Patriarchal Consciousness

Patriarchal consciousness – a form of consciousness characterized by the following features:

  1. the belief that social and family relations should be organized through a rigid division of male and female roles;

  2. the view that men should occupy the leading and active role in the family and society, while women should occupy a subordinate and passive role;

  3. the belief that women and men have different life values: family and love are regarded as the main values for women, while work, professional activity, and self-realization outside the family are regarded as men’s values;

  4. a preference for family relations in which the man is the head of the family and makes the main contribution to the family budget;

  5. the assignment of motherhood to women as their primary social role, that is, a role associated with giving birth to and raising children;

  6. the condemnation of women’s behavior when it is oriented primarily toward self-realization outside the family, career development, and professional achievement;

  7. the belief that distinctive features in the behavior of girls and boys should be reinforced and developed in every possible way;

  8. the idea that the patriarchal model of society is natural and determined by biological differences between the sexes;

  9. the tendency to justify gender inequality by presenting it as natural, traditional, morally desirable, or socially necessary, rather than as a form of discrimination against women (Khassanova, 2002, p. 153).

Reference:

Khassanova, G. A. (2002). Gender, politika, demokratiia [Gender, politics, democracy]. Almaty: Institute of Development of Kazakhstan. [in Russian].

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