from what I've seen of you around CU and various events, to fit well the description that you wrote above. With one minor change though in bold.
a grown-up and graceful young lady with good posture, good social skills, and an air of composedness and ease - one of those people who is always appropriate and equal to any situation;
Aww, thanks mate. Well that's nice if I come across that way, even if I don't particularly feel it.
Another one I just thought of is 'chicks'. For some reason some girls find this offensive or something, apparently. I dunno, maybe it has some connotations that I in my innocence am unaware of, but anyway I don't mind the term. I guess it's kind of the equivalent of 'guys'. Any chicks care to comment?
As with many things, adulthood is dependent on many different variables. For example, age, physical and emotional development, independence, responsibility, etc. Perhaps age in itself is not a factor, but a gage of where the other factors most probably stand.
I would consider myself to be neither a child nor an adult, simply because some of these factors I’ve matured in, and some (well, probably most!) I have not.
It’s probably relative to the situation too, as Chad commented. Around children/teenagers, I feel like an adult, but around the adults of my childhood days (ie: parents, teachers), I feel more like a child.
Ultimately adulthood would be fully established in marriage and the raising of children, as all factors of being an adult are required for that task, and in a sense that is the whole point of growing up. As for those who aren’t married/have children, perhaps it’s the potential for them to do so.
Nowadays, I think that the main single factor that sees the delay of adulthood is responsibility. Perhaps it’s because, in our self-seeking society, responsibility is seen as something of a party-pooper in our desire to have an enjoyable, non-accountable, stress free lifestyle. So delaying our adulthood is some sort of way of maintaining a sense of freedom.
It seems to me highly ironic and somewhat amusing that we desire the responsibility to be able to do what we want, but not the accountability that goes with it. I know that that’s something that I need to deal with, I can be quite selfish at the best of times! Actually, I’m probably sounding too harsh on all of us with the whole selfishness thing, I’m not really trying to say that you’re all selfish; in fact most of you are on the contrary very self-giving! Urmm, I think I’m just commenting on society in general, and how as Christians we need to be careful of how our attitudes are influenced by it.
(Maybe there’s some sort of correlation between this and the speed at which we get married after meeting a partner?) :)
Um, after you’ve managed to turn a gender issues post into one on adulthood Katherine, it looks like I’ve turned it further, from adulthood into that of self-seekingness! (Maybe you need someone to complete the loop and comment on the selfish attributes of each gender)
Anyway, blah.
Great post. A thought in similar vein that has been running through my head recently has been, what will we be like when we're 50? Especially the punk, hardcore, long-haired males etc. Will our tastes have quietened and rather than cranking Project 86 up we will prefer to listen Beethoven and Mozart, and get offended by the youngsters playing that 'noise. Or will we keep our current tastes and the younger generation will rebel by listening to Chopin and Bach.
With regard to guys/girls thing I will generally use guys as a gender inclusive word to describe a group of ppl our age, but would use girls generally for those younger probably under 18 ie still at high school. For members-of-the-female-gender out of high school but younger than say 30/35 I don't think I have a specific term.
I definately agree that the terms man and woman imply a sense of responsiblity that is to be avoided at all cost. The term Mister used to really amuse me because I always associated it with a married man so when I got Mister'd it doesn't feel right. Maybe when we leave University and join the contributing members of soceity we'll feel more like men and women. Or not.
I don't find chicks offensive.
When people call me miss - it's weird. I had a placment at a school at the start of the year and I was asked if i wanted to be called miss - or Ruth? I was like you can't call me miss, I'm just Ruth.
That is all.
Huzzah for listening to Chopin and Bach! Now I feel like a rebel, and ahead of my time - something that doesn't happen too often. [Why is being a rebel something I want to lay claim to anyway? Bizarre how cool it makes one feel. Blah blah blah our flawed society blah.]
Well Jared all I'll say is that I currently listen to both Bach and Project and have no intentions of moving more towards either style.
Any way you are right with the Mister bit, the tradional term for an unmarried male would be Master.
Master Mayes fits better than Mister Mayes one would hope.
*warning warning... too many long comments... you all must stop or you will implode*
After only having time to read the first paragraph or so of your post, Katherine, i have only this to say
In our church we refer to guys as mighty men of God, or like "thanks God for this awesome man that you are raising up" and "...is becoming a godly woman"
And when my mentor was praying for me on Wednesday she referred to me as a woman and it gave me a buzz. I'd Like to finally be able to be considered a woman.
"thanks God for this awesome man that you are raising up" and "...is becoming a godly woman" What kind of church do you go to?! :P
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