Blackwell Reference Online

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Gender stratification refers to the level of inequality in society based on gender, the social characteristics associated with sex. Specifically, gender stratification refers to the differential ability of men and women to access society's resources and to receive its privileges. As gender stratification increases, so does the level of gender inequality, reflecting greater differences between men's and women's access to power. Because historically men have garnered greater social power, gender inequality has systematically disadvantaged women. Gender inequality is complicated, moreover, by the intersection of gender with race/ethnicity, social class, age, and sexuality. That is, every individual, categorized as either male or female, also falls somewhere within a matrix of domination that includes these other dimensions ( Collins 1991 ). Original applications of the terms sex and gender tended to confuse the two, which were often used interchangeably. More recently, most sociologists have begun to distinguish between them, agreeing that the terms should apply to different, but related, concepts. While sex is defined in terms of biology and the reproductive organs one is born with, gender is typically seen in more social terms, as society's idea of how people should be, based on their biological sex. Gender, that is, is socially constructed to reflect society's expectations about ... log in or subscribe to read full text