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atman and Robin, Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry
Finn, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Who
symbolizes friendship to you? What are some famous pairs of friends? What
do all these pairs of friends have in common? They are men (see Figure 8.1). When
I asked some students if they could think of a famous pair of female friends, the best
anyone could come up with was Laverne and Shirley—or maybe Thelma and Louise.
Does the bond between two men epitomize friendship? As you will see in this chapter,
it depends on what constitutes friendship.
Much of this chapter focuses on friendships between women and friendships be-
tween men, or same-sex friends. Although romantic partners can certainly be friends
(in fact, I hope they are!), studies on friendship typically focus on platonic, nonro-
mantic relationships. Platonic friendship does exist between men and women; these
relationships are referred to as cross-sex friendship. One arena in which cross-sex
friendships are likely to form is in the workplace. Because women are increasingly
working outside the home and because women are more likely to work in jobs once
held exclusively by men, women and men are more likely to come into contact with
one another at work. In this chapter, I examine a variety of friendships—same-sex
friendship, cross-sex friendship, cross-race friendship, gay and lesbian friendship, and
friendship at work.
There are at least two levels of analyses to the study of gender and friendship (Wright,
2006). First, there is thedispositional level of analysis, which emphasizes the characteris-
tics of the person as a determinant of friendship. What characteristics of a person predict
friendship? One attribute of a person is his or her sex; another is his or her gender role.
An example of a dispositional analysis is the research showing that women’s relationships
are more intimate than those of men because women are more likely than men to self-
disclose. The analysis focuses on a characteristic of women as a determinant of friendship
CHAPTER 8
Friendship
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