Girls in Industrial Area

While one's sex refers to the biological features that determines if they were male or female, gender, on the other hand, refers to "the meanings a the society gives to masculinity and femininity" (Sutherland & Feltey, p.132).

Worldwide, strength, boldness, aggressiveness, ...etc. are seen as masculine traits, while femininity is usually thought of as being emotional, submissive, sensitive, nurturing, ...etc. Despite the major achievements done by women in the Arab world, the society still prefers if they perform within their "feminine" context, as they are mainly seen as nurturing mothers and loving wives only. These gender stereotypes have been negotiated over the years, however, they have not completely vanished.
Nowadays, women can study, work, travel, and do a lot of other "active" things, however, there are still a lot of constrictions that they face everyday.

A few days ago, my friend and I had to go to the industrial area to pick up a phone booth from Qtel/Ooreedoo, a prop that we need for a film that we are making. Industrial area is an area with all the garages, factories, car service companies,... etc., and it's usually a male-dominated area as it is mostly filled with workers and laborers. When we first mentioned that we are going to our friends, they were very surprised that we are two girls going there alone without the company of a guy. Some of our male friends offered to accompany us, but we refused.

It was very interesting to see how our gender was an issue even though our sex was not. We went to the industrial area regardless of all the comments that we got such as: "Better safe than sorry".

We arrived to Qtel on time, and we were ready to pick up the phone booth and load it on to the truck. However, the Qtel representative and the truck driver did not let us, and called some of the workers to do it. We thought that they were being nice so we agreed and left.

However, when we left the industrial area and reached our location, it was only us and the truck driver. He tried to load the phone booth off the truck alone but it was too heavy and it almost broke. Again, we offered to help but he refused, and called a stranger off the street to help him instead.

This incident like many others was just a reminder for my friend and I of how our gender determines the way the society and other people see us.

CMUQ event

The Student Majlis of CMUQ had an event that was on Thursday, the 21^st of March. A DBQ event (Dodgeball and Barbeque event). For people who don’t know what’s dodgeball game like me; dodgeball is a game in which players on two teams try to hit players in the other team and they must avoid being hit themselves. This event happened in the green spine outside CMUQ building. Many students participated in this event, and the teams had different genders.

Masculine tasks

The male students made all the preparations for the event. It needed the carrying out of heavy equipment such as the BBQ fireplace. According to sociology, all societies categorized people based upon sex and gender. This seems ‘natural’, but it is a social construction. The male students did all the arrangement, setting up the cones in lines for the dodgeball game and prepared all the food and things needed for the BBQ.

A non gender-polarization event

Many male students were saying that this game is for boys only, and girls are not capable of playing it. This game needs masculine actions such as the throwing balls to the other side and hit the other team. However, many female students cross the gender-polarization concept. They think they have the ability to do masculine activities. And so, many female students participated in this game. There was a team called ‘women in black’ that had all female participants, and were strongly excited to compete with other teams.

According to sociology, there trends to be a higher degree of conformity to prescribed gender roles. Those who do not obey the ‘rules’ of gender face social punishment. However, in many societies, it is easier for people to accept the idea that females are the one who cross the gender-polarization concept than male. Many societies are not accepting the new image of the male version, the sensitive and soft man. But remasculinization process is always takes over all boys in their earlier lives. They grow up having the traditional masculinity idea; boys love to be featured strong, competent and powerful males.

 

Although cooking is known as females’ responsibility, but the male students toke the charge of the BBQ. The boys enjoy doing the BBQ in the trips or the events, because usually they do not cook in houses, so they feel free to do the cooking when they are with their friends. And maybe the reason the chose BBQ is the that it is the easiest way to cook food.