Quantitative and Qualitative Views on Gender An overview

Quantitative and Qualitative Views on Gender An overview of different approaches to gender in Anthropology

This Presentation ● Explore examples of qualitative and quantitative anthropological research in the field of Gender Studies ○ ○ Qualitative: Brothers as Men: Masculinity, Homosociality, and Violence Among Fraternity Men Quantitative: Gendered Space ● Investigate the pros/cons for these types of research ● Discuss future topics for each of these methodologies

Gender Studies ● Interdisciplinary field ○ Includes people from throughout the social sciences and humanities ● Topics ○ ○ Constructions of gender Gender performance Gender ideology Gender status/hegemonies ● Gender Studies and Anthropology ○ Anthro has a long history of being on the forefront of research into gender

Brothers as Men - Introduction ● My own independent research ○ Served as the research for my Honors Thesis, my University Scholar Project, and my IDEA Grant Project ● Conducted Fall 2019 ○ ○ Research was conducted in the Fall Analysis and write-up were done the next semester ● Research questions: ○ ○ How do fraternity men construct, perform, and understand gender and masculinity? How does this affect their interactions with other men and other people in general?

Brothers as Men - Methodology ● Interviews with 55 fraternity men ○ ○ ○ Self-selected sample Recruited through flyers, word of mouth, etc. Compensated with gift cards ● Semi-structured interviews ○ ○ Interviews loosely following an interview schedule There were also other elements such as using Likert Scales and Cultural Domain Analysis ● Qualitative analysis ○ ○ Required transcription of all interviews Transcripts are then gone through with a fine toothed comb to look for patterns/commonalities

Brothers as Men - Conclusions ● Findings ○ ○ ○ Men seemed to emphasize hybrid masculinity Men also acknowledged that gender was constructed and stressed that gender expression was an individual choice Men stressed that homosocial spheres (fraternities) were a necessary refuge for them ● Conclusions ○ ○ ○ Contextualize these findings into gender/feminist theory Gain insights/refine into those theories through highly detailed data However this is constrained by the small scale of the research

Gendered Space - Introduction ● Feminist cross-cultural research ○ ○ Conducted by Daphne Spain Published in 1992 ● How does the partitioning of different spaces by gender affect women’s status/power in various areas? ○ ○ Types of spatial separation ■ Partitioning in dwellings ■ Men’s huts/ceremonial houses/clubhouses ■ Separation while working Types of women’s status ■ Power in kin networks ■ Preference for women in inheritance ■ Control over labor and property

Gendered Space - Methodology ● Sampling ○ ○ Standard Cross-Cultural Sample ■ 186 cultures ■ Selected to be geographically representative, but also independent Only uses half of the sample ● Coding ○ ○ Determine women’s status and spatial separation variables in each culture Uses variables that were already coded by other researchers ● Quantitative Analysis ○ ○ Run statistical tests on these coded and quantified values Uses gamma

Gendered Space - Conclusions ● Findings ○ ○ Supported: ■ Partitioning of space in dwellings and spatially separated labor divided by gender are both negatively associated with women’s power in kin networks Partially supported: ■ Men’s huts are negatively associated with power in kinship, women’s preference in inheritance, and control of labor and property ■ Partitioning of space in dwellings is negatively associated with women’s preference in inheritance ● Conclusions ○ ○ Space that is divided by gender contributes to the subordination of women cross-culturally Larger scale conclusions that are generalizable ■ However, little detail is gained

Strengths and Weaknesses ● Question: ○ ○ Qualitative: General, thematic, less measurable Quantitative: Specific, quantifiable, measurable ● Methodology ○ ○ Qualitative: Time consuming, resource intensive, sampling issues Quantitative: More predictable, better sampling, relying on other researcher’s data ● Findings ○ ○ Qualitative: Detailed, multi-faceted, amorphous Quantitative: Specific, generalizable, lacking detail

Conclusions ● Two methods, one discipline ○ ○ Many different ways of investigating the same questions Emblematic of the diverse field that is Anthropology ● Why not both? ○ Each methodology has strengths and weakness, using both could strengthen research ● Future Research ○ ○ Qualitative: Understand more about homosociality and constructions of masculinity among men Quantitative: Investigate the effect of the intensity of masculinity and male institutions on women’s status cross-culturally

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