Tackling Gender Stereotypes – “The Staff Talked About ‘The Girls’ Table’ And ‘Boys’ Table”
Meet the couple trying to make a stand against gender stereotyping in education and elsewhere – one diary entry at a time…
It’s hardly uncommon now for both men and women to work in order to support their families. Job opportunities for both genders are nothing like as prescribed as they used to be (though rates of pay and promotion still leave something to be desired, but that’s another matter).
In an age when women and men can theoretically pursue whatever career and life for themselves that they wish, it follows that that’s the message we’d want to impart to our children. They should be free to explore whatever interests and enthusiasms they happen to have, right?
And yet, more recently it seems that traditional childhood gender stereotypes may have started to reassert themselves. At least that’s the view of Ros Ball and James Millar, parents to a daughter and son, aged 9 and 6 respectively. The couple are co-authors of recently published book, The Gender Agenda, which documents their efforts at trying to raise their children in a social and media environment that seems determined at every turn to hammer home what boys and girls ‘ought’ to be like and what they ‘should’ be expected to enjoy.
As James is quick to clarify, however, “We haven’t tried ‘gender-neutral parenting’. We’ve always said that you can’t do that unless you leave your child alone in a room and keep them away from the outside world. What we have tried to do is give them the tools to recognise gender stereotypes and challenge them.”
Ros picks up the point: “How people behave in their home will have an impact on how their children see themselves, but there’s so much more to a child’s life. The adverts they see on buses, the programmes they see on TV, films, books, what they hear in school – all these things that shape their understanding of what it is to be a boy or a girl.”
Thus, they began recording instances of their encounters with such stereotypes over a series of diary entries that they subsequently posted to an online blog – sightings of particular adverts, conversations with other parents, and on occasion, incidents related to nursery and school. “In the book we mention how, when our daughter first went to nursery, the staff talked about ‘the girls’ table’ and ‘the boys’ table.’” says James.
Ros recalls another example of “A friend who, when her daughter was starting primary, was worried about whether she would fit in with other girls. It was a co-ed school, yet she’d automatically assumed that her daughter would only play with other girls, not boys.” “Up until junior school, say age 9 or 10, we all just mixed together,” says James. “I remember having female friends round to play, at parties you’d invite everyone – I don’t remember that level of gendering.”
“It’s quite a modern phenomenon,” adds Ros. “Gendering does seem to be very much more on the cards these days.”
Star Wars versus fairy stories
As their daughter enters Y5 and their son Y2, has the issue of gender stereotyping come up much over the course of their schooling? “Our daughter used to tell us that she couldn’t play with cars, or take part in car races when she was in reception, because the boys ‘Wouldn’t let her,’” James recalls. “At the time, we spoke about this to her, rather than her teacher, because there’s that thing about wanting to fit in – you don’t be ‘that difficult parent.”’
James and Ros’ desire to highlight unthinking assumptions about boys and girls seems to be somewhat balanced against not wanting kick back too much. “Our son’s teacher was brilliant,” continues James. “On the last day of term she sent him home with a present, which was nice – but the girls received a book about fairy stories and the boys got a Star Wars book. Part of me wanted to go up and ask her why none of the girls could receive the Star Wars book, or any of the boys the fairy stories book, but she’d been a brilliant teacher. It would have been a bit much to start haranguing her about it on the last day of term.”
And what of their daughter’s experiences? At one time, PE lessons would be split down gender lines, with boys playing football and cricket and girls playing netball and rounders, but that hasn’t generally been the case for some time. Here, at least, aren’t things pretty much equal in terms of the activities children get to take part in? Well, yes and no.
“On the face of it, there appears to be this loose equality. Our daughter plays cricket, for example,” says Ros. “But when you drill down, you find something a bit different. When the children play football together in PE classes, the boys won’t pass to the girls. Our daughter’s teacher does something which we think is great – for a portion of the game, often the last 10 minutes, he’ll declare that only girls can score, which means the boys have to pass to the girls if they want their team to win. But it’s sad that that has to happen.”
“Oh, you’re different”
It’s not intended as a ‘gotcha’ question, but I have to ask – in light of how much they’ve tried to grapple with issues of gendering and stereotypes, to what extent have their own children’s interests and hobbies developed along ‘typical’ gender lines? “A bit,” concedes James, “though I’d say that our daughter’s coming out the other side of that. She’s starting to question things more and make her own decisions on that front – we’re wondering if our son will do the same.”
“Do they have some pink and blue stuff? Yes, they do,” says Ros. “We haven’t tried too hard to avoid all that – prohibition never really works, but when children come to visit, we say that all the toys in the house are for everyone.” They’ll watch adverts for ‘boys’ toys’ and ‘girls’ toys’ and say ‘That’s not true, is it?’ notes James. “They’ll clock it.”
It might seem like a small thing, but as Ros concludes, it’s a step towards taking on larger issues. “You’ll often hear people say that the next generation will be more equal – but looking at our kids right now, things don’t seem great. This year’s A level results in computing and science were terribly misbalanced for gender, just really bad – you’d like to think we’re getting somewhere with all this, but it’s not looking good.”
‘Dear Gender Diary…’
Several snapshots from Ros and James’ two-year documenting of everyday gender stereotyping…
11TH JANUARY 2011 Being shown round her new nursery a member of staff said to our daughter, ‘This is what we call the boys’ corner.’ It’s a play table for cars.
16TH JULY 2011 Went to a primary school fair today. The ‘Test your strength’ stall had prizes of toy guns, swords and bows and arrows… I didn’t see any girls with the prizes.
23RD NOVEMBER 2011 A voice message from a relative: ‘Really annoyed, [daughter’s] pre-school nativity play and all the girls are angels, boys are shepherds.’
27TH JUNE 2012 News from the kids’ aunt about their five-year-old cousin. He wants to get pink Crocs (shoes) for summer, but said ‘I know I’d never be able to wear them to school because everyone would laugh at me.’ He says he knows he’s not meant to like pink, but doesn’t care that it’s a girl’s colour. Where to start unpicking those sad statements
The Gender Agenda is available now from Jessica Kingsley Publishers, priced at £9.99; for more information, follow @GenderDiary
