Social Construction and Sex and the City

Charles Wulke

Steve Wexler

English 313 HON

11/2/09

Social Construction and Sex and the City

Social construction has provided a certain amount of order and a blue print for future generations to follow; however, it does change over time. Doreen Massey proposes, “gender relations vary over space: spaces are symbolically gendered and some are marked by the physical exclusion of particular sexes” (Barker, 377). In a conservative viewpoint, a woman’s gender role in society is to raise the children, take care of the house, and to run social events. The spaces separated to her normally included the house, a coffee shop where she could meet with her friends and chat, possibly the school for teaching or for dropping off and picking up her children. This sphere of life was left almost exclusively to the women. In contrast, men work to make a living and therefore support the family. The space that they use include: the office, possibly a study, the gym, sports field, TV room, among many places. These spaces have been cultural codes that have been upheld in the past but have undergone many changes in this modern culture.

The women from the modern cult TV show, Sex and the City, are very much models of the “modern woman.” Unlike the normal, “spaces” that women were considered to normally reside in, these women are single, and work in the professional world. They do not fit the “stay at home mom mold", and don’t even consider trying to be married. They seem to assume that guys are more there if they need them. In the particular scenes from the Season 1, Episode 7, “The Power of Female Sex,” the different characters discuss their private “uses” for men but it never seems to be for the use of a partner or treating them as if they deserve any respect. This is a very different view of gender roles because instead of the man being the boorish character it now seems to be acted by the woman. This is accentuated by Amalita who constantly seems to use the men in her life as people to get money from or to get sexual pleasure from, however she then dumps them when she doesn’t need to get them anymore. This obsession with sex and money was a role that men used to be criticized for but is now replaced by the women. There is also the scene about women using the men for money and using their own sex as a bartering chip, which seems to produce a double standard.