Friend by Any Other Name

Sex matters between friends. No, not in the way you might think -- or the kind of sex that you might think. Sex matters in terms of gender: Male friendship and female friendship really is different from each other. Of course, there are always exceptions to statements as broad as this, and other traits of any individual dyad matters a great deal. Race matters as well as gender, and age, and physical disability, and personality.

But aside from all of these factors there are substantial differences between the ways in which men and women (and before them, boys and girls) conceptualize and practice the art of friendship. These differing definitions of friendship reflect larger social and cultural ideas about gender, a point that will be taken up below in this paper that examines how sex -- that is, gender -- affects friendships.

The basis for...
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