Assignment Title: Exploring Gendered Heteronormativity through Breaching Experiments
Created for:  Intro to Sociology
Author: M. Bess Vincent, Sociology
Summary:  This short exercise invites students to explore the interconnectedness of gender and sexuality by violating gender norms and judging others’ reactions.  
Integrative Learning Elements:  Connections to Experience, Reflective
Other Elements:  Qualitative Reasoning in the Disciplines 

When covering the topics of gender and sexuality, students are assigned a supplemental reading by Nielsen, Walden and Kunkel titled, “Gendered Heteronormativity: Empirical Illustrations in Everyday Life.”  Between 1975 and 1990, the authors had students in gender classes complete research projects involving gender norm violations.  Using 658 of these cases as the data for their article, they found that when studying non-sexual gender norm violations the actors’ behaviors were interpreted through a lens of sexualization.  (For example, a woman who chewed tobacco received a comment that she would have a hard time finding a man that way.  In reality, the behavior is not sexual but it is interpreted through this lens).  Furthermore, they find gendered differences in sexualization:  Men were commonly labeled as homosexual or potentially homosexual while women were more often judged in terms of their attractiveness to men (heterosexualization) or as hyperheterosexual (promiscuous).

Students are asked to read this article and then to write a reflection based on the prompt below:

After reading this piece, consider the gender norm violations studied in this article (list provided below) and conduct your own breaching experiment where you violate one of these norms (make sure to choose one for the appropriate gender). Describe what you did.  How did others react? Did anyone define your actions as deviant? If not, what do you think this means for society and the meaning of gender norms? If so, should gender violations be defined as deviant? In either case, provide one practical suggestion of a way we can transcend traditional gender roles so that they would be less important.

Students submit reflections to the public Blackboard discussion board at least one day prior to the class meeting where we are set to discuss the reading, allowing time for me (and other interested students) to read the posts before we meet.  During class, we review the methods used in the article and then go around the room discussing what everyone did and how others reacted. After sharing, I challenge the students by asking them “so what?”  Potential conclusions include:

-	We conflate gender and sexuality in everyday life, while using sexuality as a tool to enforce gender norms.
-	Both men and women are judged from a male gaze, demonstrating the patriarchal structure of society.
-	Men may be judged more harshly because they have more to lose in the power structure of society.
-	Even though the authors conducted their research several decades ago, gender and sexuality still structure our interactions.  There are still inequalities based on these dimensions.
-	Some gender norms have changed in meaning over time and no longer elicit strong reactions.  This demonstrates the social construction of this concept.
-	What purpose do gender norms serve?  Are they functional for society?
-	How do we transcend traditional gender roles so that they would be less important?  

Reference:
Nielsen, Joyce McCarl, Glenda Walden and Charlotte A. Kunkel. 2000. “Gendered Heteronormativity: Empirical Illustrations in Everyday Life.” The Sociological Quarterly 41(2): 283-296.