When you fill in an application form, you may sometimes see "Gender" but may also encounter the word "Sex". Nowadays, it is commonplace to use them interchangeably (交替地), however, they actually have different meanings and using them wrongly can be offensive (冒犯的) to sexual minorities (小眾).
"Sex" is the biological traits (特徵) that society associates with being male or female. In most cases, your biological sex was identified by the doctor at the time you were born. Yet, the definition of "sex" is no longer binary (雙的) as there are intersex people who are born with sexual characteristics that cannot fit the traditional definitions of either male or female bodies. For "gender", it is the cultural meanings attached to being masculine (男性的) and feminine (女性的). It seems to be abstract but in fact, every one of you DOES gender every day. Girls may wear dresses when boys usually don't. A lot of girls has long hair when boys are expected to have short hair. And how did your parents put clothes on you when you were new born? Probably in pink or blue (given that colours originally carry no meanings but their artificial (人造的) meanings are now socially accepted). There are a lot of phenomenons you believe they're natural but you gradually (逐步地) find that they are all shaped by society when studying sociology.
Can gender and sex be distinct? Yes! If you have a female friend who dresses like a boy and thus, is categorized (歸類) as a tomboy, there may then be a mismatch (錯配) between her gender and sex.
So, What are the differences between transGENDER and transSEXUAL? Have a guess and comment below!
-🖋Sociology minor, the University of Hong Kong
////
大大:嚟緊我哋有唔同uni、唔同學科嘅人share佢地嘅知識，聽日就有Maths同英文嘅關係。🙈鍾意我哋呢個新系列就俾個like同comment, 下一個介紹可能就係你有興趣嘅學科啦！❤️
#Vocabno #English #19DSE #2019DSE #DSE #17DSE #2017DSE #18DSE #2018DSE #Reading #Writing #Speaking #Wordoftheday #Vocabulary #Expression #Phrase #HKDSE #LiberalStudies #通識 #LS #Dsetips #Linguistics #語言學 #Morphology #Sociology #Sexuality #社會學 #性別學

外傭或是外籍看護已經成為台灣許多家庭日常生活中不可缺的一份子，但是否有注意到他們的「服裝」都偏向「中性」呢？他們都比較傾向掩藏自己的性別特徵呢？

這篇來自《關鍵評論》上賴婉琪的好文，帶我們先把視野拉到香港，探討當地外傭或是外籍看護的服裝特徵。看完了這篇文章，我們也再回頭想想台灣對於外傭或是外籍看護是否也有類似的態度。

-------------------
綜觀受訪外傭的經驗，香港的僱主對男性化打扮的外傭持接受的態度，借用Eddy的說法：「有老闆喜歡聘用tomboy。」喜歡的原因可以是減低外傭成為性威脅的機會，就像Jan的新僱主，不希望外傭穿得太漂亮，又或者真心不介意外傭的打扮。外傭的性別形象可以偏離主流對女性的期望，例如束超短的頭髮、穿男裝的汗衣，不過她們仍要應付僱主冷不防的提問，諸如「為甚麼頭髮那麼短」、「為何不穿胸圍」之類的特權問題。

性威脅的論述讓這群外傭無意中獲得顛覆主流性別形象的力量，她們不用像一眾香港同志般要在僱主面前「扮直」，例如女同志得穿著女性化服飾去上班、男同志在公司要掩飾女性化的小動作。反之，外傭能在僱主面前如常般表現她們男性化特質。不過，縱然僱主包容這種女穿男裝的性別模糊，但仍然有其底線的──束短髮和穿男裝汗衣只是為了方便做粗重工作，而不應與同性戀扯上關係。不過，即使外傭願意掩飾，宣稱自己不愛女人，並不等於僱主不會懷疑她們的性身分。外傭嚴重缺乏私人空間，因為她們既在別人的私人領域工作，又在工作的地方居住，逼不得已要在僱主面前晾曬內衣，而當僱主洞悉外傭的內衣喜好時，便立即追問，以滿足其好奇心。這些都顯示出香港的僱主並無尊重外傭私人生活的概念。

當一般家庭仍流於教導男孩子要愛藍色、女孩子要愛粉紅色時，到底這群外表性別模糊的外傭有沒有顛覆香港家庭的性／別價值觀？我認為刻板的性別形象及其社教化，表面上雖受到一點點衝擊，因為這群外表較性別模糊的外傭正在穿梭家中，東奔西跑地照顧家中各人；不過這種性別顛覆必須有其功能性，可以方便日常勞動工作，否則會被僱主標籤或質問

(以上引用網頁原文)