Sex-roles are the observable behaviors assigned to men and women
by the various cultures on planet Earth
because of their identifies as either males or females.

     Closely related bibliographies—such as gender-personalities—
are listed at the end.

1. Sandra Lipsitz Bem

The Lens of Gender:
Transforming the Debate on Sexual Inequality

(New Haven, CT: Yale UP, 1993)                                 244 pages

     A feminist psychologist shows how different sex-roles
emerge from three basic beliefs:

(1) BIOLOGICAL ESSENTIALISM
—that men are naturally better than women in almost every way;
and therefore men naturally must be in charge of everything.

(2) ANDROCENTRISM—that men are the center and criterion of everything,
women being defined as secondary and supportive creatures.

(3) GENDER POLARIZATION—that the sexes are fundamentally opposite,
which puts them at odds with each other.

As these beliefs disappear,
androgyny—the best of both genders—can emerge. 
This book seeks to improve the status of women thru
social and cultural change rather than inward, psychological change.
Since the culture causes the inequality, Bem believes,
cultural changes will bring the solutions.

2. Anne E. Beall & Robert J. Sternberg, editors

The Psychology of Gender

(New York: Gilford Press, 1993)      278 pages

     A collection of articles by about 10 psychologists
exploring the differences between men and women.

3. Sherry B. Ortner & Harriet Whitehead, editors

Sexual Meanings:
The Cultural Construction of Gender and Sexuality

(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 1981) 435 pages

     A standard work of anthropology,
looking into the sexual customs and patterns of simple tribes.
Each culture begins with the biological differences between the sexes
and builds elaborate marriage and kinship systems from those facts.

Sexology                                      B-SEXOLO

Sex-Script Hypothesis                 B-SEX-SC

Variations of Sex and Gender      B-V-SG

I. Intersex                                     B-CRIT

II. Transsexualism                        B-TS

Transsexual Autobiographies      B-TS-AB

III. Sex-Roles                                B-ROLE

IV. Gender-Personality                 B-GEND

V. Sexual Orientation                   B-ORNT

VI. Cross-Dressing                       B-TV