The Gendered Nature of Sexual Harassment - Literature review Example

Section The Gendered Nature of Sexual Harassment Sexual harassment is a controversial issue that has gained ground with regards to creating awareness, expanding research, statistical and theoretical studies, and becoming a part of legislature. Although many in the recent years have lobbied for the recognition of sexual harassment done to men by women, the term and act are still considered to contain a certain gender-bias, wherein the opposite is almost always the case. Let us take a look at the issue itself and what it was it was during the 1990s. Sandy Welsh’s article “Gender and Sexual Harassment” examines the social phenomenon that is sexual harassment situated within the workplace. She presents a comprehensive overview of its definition, measurement, the different theoretical approaches to it, and even gives recommendations for future research. It basically investigates extant research on sexual harassment in the workplace, with particular focus on its gendered overtones. Rhonda Lenton, Michael D. Smith, John Fox and Norma Morra’s article, entitled “Sexual Harassment in Public Places: Experiences of Canadian Women,” expands the customary view of sexual harassment in that it always transpires within confined spaces like an office or university by creating a study in the form of an analytical survey that attempts to explore its etiology through the examination of the types, frequency and severity of harassment, as well as the characteristics of women most likely to be victimized, its theoretical implications, and its emotional and psychological effects (517). Both articles have feminism overtones in that it is assumed, even explored further, that sexual harassment has a gendered nature in that women are seen as the victims and men the perpetrators of the crime due to the male dominant structure of society and organizations (Welsh 184; Lenton, et al. 519-520). However, Welsh acknowledges that men are not neglected as victims of sexual harassment, rather, there is just a lack of research and investigation into their experiences (170 and 187). Welsh shows how the definition and the constitution of the act of sexual harassment itself, alludes to a subjective nature in that what might be offensive behavior to some may be considered as flattery by others (Welsh 173). She explores this angle through the examination of how sexual harassment is measured—mainly through surveys. The unspecific nature of surveys make it a problematic tool for measurement as differences in “sampled populations, response rates, number of sexual harassment items, and context and time frame of questions” should be taken into consideration when attempting to provide a comprehensive and intensive view of its prevalence (171). The fact that the labeling of an act as sexual harassment differs across perspectives—it was found that “women, in order to be seen as competent and as teamplayers, may not define their experiences as sexual harassment” (sex role spillover)—may be due to the gendered nature of the structure and culture of organizations (Collinson & Collinson qtd. in Welsh 174). This is something that needs to be looked at more closely as it presents a continuing problem that obscures the validity of these measures (Williams qtd. in Welsh 175). Another enduring problem that Welsh has observed is the lack of solid systematic theoretical explanations for the etiology of sexual harassment (176). Her solution to this is to look more into qualitative research as a means of making sense out of the results of the quantitative measures that are in effect, such as the influence of organizational culture, the organization of work, and gendered organizations (180-181). Welsh stresses in her article that more needs to be done in order to fill the gaps of how sexual harassment is being studied and viewed. While Welsh examines extant literature on sexual harassment in the workplace and points out the gaps, Lenton, et al. sheds some light on the less studied aspect of sexual harassment—the ones that occur in public places. The study takes into consideration the importance of defining the characteristics of sexual harassment—prevalence, severity, its effects, and women’s responses—as well as contextualizes the results within three theoretical arguments—social-structural, sociocultural and social control—and sociodemographic correlates. The survey involved conducting 1,990 telephone interviews with randomly selected Canadian women within the age bracket of 18-65 (523-524). The interview consisted of five representations of the different dimensions of sexual harassment (524). Lenton et al. found that almost 77% “reported more than one form of harassment and most women experienced more than one incident of each type” and only around 9% experienced no or do not recall any incident of unwanted male attention (525). The analytical survey also found that 3 in 10 women have experienced the most severe form of sexual harassment. The article states, without a doubt, that sexual harassment is also pervasive in public places—not only in workplaces—like streets, transportation systems, restaurants, theaters, etc. (534). Lenton, et al. call for further and more detailed research on public sexual harassment as their study lacked the specifics of the event itself, like when and where it took place, what actually happened, etc., that are important when studying an act that involves the study of both the victim and the perpetrator (536). While both articles provide compelling data on the prevalence of sexual harassment within the workplace and out in public places and theoretical perspectives that are useful in understanding the phenomenon, the articles vary greatly in the kind of information they present. First, what Welsh did is both an intensive and extensive literature review on sexual harassment within the work environment, presenting her opinions as to the gaps and making educated recommendations, while Lenton, et al. created an actual qualitative study to show the prevalence of sexual harassment in public—something that Welsh thinks to be an inadequate tool to measure and analyze sexual harassment. Furthermore, Welsh’s definition came from a legal standpoint, while Lenton, et al. used the psycho-social view of sexual harassment. Whatever their definitions may be, however, both came to the agreement that at the heart of sexual harassment should be the examination of “gender role prescriptions,” “culturally legitimated power and status differences between men and women,” and its effects on society and social organizations (Lenton, et al. 519; Farley; MacKinnon qtd. in Welsh 176). It cannot be denied that society is innately gender-biased—whether consciously or not—and this has prompted men to feel that they have the right to express their approval of a woman’s attractiveness through lewd comments and even pinching or slapping someone’s buttocks or to unabashedly show their disapproval of the presence of a woman in what they think to be a man’s world by making derogatory remarks or sticking an insulting nickname to a female colleague. Both articles call for more detailed research on sexual harassment as what has been done have gaps that need to be bridged in order to better present solid data on the prevalence and etiology of the phenomenon, as well as other factors surrounding the event, and their stand on the seriousness of the issue of the prevalence of sexual harassment. Because the study has been done approximately ten years ago, their recommendations for more qualitative research may already have been answered within the decade. I believe that I would need to look into the recent studies in order to check if the gaps mentioned by Welsh and Lenton, et al. have already been bridged. With regards to the gravity of the issue of sexual harassment and its prevalence, I can only agree with them that it is indeed something that needs to be taken seriously—something that needs to be given due space within legislature and policy and the areas of psycho-social and gender studies. Works Cited Lenton, Rhonda, et al. “Sexual Harassment in Public Places: Experiences of Canadian Women.” Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology, 63.4: 1999. Welsh, Sandy. “Gender and Sexual Harassment.” Annual Review of Sociology, 25:169–90, 1999. Name Course/Section Date Poverty among Canadian Immigrants versus Non-Immigrants Canada, throughout the decades, has tried to account for their dwindling population through the acceptance of immigrants, mostly skilled workers from third world countries. However, in search for greener pastures, many of these immigrants find themselves out of work and just one of the statistics that define the lower strata of the “hourglass” shaped social structure—poverty (Kazemipur and Halli 218). Abdolmohhamad Kazemipur and Shiva S. Halli’s article “The Changing Colour of Poverty in Canada” addresses this controversial issue by providing a comparison of the prevalence, extent, effects and reasons of poverty among immigrants and non-immigrants, while taking into consideration their ethnic origin, location of residence, period of migration and age of arrival (219). Peter S. Li’s article, “Earning Disparities between Immigrants and Native-Borns,” likewise examines this issue on poverty and the income gaps between the two groups by taking into account how the factors of gender and race influence the economic status of immigrants, as well as how this contributes to “how inequality is sustained in Canadian society” (290). Both articles pertain to the seriousness of the rising poverty among immigrants and how they warrant positive and active attention—as opposed to negative attention that can result in more restrictive immigrant policies and procedures (Kazemipur and Halli 219). Kazemipur and Halli examines the many factors that influence poverty rates among immigrants and uses various theses to put them in perspective: assimilation, entrance status, human capital, discrimination, period effect (220-223). The authors contend that these theses, in one way or another, affect and/or aggravate an immigrant’s economic status. These theories make sense as immigrants need to adapt first to their host country in order to get better jobs (learn to become more fluent in the language, for instance) and they need to start at the bottom of the food chain as they are new to the country (220-221). Furthermore, the age that they immigrated to Canada, the time period of their immigration, their education, and even education all need to be considered as influencing factors because these affect their standing in society and ultimately, the kinds of jobs they get (221-223). For instance, when a family migrates, the chances for economic success of their youngest child is higher than the other as he or she has more time to assimilate by being educated there and learning the language/s at a tender age. In other words, the age determines the rate by which the immigrants are able to forget their own cultures and absorb the way of life of their host country. Kazemipur and Halli’s findings, except for minor gaps that cannot be explained fully, conform to these theses. The authors ascertained, for instance, through their quantitative study of the population census between 1191-1996 that “the poverty age then rises as the age of migration increases” (229). The location of where the immigrants now live is also a great factor affecting their economic status as the immigrant minorities tend to become exposed to urban poor communities that affect their persona and limits their access to opportunities, like better education, that can increase their social standing (230). What is more appalling, as Kazemipur and Halli’s study found, is that an educated immigrant still has less chances of getting better jobs than native-borns—even if the latter has inferior educational attainment (230). Li’s article similarly presents evidence that corroborates Kazemipur and Halli’s findings. Generally, when specific factors like race and gender are put into the picture, immigrants are poorer and more prone to be within the poverty level than non-immigrants (290). Although it appears that “immigrants have an average earning level similar to or higher than non-immigrants, [but] immigrants have lower earnings after accounting for differences in education and other variables (293). This wage gap is partly due to education attained within the immigrants’ home countries are valued less than those that are gained from Canada—human capital (291). For instance, an immigrant of the same sex and age may seem to have equal or slightly greater income than a native-born; however, when looks at the details more closely, the latter may have a master’s degree while the latter only a bachelor’s degree (299). The gender wage gap has also widened with the result that immigrant women belong to the lowest paying and types of employment—be it full-time or part-time (291). Furthermore, racial origin influences employers’ acceptance of job applicants as it was found that Black and Asian immigrants earn much less than their European counterparts—who almost have equal positioning with the native-born Canadians (293). Immigrant women belonging to minority groups also suffer the greatest and have the lowest income—even when compared to other immigrant women, not from the visible minority (305). Both articles pertain to extant—both external and internal—factors that affect an immigrants chances of becoming economically stable and successful in Canada. The earning disparities between immigrants and native-borns, European and non-European immigrants, male and female immigrants, and immigrants from the visible minority versus those from the non-visible minority all state that gender and race determine an immigrant’s chances to live well and rise from poverty. The different frameworks from which they have contextualized their findings were very helpful in understanding this unfortunate phenomenon. Certainly, being an immigrant opens one to certain unavoidable factors (like language skills and the time of migration, if for instance, the immigrants arrived during or after the post-war boom) that tend to act on their chances of survival. Both articles explore these factors and show how limiting they could be wherein educational attainment may even be disregarded in favor of race and gender when it comes to employment. Thus, these variables “interact with immigrant status to produce complex interactive effects on earnings” (Li 305). Although Li focused on gender and race, he also touched on factors like human capital and work-related variations and how they can influence immigrants’ economic status. In contrast, Kazemipur and Halli incorporated and delved deeper into the other important variables that act on the poverty level of immigrants in Canada, but failed to consider gender—a weakness in their study that they admitted in the end as a recommendation (237). Having studied these two articles, and although their methods and models of analyses may seem vague in that computations seem so complicated for me to understand, I can say that they provide a very comprehensive view on poverty among immigrants and how marginalized they are in Canadian society as compared to the native-borns and European immigrants. Immigrating to a foreign country is hard enough without having to deal with discrimination and other factors that dash their hopes of finding a greener pasture. While native-borns certainly have an advantage as they are in their home country, some of the disadvantages that immigrants face, especially immigrant women, are really unwarranted and may even be called undemocratic. These articles really opened my eyes as to how inequality is prevalent within Canadian society and how the brunt of this unequal treatment and opportunities are dealt to the visible minority and the women. I thought our society has moved forward from those days of prejudiced thinking and gender discrimination, but I guess in more ways than we know, we really have not—these two articles are proof of that. Works Cited Kazemipur, Abdolmohammad and Halli, Shiva, S. “The Changing Colour of Poverty in Canada.” Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology 38.2: 2001. Li, Peter, S. “Earning Disparities between Immigrants and Native-Borns.” Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology 37.3: 2000. Read More