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Conduct books from the period present an image of the role of elite women being to obey their spouse, guard their virtue, produce offspring, and to oversee the operation of the household. For those women who did adhere to these traditional roles, the responsibilities could be considerable, with households sometimes including dozens of people.
Common free women may have been found spinning as well as weaving. [1] An important figure in poetry, especially the Beowulf poem, high status women are depicted serving drinks for company and family. [6] Women of this time were also entertainers, comedians, and singers, and may have been employed by households or travelling groups. [1]
The change from the one-sex model to the two-sex model helped to create a new understanding of gender in the meaning of human history. There is an "increasing differentiation of male and female social roles; conversely, a greater differentiation of roles and a greater female 'delicacy and sensibility' are [seen as] signs of moral progress."
As in earlier centuries, most women worked in agriculture, but here roles became more clearly gendered, with ploughing and managing the fields defined as men's work, for example, and dairy production becoming dominated by women. [7] [8] In medieval times, women had responsibility for brewing and selling the ale that men all drank.
[5] [6] [7] Gender roles can be linked with essentialism, the idea that humans have a set of attributes that are necessary to their identity based on their gender. Sociologists tend to use the term "gender role" instead of "sex role", because the sociocultural understanding of gender is distinguished from biological conceptions of sex. [8]
Gender is used as a means of describing the distinction between the biological sex and socialized aspects of femininity and masculinity. [9] According to West and Zimmerman, gender is not a personal trait; it is "an emergent feature of social situations: both as an outcome of and a rationale for various social arrangements, and as a means of legitimating one of the most fundamental divisions ...
Little is known about gender roles in various ancient societies, but there is often an asymmetrical approach when depicting male and female roles in these societies. There are instances where male archaeologists have depicted the role of males of ancient times by mirroring present-day gender roles.
Sexologist John Money coined the term gender role in 1955. The term gender role is defined as the actions or responses that may reveal their status as boy, man, girl or woman, respectively. [44] Elements surrounding gender roles include clothing, speech patterns, movement, occupations, and other factors not limited to biological sex.