A Swa-Shakti Working Paper - Vanbandhu Kalyan Yojana

Integrating Gender Concerns
Though theoretically, the concept of gender is found intimidating by
functionaries at different levels, the effort here is to translate gender interventions
into activities that help mainstream it. Put simply, gender can be seen as socially
constructed whereby the society/community ascribes characteristics, duties,
responsibilities etc., to a man or a woman based on societal norms. , It, therefore,
is different from the biological identity of being male or female, which is
based on physical characteristics.
Thus gender is a social construct or a socially imposed identity that
determines roles – what can and cannot be done by men and women, – what
is the right behaviour for men and women etc. But more often than not, this
social construct places a number of restrictions on both men and women in
their day to day life, with the result that men are expected to be strong, they
cannot cry, they are not supposed to do household chores etc., and women
are expected to look after their homes and children, they have to be
protected and cannot move about on their own, decisions are to be taken
for them etc. Many of these expectations are slowly changing with men
and women performing overlapping roles without the
limitations of gender.
Nonetheless, it is to be understood that the socially
imposed identity of a woman places many more restrictions
upon her as compared to a man. These restrictions
become a basis to discriminate against her, which, makes
it necessary to separately focus on women and work
towards gender equality and absence of discrimination.
Our social construct is an inherent part of what we
think and do and thus, at times, it creates a bias or
influences in the way we perceive things.
The important aspect is to
Gender — A Swa-Shakti Working Paper