Sex and Gender -- Categories of the Social Organization of Sexuality

A review of the literature shows that the social sciences have not adequately distinguished between the biological category of sex & the social organization of sexuality, ie, the distinction between sex & gender. An analysis of Yugoslav sociologist Vera Stein Erlich's (1897-1980) U drustvu s covjekom ([In the Company of Man], Zagreb: Liber, 1968) & other works uncovers a certain flexibility of categories relating essential but fragmentary elements of an anthropology of gender, expressing two main, though insufficiently elaborated, points: (1) every culture interprets & appreciates distinctions between men & women differently; & (2) Fs are commonly associated with social strata low on scales of hierarchical & cultural evaluation. Due to this surprising perceptiveness of concepts of gender & gender asymmetry, her writings are interesting to modern students of the anthroplogy of gender & to feminists. Modified HA