Instructions:
As discussed in the readings and lecture notes, gender is heavily
embedded into our social institutions, making it very difficult to
distinguish between our personal choices/desires and social expectations
for our choices/desires – especially when it comes to gender.
For this assignment, you will:
Analyze any holiday celebrated by your family through the lens of the gender binary.
Write a reflection paper that includes the following:
An introduction that includes the holiday, why you chose that
holiday, and who is typically involved/invited (immediate family only,
immediate and extended family only, friends and family, neighbors,
etc.).
2-3 paragraphs looking at the breakdown of tasks and
responsibilities involved in the preparation, execution, and clean up of
the holiday celebration. Consider the following in your analysis:
What preparations are made in advance of the day? Who makes these preparations? Discuss at least two examples.
What types of customs or rituals are involved in celebrating this
holiday? Who is responsible for preparing and executing these
customs/rituals? For example, when celebrating Christmas, my husband’s
family typically has tamales and sometimes posole (a pork and hominy
stew), which is prepared and served by my mother-in-law. On the other
hand, for Mother’s Day they typically have a barbecue, where the
majority of the cooking is done by my father-in-law. Discuss at least two examples.
Who is typically involved in the clean up process after the celebration is over? Who is responsible for which tasks? Discuss at least two examples.
What patterns do you see in the breakdown of responsibilities for the celebration? Make
connections between at least two different examples in your responses
with examples from the lecture notes and/or the textbook readings.
Please use the textbook sources!!
textbook link: https://open.umn.edu/opentextbooks/textbooks/461
There is lecture note also, if you need other resources please ask me for it. Thank you!!