An Excerpt From This Week's Reading for my Gender, Power, and Politics Class

[kangaroo_sensei]

"At its extreme, the age-old relationship of the egg and the sperm takes on a royal or relgious patina. The egg coat, its protective barrier, is sometimes called its 'vestments,' a term usually reserved for sacred , religious dress. the egg is said to have a 'corona,' a crown, and to be accompanied by 'attendant cells.' It is holy, set apart and above, the queen to the sperm's king. The egg is also passive, which means it must depend on sperm for rescue. Gerald Schatten and Helen Schatten liken the egg's role to that of Sleeping Beauty: 'a dormant bride awaiting her mate's magic kiss, which instills the spirit that brings her to life.' Sperm, by contrast, have a 'mission,' which is to 'move through the female genital tract in quest of the ovum.' One popular account has it that the sperm carry out a 'perilous journey' into the 'warm darkness,' where some fall away 'exhausted.' 'Survivors' 'assault' the egg, the successful candidates 'surrounding the prize.' Part of the urgency of this journey, in more scientific terms, is that 'once released from the supportive environment of the ovary, an egg will die within hours unless rescued by a sperm.' The wording stresses the fragility and dependency of the egg, even though the same text acknowledges elsewhere that sperm also live for only a few hours."
"The Egg and the Sperm: How Science Has Constructed a Romance Based on Stereotypical Male-Female Roles" (Emily Martin)