Constructing Images of Women in Asia: Gender Roles

This essay provides an in-depth analysis of the construction of women's images in the Asian region, examining the interplay of contradictory forces that shape modern gender representations. It explores the impact of patriarchy and matriarchy on women's roles and societal structures, highlighting the historical context of gender stereotyping and the evolution of women's rights and opportunities. The essay discusses the concept of gender making, exploring the influence of cultural, religious, and societal norms on gender roles. It delves into the dynamics of matrilineal and patrilineal societies, providing examples from communities like the Minangkabau and Mosuo. The essay also examines the concepts of power dynamics, including the concept of "power pollution", and the impact of economic systems on gender equality. It concludes by summarizing the transformations of gender representation in Asia.

Running head: CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
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1CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
Introduction
Asia is the largest continent of the earth and shares important part of the history and culture
of the human evolution. The aim of this essay is to analyze and describe the contradictory
forces in constructing the modern images of women in relation to men in the Asian region
and in what extent these images transform the traditional gender representation.
Discussions
Gender making
Gender making or gender stereotyping has become one of the most important aspects of the
present day scenario (Epstein and Arnold 2014). Since times in memoriam, there was
discrimination between the men and women Men were usually given the maximum priority
in the family and was considered as the head of the family whereas women were always
considered as their subordinates. Even more surprising is the fact that the gender stereotyping
that consider males to be superior to the females are often taught by teachers at school and
also by the priests through the religious teachings. A good example can be a ban of the
women’s freedom to wear dresses as per their choice. However, it has been seen that over the
years that several countries in the Asia have signed the petition for eliminating the ban on
dresses. Though women are trying their level best to become self sufficient and applying for
jobs but there is often the incidence of unequal pay followed between men and women. The
gender attitude towards women in Asia is largely patriarchal. Here in this region, the
traditional societal hierarchy was maintained and women were considered as the lowest
members of the gender structure (Nayak, Anoop and Kehily 2013). However, the
archetypical role of the women is changing rapidly and more and more women in the Asiatic
society have been contributing to the changing gender role in the society.

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Matrilineal
It is a known fact that most of communities in Asia, particularly in South Asia are
patriarchal in nature. However, there are certain communities that do follow the matrilineal
structure as well. It is a kind of family structure where the women are given some
independence. They are not forced to marry for financial purposes. They are no dependent on
males for their economic independence. Many families also consist of only female members
who also take up the responsibility of raising their children single handedly. However in
many communities the freedom of women is restricted mainly in the context of choosing their
life partners. However there is again another constraint. The women cannot select their life
partners outside their own community, if they do so they will be banned from their
community. However there is no restriction imposed on women to stay with her husband’s
family after marriage. She might also consider staying with her own family and take all the
necessary family decisions. However the women are not allowed to use any make up or dress
as per their choice since it is restricted by the adult members of the society oppose it. They do
not like the influence of the modern day society. Hence it is evident that women
empowerment has not taken place in the right manner though women are given some rights
and privileges but at the same time they are also denied many.

3CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
This system considers men and women have equal rights to power and they have
equal access to the resources. However, in this system men and women are associated with
equal sexual parallelism. Female is considered as the main descendant line in this family of
the matrilineal society (Stark 2013). In this system, each member is identified with his or her
mother’s lineage and it is associated with the inheritance of the property. Minangkabau
community of West Sumatra, Malaysia, Indonesia and Mosuo community of China in the
Asian region belong to the matrilineal societal system.
Patriarchal
As the very name suggests, patriarchy is something that is related to the domination
structure between men and women. One of the very common features that are seen within the
context of patriarchy is the treatment of women as a property. Women are considered as
objects that can be used by at any time. Women are always objectified, right from their birth
till their marriage. In the Asian communities, particularly in the South East Asian most of the
communities are patriarchal. Women are constantly suffering from identity crisis. They suffer
from the lack of empowerment both in the emotional as well as the financial basis. They are
always kept confined within the four walls of their domestic premises and are hardly allowed
to go out and mix in the social mainstreams (Nayak, Anoop and Kehily 2013). There is a very
poor belief among the entire south Asian people that girls are born to be fed throughout their
lives and boys are there to earn and support the family. So, naturally the girls are always
treated as a burden and are thought to be inferior to boys (Andersen et al. 2013).
Patrilineal system consists of dominant power relationship between men and women.
In this system, the men are in the dominant position and the inheritance of property, titles of a
person and other rights in the family go from father’s bloodline. In this system, the male is in

4CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
the dominant position and the other family members depend on the men’s decision in the
family (Maynes, Mary and Ann 2014).
Marriage and divorce in the matrilineal society holds a different role than the other
normal or patriarchal societal structure. Different matriarchal society has different marriage
rules. For example, the Mosuo community in China, the female could handle all the
responsibilities of the household and finance. A family is consisted with a woman and all the
female members of her family. In the matrilineal structure, marriage is considered as less
important as most of the time women are not seen as the property of the male family to
continue the bloodlines (Epstein and Arnold 2014). Men and women could mix more freely
than the patriarchal one and both could freely choose their lovers. In spite of being matrilineal
system, the family of the Mosuo community is composed of matrilineal members, which
includes mother, grandmother, maternal aunts and mother’s brothers. The children remain in
the mother’s house and all the responsibilities of the children are taken care by the mother’s
family. Thus, marriage is not a big deal in this system and it does not matter if marriage is
occurred or not as long as men and women could mix freely and continue their love affairs.
However, divorce is more frequent in the patriarchal structure and less common in the
matrilineal society. As marriage is not forced on the women in the matrilineal structure,
divorce is not seen as common rule in this societal structure. Women do not have to marry to
the men for security or financial needs. There are some pressures against maintaining
matrilineal system in Minangkabau and Mosuo societies. The pressure mainly comes from
outside or external world. In the film, The Land Where Women Rule: Inside China’s Last
Matriarchy, these issues have been discussed in the context of the Mosuo community. The
young members of the Mosuo community, they want to go out of the region and experience
outside world. In this matriarchal system, the husband and wife could not live together in
lifetime. However, some of the young members want to live together with their partners like

5CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
members of Han community ("The Land Where Women Rule: Inside China's Last
Matriarchy" 2017). However, this is the major resistance in maintaining the matriarchal
structure in this community. The female members have to choose her partners within the
community. However, if someone chooses her partner outside of the community, she has to
leave the society. In this sense, the society is very conservative. The members are restricted to
sing and dance Mousuo staffs and older members do not like make-ups. However, the outside
world is exposed as the technology is advancing day by day. The community is affected by
the external influences or rules and this is the major constraints to maintaining the matriarchal
system in the Mousuo community.
In the film, Muslim Women of Minang, it has been shown that the community is also
matriarchal. However, there are resistances in maintaining the mother’s lineage as outside
world would see the Muslim women under the men’s dominance. Thus, the men from the
outside world apart from Minang see the women as the men’s property ("Muslim Women Of
Minang" 2017). The Minang Muslim women are compared with other Muslim women of
Afghanistan, Taliban or Iran and they are very much different from the other Muslim women.
The resistance mainly comes from outside Muslim community.
Michelle Rosaldo’s distinction of private or public distinction of the division of labour
does not fit in the Minangkabau or Mosuo society. The division of labour in relation to
private and public proposed that men and women have different gender role in society
(Connell 2014). Here the society means mainly the patriarchal society. In this gender role, the
public sphere is for men and the private is for the women. In the Mosuo community, the
typical gender role of the public and private are changed. In this community, the women
manage the public world and take all the responsibilities including the family and outside
world. However, men are for harder and heavier works only.

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Power pollution
The power structure that mostly exists in the South Asian communities is harsh
towards women as most of the communities there is male dominated. In other words the
power in the domination is always exerted by men over the women. Women are always
considered to be fragile. They are always treated as men’s property; hence they can be treated
in any way as per the will of the male members of their family. Women are always kept at the
bottom of the power structure because it is taken for granted that they are the ones who will
always surrender to men. It is often considered as a sign of masculinity to dominate and
exploit the females (Stark 2013). Men and women are however considered to be equal in
some societies like the Minangkabau society but there are some work that can only be
performed by men particularly those that are heavier and need more physical strength. Men
and women are considered complementary to each other. The society is purely matriarchal
and matrilineal. In the time of the marriages, the men are exchanged unlike general societal
rule. However, the division of labour does not exist in this society. Men and women
complement each other. Women and men enjoy almost equal rights in division of labour and
so-called private and public world do not exist for women and men.

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Immediate return or delayed return economies
This again is another problem in the current gender context. In order to initiate
equality in society, most of the communities are trying to adopt the concept of the immediate
return or the delayed return economies. It is a kind of community that tries to initiate equal
rights and opportunities among individuals by incorporating the principle that no individual
can dominate each other. As a result of which among every two persons, one of them always
tries to become the dominant. This creates a problem as the entire society now exerts pressure
on the “would be dominator” to bring the counterpart back in line (Maynes, Mary and Ann
2014). Often it is seen that in many communities, men start surrendering so that their women
counterparts do not have to get dominated by them. In the act of doing this, women are often
blamed by the society with then charge that they are bossing over men and exploiting them.
This really becomes a major problem.
Conclusion
It can be concluded by saying that the archetypical construction of women and the
patriarchal notion of the role of the women in the Asian region are in the contradictory forces
as seen in the different ethnic groups of this region. The Minang and Mosuo are the
matrilineal society and gender role of the women are different from that of men.

8CONSTRUCTING THE IMAGES OF WOMEN
References
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competitiveness, and socialization at a young age: Evidence from a matrilineal and a
patriarchal society." Review of Economics and Statistics 95, no. 4 (2013): 1438-1443.
Connell, Raewyn. "Rethinking gender from the South." Feminist Studies 40, no. 3 (2014):
518-539.
Epstein, Arnold Leonard, ed. The craft of social anthropology. Elsevier, 2014.
Maynes, Mary Jo, and Ann Waltner. Gender, Kinship and Power: A Comparative and
Interdisciplinary History. Routledge, 2014.
"Muslim Women Of Minang". 2017. Youtube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=CvNFvpCeCFY.
Nayak, Anoop, and Mary Jane Kehily. Gender, youth and culture: Young masculinities and
femininities. Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.
Stark, Alexander. "The matrilineal system of the Minangkabau and its persistence throughout
history: A structural perspective." Shoutheast Asia: A Multidisciplinary Journal 13 (2013): 1-
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"The Land Where Women Rule: Inside China's Last Matriarchy". 2017. Youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_l9D7tEixc.