What in the world is biological essentialism?

Biological Essentialism refers to a way of thinking that says, in essence, “biology is destiny”. In the past this kind of view has been used to create different classes of human beings, like saying that Native Americans are ’savages’, black people are somehow ‘less’ than human or women are not ‘capable’ of being scientists. These more blatant examples have given way in our era to much more subtle ways of perpetuating power based gender differences. “Boys being Boys” is one very routine example. The idea that men are somehow entitled to behaving immaturely because of biological differences is a way that men hold on to dated understandings of the roles of men and women. And I am not an exception here – I still try to get away with some ‘typical male’ behaviors when I don’t want to accept responsibility for my actions and motivations. And don’t get me wrong – I think that these distinctions are reinforced by the WHOLE culture, not just by men. Read the rest of this entry »