Negotiating gender relations in the context of heterosexual intimate partner relationships : a thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Psychology, at Massey University, Manawatū, New Zealand
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Date
2017
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Massey University
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Abstract
Contemporary neoliberal postfemininism portrays women as empowered and existing in
heterosexual relationships where equality is negotiated between two equal beings. The current
study is a feminist project seeking to understand how men and women negotiate gendered
relations in the context of heterosexual intimate partner relationships. The research draws on
individual semi-structured interviews conducted with six men and six women aged between 25
and 40, who had been in a heterosexual intimate relationship for at least two years, thus having
experience in the area of interest. A feminist poststructural discourse analysis was used to attend
to the gendered power relations and dominant discourses that enabled and constrained
subjectivities and positioning for the men and women. This research indicates that whilst
equality and women’s empowerment are popularised ideals, the lived reality is quite different. In
both their own gendered subjectivities and gendered performances in their intimate heterosexual
relationships, men and women are navigating the positions/roles on offer in hegemonic
masculinity, emphasised femininity and neoliberal postfeminist ‘choice’ femininity that are both
enabled and constrained by heteronormativity. Heteronormativity produces discourses,
subjectivities and positioning that are so dominant they are invisible, and are taken up as one’s
own individualised choices. Social sanctions make resisting or developing new positions
difficult. The result is the continuing enactment of traditional gendered roles in intimate
heterosexual relationships, rather than negotiating new positioning, which is reproducing
inequality and the continued subordination of women.
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Keywords
Sex role, Man-woman relationships, Intimacy (Psychology), Research Subject Categories::SOCIAL SCIENCES::Social sciences::Psychology