Sociology Now, Census Update

“MEN ARE FROM MARS, WOMEN ARE FROM VENUS.”This phrase, now part of our everyday

language, is the title of John Gray’s book, perhaps the most successful bestselling self-help

book in world history. It has also been the title of a movie, a television show, and a board

game. It expresses what many people have come to believe is a basic and simple truth: Men

and women are so different that we might as well be from different planets. As Gray puts it,

women and men “think, feel, perceive, react, respond, love, need and appreciate differently”

(1992, p. 5). Seen this way, communication between women and men is an event of cosmic

proportions, a moment of intergalactic understanding.

Yet, despite these differences, you are probably reading these words at a coeducational

school, where you sit in the same classes, live in the same dorms, eat in the same cafeteria,

listen to the same lectures, read

the same texts, take the same

tests, and are graded (you hope) by

the same criteria as members of the

opposite sex. At home, we live in

the same houses, prepare and eat

the same meals, use the same bathrooms, and often watch the same television programs as

our opposite-sex family members or spouses. And I’ll bet none of you has ever considered

going to the dean of students

to complain that because you

are a Martian and your professor

is a Venusian that you should

receive extra credit, or at least

the school should provide an

interplanetary translator.

Sex and

Gender

279

We live in a world of both

gender difference and gender

similarity. Women and men do

often appear to be completely different creatures, and yet we are also able to work together

and even live together.

We live in a world of bothgender

difference and gender similarity.

Women and men do often appear to be

completely different creatures, and yet

we are also able to work together and

even live together.