Women and Men: Cultural Constructs of Gender

by Nancy Bonvillain

A cross-cultural study of gender roles and relationships, this book presents a synthesis of a wide range of ethnographic and historical data concerning the roles of women and men in wide range of different kinds of societies--with a focus on both material conditions and ideological valuations that affect and reflect cultural models of gender. First looks at the impact of material conditions on gender roles: Foragers; Farmers; Agricultural States; Industrial Economy: The United States; and Women and Global Economic Development. Then explores ideological constraints on gender constructs: Gender and the Body; Gender and Religion; Gender and Language. For anyone interested in gender roles from an anthropological, sociological, and psychological perspective.

Genres: Anthropology, Feminism, Nonfiction

344 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Dr. Bonvillain is an authority on Native American cultures and languages. She is the author of books on the Mohawk language and on the Huron, the Mohawk, the Hopi, the Teton Sioux, the Navajo, the Inuit, the Zuni, and the Santee Sioux and on Native American Religion and Native American medicine. She has written on gender, linguistics, and narrative.

Dr. Bonvillain has written four textbooks: Language, Culture and Communication; Women and Men: Cultural Constructs of Gender; Native Nations: Cultures and Histories of Native North America; and Cultural Anthropology. Her articles have appeared in Anthropological Linguistics, American Indian Culture and Research Journal, International Journal of American Linguistics, Dialectic Anthropology, Papers on Iroquoian Research, and in several collections. She has taught at Columbia University, SUNY Purchase and Stonybrook, the New School for Social Research, and Sarah Lawrence College. Dr. Bonvillain has received fellowships from the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Philosophical Society, and the U.S. Bureau of the Census. Her fieldwork has been with the Navajo and on the Akwesasne Mohawk Reserve.

Reviews

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I appreciated many of the topics in the book, although I had to skip around a lot. I wish the information was organized in a bit more of an organized fashion. I bought this book for a gender development course and overall it helped me, especially interesting were the chapters "gender and the body" and "gender and religion."

[Rowan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Full disclosure I only read the prologue, ch. 6, and ch. 8 on. Its interesting but dry. Its clear its an academic book.

[Katie · Rating 4 out of 5]

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