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Welcome to the opening installment of a new series on what we can learn about human sex and gender by looking at the natural world.
Sex—one small word with huge implications. To most humans, being male or female implies a certain set of inseparable biological and sociological characteristics, but the natural world around us is rarely so black and white. For every characteristic that we associate with a particular sex, the animal kingdom harbors at least one surprising exception; concepts that we believe are inextricably linked are uncoupled, and even reversed, in other species.
Our sex exerts an incredible influence on our lives, influencing anatomy, appearance, behavior, and countless other traits. Socially, our sex also matters in terms of how we are understood and treated by others, because we see each other through a gendered lens. Female college graduates are hired more often than male graduates, for instance, but earn 17 percent less than their male counterparts. Police pull male drivers over at a much higher rate than they do female drivers. In high school math classes, teachers direct questions toward, call on, and interact with male students much more frequently than females.
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