Gender and Identity

Going through these readings I am realizing that rather than accepting gender as a word that has no history I am being forced to look into what it means. Gender is another word we use to identify ourselves. Now we have the issue of coming up with a meaning for Identity. Is our identity our own individual foundation that we must find? Is our identity completely constructed by the social world? A mix of both? These questions also come up when looking at what gender is. Is our gender a product of biology, or completely formed by social practices? In the article by R.W Connell titled Making Gendered People he argues that it is a mix of both. In his words femininity and masculinity "constitute a world that has a bodily dimension, but is not biologically determined." In the other reading called Full Frontal Feminism by Jessica Valenti she discuses how feminism has been made into something unattractive. Its true, I think that it is more or an insult than a compliment to call someone a feminist but I don't think that it is as dramatic as Valenti portrayed.  I liked her point that all women who did not agree with the pay difference between men and women, childcare, women s health care...etc. then you are feminist. Then, in her eyes I am.  In my mind a feminist is an activist for feminist issues and at the moment I am not speaking out against anything feminists do.  This is mostly because I do not feel the inequity personally at the moment.