Women are born or made?

The reader must be thinking that this question has no validity, since not born a woman chooses, is Morphological. Well, you are right my dear reader, but women are made, i mean, being a woman represents a huge amount of ideologies that have a little or nothing to do with the woman's morphology. Then, the gender identity that is given to woman is to be feminine and when this is not fullfilled as it should be, the designation of woman become diffuse.

For example, I have deep voice, short hair, I wear wide clothes, I don't wear heels neather skirts, and I just carry on one earring. Morphologically, I am a woman, however when I am outside people use to name me as if I were a man, often at stores people say: what do you want sir?

Being woman, Morphologically means to be born with vagina and sines, besides some characteristics that variates from woman to woman, like notorious hips, a small waist, small hands, facial hair and corporal hair, particularitities that in fact are not decisive when recognizing a Morphological woman, like are it the two that I enunciated at the beginning.

I ask you: does the fact of has been borned with vagina and sines, determine me to give birth a son or marry a man? Actually no, this is a question based on a cultural twist. Being borned in this shape does not imply having a son neather marrying a man, nor having a relationship
with him.
However, in today's world, in the real world, specifically the world of Western culture, this reasoning is accepted as true by most people, claiming for example that God made us for such purposes, or anatomically agree with what nature gave us the way we designed it to term complement to the opposite sex and thus generate new specimens of the human race.

"The sense is not the object or person or thing, or is in the word. We are the ones that put the sense so strongly that after a while seems like a natural and inevitable thing. The meaning is constructed by the system of representation. " (1)
"This is what children learn, and how they become, not merely biological but cultural subjects individuals. They learn the system and the conventions of representation codes of their languages and culture, to equip them with a 'know-how' culture that enables them to function as subjects culturally competent. " (2)

As subjects belonging to this culture, we learnt what a woman represents, therefore, learned to represent us as women, were not born with it within us biologically. Now you my dear reader can give me the reason that women are not born, we become women.

Well, from my experience I can tell you that understand this clarifies and explains things a bit because in my lifetime I have never been able to feel comfortable with being a woman, not because I want to be a man, because for me the femininity as I have been describing to this point has not been characteristic, was formed more as an absence, in this way, each time I appointed to call me "woman" I never saw me like a "woman", I acquired the identity of the vampire, I looked into a mirror that was not my own , which does not represent me, this image was no meaningless , its silence is that perturbing discomfort.

This makes no sense if my peers do not resonate; on the one hand, in one hand, i didnt look like the girly girls, i wasnt particulary delicate, never played with dolls, or used dress; on the other hand, and they did notice it and would exclude me from their games for the same reason.

That dislocation on identity, not recognizing myself as being feminine became a conflict , it was not only the impresion i had of myself, but also how the girls felt about me not being as feminine as they where; when they legitimized me as different, there was not only an appearance, was a collective that classified me as different, and they noticed radically excluded; gesture that made me be aware that I was, that I meant difference.

Simultaneously there was another voice uttering the same speech, my mom, she did not point at me for being different, she only pointed at me for what was "right",was the "ideal" representation of how should a woman be, basically i should be like her, if we think that she was my immediate identity (mirror), my adjacent authority. In essence, it had to seem like her. But it was not like that, which started to define a type of self-censorship, a self-recognition as different, which is within its limits, its boundaries, not reflection.

... Distinctness, the outline of a particular identity would be traced within the margin of the "others". (3)

That: "not fit", this divergence with the reflection, that opacity in the identity, this ambiguity, that non sense, that non sense, made it difucult and confusing to understand myself under that image i was - why do not I am like the rest? then why should i look like the rest?. - somehow i felt imcomplete and felt lots of anger for that reason, -censorship became self-censorship-.

Thus, accelerated the rejection of the feminine, tied my masculine image to symbolize the abjection of the feminine as the identity. - Abortion as a mark of femininity, as measured and evaluated body. - Disgusts her (my) threwup rejection and form, to designate "contradiction" in the feminine, saturated that "not fit" as appropriate as a stud.

I built diffuse gender identity: a woman with very masculine, that is a dissolution / separation of gender representation (4), I mean, I adopted a non-clear shape, different from the models of representation, acquired a meaning ambiguous, a designation confuses its limits, that becomes problematic in relation to the feminine and masculine, as cultural representations of biological sex.

I identified with gender discomfort - a situation that is not really very hard to encourage - because female and male categories are unambiguous, this means that it is for women only women, is a designation that provides values of "equivalent" and proportional, where the woman is the feminine noun and adjective is its only for the designation of gender identity, then, any woman who is rendered differently would be considered ambiguous, beyond the limits of what female, in effect would be greater or lesser degree men, for the binary system of gender identities and the pure character in the way it establishes its concept (meaning, the name), make any alteration in its representation more or less excluded degree that gender identity of the noun index, hence we begin to generate some suspicion on whether or not women because they are not represented as such, does not look like one, does not look feminine.

I consolidated like deformed for the "world" as an incoherent speech in / with the sign-graphy are the one I represent me, or rather, I formed an incoherent speech in my performativity (5) that the "receiver" was out of the limits of what he meant by women. However, this nebula lenses of you, the reader / receiver to recognize me with my performativity sui generis, when reading me, is determined by the context of it, say it is rather a type of lens, which in accordance with the vision that gives decodes of "x" as the message.

To put it in clear terms, what I shall like this: one day I was walking down the street and a man who was there, told me in passing, "wow, just missing the antenna." Proposition which can be translated in these terms: what he was seeing was more like a man than a woman, he could recognize me as a biological woman, but it was ludicrous to think that it was not for the signs I saw in my appearance. What do expect from me? I expected to find: a woman looking for woman?, Does a woman look feminine?, What is performa in what he recognized as a woman? he wanted to see me fine, with blower, long hair, earrings, heels, well perfumed, with one of these symbols put to me as a woman in full and not as a man undone.
But he has told me that and I have understood what he meant and why he said, that I have understood the message, it means that we share a conceptual map, we learned the same thing by speaking the same language, belong to same place, at the same context, we know that the feminine is representing a woman and know how it is in our culture.

Even more significant is the knowledge that he uttered this trial was a man referring to a woman who seemed as women, it gives a panorama of how order is established cultural meanings of how they are represented from hegemony. It is clear that we are part of a society that is established under a patriarchal hierarchy, most authorities takes a man: this way we see male presidents, priests, parents who keep most of our homes, etc.. If we change the gender perspective we will first ladies, nuns and homemakers, trades in relation to men are less important, lower status, lower power and note also that these trades are subject to the male, the first lady arrives to be as the wife of the president, the nun is the servant of God but can not utter the speech to the believers in the church as the father, housewife serves her husband. The mean male trades occupations women and men, mean to women.

If you've thought about letting my love
Remember the path where I found you
If you plan to change your destiny
Remember a little
Who made you a woman. (6)

... Language as a system formed externally and within the symbolic order whose themes are built on the ideology, institutions and discursive formations. (7)

This means a woman is socially established language, from the institution and on behalf of hegemony, since that's where the speeches are broadcast on how a woman should behave. So we do believe that power, the institution (roughly: the State, the Church and the Family) is led by men and that this was what was set as hegemony through history, we understand that under this paradigm established what represents a woman, meant that from thence the feminine and masculine in outlook is where the meaning was.

This relationship of power was what was said at trial that the man nodded at me, him from the "power" be conferred on man as a woman I preached it, not feel embarrassed to do so, just did; statement from his voice, legitimated by the hegemony that confers a particular power: it puts us head, marks an unequal and hierarchical relationship on us. That's why it becomes particularly important the fact that he delivered on what the trial was about the character of my femininity, he meant to me as I woman, I appointed aberration, I regulated, as expressed in public, I scoffed at public has shown it to others, unlike what I said I should be, apparently, exercised its power.

Never the same, our bodies as women. Never safe, never like them. We are afraid of sex, humiliation, sex abroad. His manliness, his famous male solidarity is built upon the exclusion of our bodies, is woven in such times. It's a deal that rests on our inferiority. Their laughter of guys, including the laughter of the strongest ... (7)

We represent a man's otherness, a difference with respect to men, what makes us a negativity which reveals that there are men, meaning that we are different, our limits on what we represent, what we are, what we mean, is within the boundaries of masculinity, are a subset, in contrast we find our ways, our sense.

As a woman I represent that no man, from the hierarchy had to represent me, along the lines of this speech I had to mean that define, in this direction had to straighten my femininity in this value system that provided that the women were seen as such, they wore makeup, playing with dolls, wearing dress or skirt, wore two earrings, were delicate, painted their lips and red nails, were cordial, nice, motherly, hardworking, ... - ornamental devices to serve man. -

And it is this situation that becomes clearer significantly because my gender identity was configured as problematic, for what was being called to be represented in a particular order of values, why I hit particular gender identities as girls from my garden and so macho man stop me in the street, because my mom was a significant and decisive representation for me.
Plainly understood to be representing me as a woman while he was being regulated to carry it out, but would always be marked; understood that this situation predated me as a subject, then relax, because I did not bring me as anomalous, but everything was provisions of the "world" so that my form is understood as deformed.

The representation is not as the manifestation of everything inside is a coherent and discrete subject but defined as imprecise dominance that pervades the purely imaginary boundaries of self and other, private and public, body and object and so on. (9)

From this perspective enunciated this work degree and that is what we seek to investigate, to know what made me a woman, how I configured as a Representation and what it means to point out what this symbolizes in shaping gender identity and Representation of a culture, that is, to see how the feminine is the symbol of several particular ideologies that define what it means to their representation.

(1) Hall, Stuart(ed.), Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices.

London, Sage Publications, 1997, Cap. 1, pp. 13-74. Traducido en Lima, Mayo del 2002 por Elías Sevilla Casas en:

< http://www.cholonautas.edu.pe/modulo/upload/tallhall.pdf >, 30 de abril de 2008 P: 7

(2) HALL, Representation. P: 8.

(3) Saldías R., Gabriel, “Modalizados en Estilo versus Moda de Roberto Echavarren.” Espéculo. Revista de estudios literarios Nº .idad Complutense de Madrid, 2007,

< http://www.ucm.es/info/especulo/numero37/modaliza.html >

(4) Let us understand here by Representation: the reflection, the idea of cultural and hegemonic "world" in us, calling us to designate as a conceptual order of values in their units of meaning in their meanings.

(5) As a sign-graphy, performativity represents the way we endow with meaning, is a sign, says a communication, I mean, a kind of language with which to communicate with the world, under this language are involved in the world as units of meaning that can be read by the world.
It is the profile that you present to the world, is the placement of external symbols are internalized as signs to be dumped outside (again) as an identity, these symbols not only reflect the personality of each person but also function as cultural index, I mean, "Tell me how you look and I'll tell you in what context and what ideology you take back."

(6) Jiménez, José Alfredo. Corazón, Corazón (fragmento). Popular Song.

(7) Buchloh, Benjamin. Hans Hacke: La urdimbre del mito y la ilustración. Ensayo Publicado en el libro: Hans Hacke “Obra Social”. (Barcelona: Fundació Antoni Tàpies, 1995) P: 287

(8) Despentes, Virginia. Teoría King Kong. Ed. Melusina. 2007.

(9) Pollock, Griselda. Inscripciones en lo femenino. Ensayo publicado en el libro: Los Manifiestos del arte Posmoderno, Guasch, Anna Maria. ( España, Akal, 2000.) P: 330