Doing Gender and Bathrooms
Social Scientists Candace West and Don Zimmerman were the first to coin the term “doing gender” in their sociological article “Doing Gender”, which explores the social construction of gender and the ways in we create, recreate, and reinforce societal gender norms.
Although much of this may be review from earlier topics we covered in class (their articles harkens back to what Judith Lorber spent a good deal of time discussing), they provide interesting commentary on the subject of public bathrooms which adds good fodder to our conversation in class today.
If you look on page 137 of this their article (provided here: http://www.soc.washington.edu/users/brines/doinggender.pdf), they discuss how the segregation of men and women in terms of restrooms actually promotes ideas of difference when none should exist. Basically, men and women go through the same process when they go to the bathroom, so why should we have different rooms? This is perhaps where the question of sexual orientation, violence, gender expression, and sexual tension becomes an aspect of society when we take time to scrutinize the way we organize ourselves.
