GENDER RELATIONS IN SECONDARY SCHOOLING.

Kessler, S.; Ashenden, D. J.; Connell, R. W.; Dowsett, G. W.

There is abundant evidence that inequality between women and men is a very general feature of Western education systems. Differential treatment and differential outcomes for both staff and students have been extensively documented by research over the past decade. In the same period, considerable energy has been spent trying to change it. By and large the discussion of gender and education has been guided by the concept of sex roles. The idea that boys and girls are socialized into different but complementary roles, which then shape their expectations of life and other peoples expectations of them is an appealing one. It fits much common-sense knowledge of how children are treated and provides a language for describing the pressures exerted by parents, peers, mass media, and schools. There is no guarantee that these uncertainties and possibilities will be resolved in a progressive direction, that is, one that actually diminishes sex inequality and gender-related oppression. It is a mass of tensions, contradictions, and complexities that always have the potential for change.

SECONDARY education; GENDER; GENDER role; EXPECTATION (Psychology); GENDER differences (Psychology); EDUCATION

Sociology of Education, 1985, Vol 58, Issue 1, p34

0038-0407

Academic Journal

10.2307/2112539