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Fate of Gender: Nature, Nurture, and the Human Future
Fate of Gender: Nature, Nurture, and the Human Future | Frank Browning
7 posts | 2 read | 27 to read
Frank Browning takes us into human gender geographies around the world, from gender-neutral kindergartens in Chicago and Oslo to "femminielli "weather casters in Naples, from conservative Catholics in Paris fearful of God and Nature to transsexual Mormon parents in Utah. As he shares specific and engaging human stories, he also elucidates the neuroscience that distinguishes male and female biology, shows us how all parents' brains change during the first weeks of parenthood, and finally how men's and women's responses to age differ worldwide based not on biology but on their earlier life habits. Starting with Simone de Beauvoir's world-famous observation that one is not born a woman but instead becomes a woman, Browning goes on to show equally that no one is born a man but learns how to perform as a man, and that there is no fixed way of being masculine or feminine. Increasingly, the categories of "male" and "female" and even "gay" and "straight" seem old-fashioned and reductive. Just visible on the horizon is a world of gender and sexual fluidity that will remake our world in fundamental ways. Linking science to culture and behavior, and delving into the lives of individuals challenging historic notions, Browning questions the traditional division of Nature vs. Nurture in everything from plant science to sexual expression, arguing in the end that life consists of an endless waltz between these two ancient notions.
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WanderingBookaneer
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saresmoore Ooooooh! 7y
Hooked_on_books It's really good! 7y
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Hooked_on_books
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Pickpick

This is a terrific book about gender, particularly our understanding of it changing from binary to a more fluid continuum. Gay marriage and child rearing, feminism, transsexuality, gender roles taught to children, sex and science are all looked at. I don't believe this book received the publicity it deserves: it's well worth the time.

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Hooked_on_books
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"Increasingly most neuroscientists and psychologists argue that despite our biological and generative equipment, what we call gender is nothing more than the consequence of many millennia of power struggles between the biotypes that up until now have been controlled by males."

Amen, Frank. Amen.

OffTheBeatenShelf.com YES!! Thank you so much for posting about this book. I'd never heard of it, but I'm going to recommend it to my feminist book club. 🙌🏼🙌🏼 7y
Hooked_on_books @OffTheBeatenShelf.com You're welcome! I think it's a great book for a feminist book club. There's quite a bit of discussion of feminism as well as gay marriage, transsexuality, and the changing concept of gender itself. 7y
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Hooked_on_books
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Ok, this just made me laugh: "…they were frequently diagnosed as suffering from 'wandering uterus' syndrome. The uterus…was believed to be in continuous search of humidity…and when denied those fluids, this 'wild organ,' likened to an alien animal, would roam uncontrollably through the female body…

Seriously? Those nutty Greeks and Romans!

Texreader Because , you know, men are *never* hysterical! 7y
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Hooked_on_books
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"…in Norway, where 74 percent of women are employed, publicly financed childcare is offered to any child over age three, and national law requires that corporate boards be at least 40 percent female."

Nice! The first chapter focused on gay marriage and this second chapter seems to be focusing on women working. Very good so far!

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Hooked_on_books
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My constant companions, reading or otherwise. Greta (foreground) almost never leaves my side and gets into many more of my photos, as her head is often in my lap. Gunther is more of a goof and slightly less interested in being a lap dog, a good thing at just under 100 lbs. #readingcompanions #dogsoflitsy

DGRachel 😍🐶 7y
Megabooks Sweetheart! 💗💗 7y
Bookzombie 💕🐶 7y
kristenlcoates 🐶❤️ 7y
Bette 🐶💜🐶💙👍 7y
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shawnmooney
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This writer's earlier book 'The Culture of Desire' was one of the single most enlightening books I read on the gay male experience way back in the mid-90s. This new one sounds interesting and I'm very curious to see if Frank Browning still 'speaks to me' all these years later.

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