I am racking my brains here, and coming up with NOTHNG...

[Oakmaiden]

Please help me...

I am writing a dissertation on stereotyping in KS2 children, and have ground to a complete halt.

I am TRYING to think of ways to show that gender stereotyping is pervasive throughout our entire culture - but without mentioning specific things like the media, books, TV programming, advertising etc (they will come later).

All I can come up with so far is that the baby changing units is generally in the women's toilet room.

There must be more examples of mundane things that people hardly notice but which underline the gender roles in society???

• The way people always assume you will want pink clothes / gifts / cards for a little girl, and blue for a boy... I had to specifically say that we did not want pink anything for Mia, and it still didn't get through to everyone
• Little boys often like pink, but are quickly conditioned by classmates / older siblings that "pink is a girl's colour." My little nephew loves pink and yellow!
• Healthy little boys are described as sturdy, whereas healthy little girls are often described as 'chunky'?!?
• The phrases "Oh, he's a real little boy / Oh, she's such a girl" as a perfect example of traditional gender stereotyping

DontmindifIdo yes - also (- I know its Media again) football, rugby, cricket are all sports that girls are not routinely taught, and only get televised or media interest with males playing them - and these are seen as 'our national sports'.... and our sports 'heros'.

However, the olympics only comes around every 4 years - I bet you do get a spike in female competitive sport participation then, which dwindles as its 'back to male sports domination as usual'...

Another thing - it might be interesting to look at doing a comparison with American and Australian cultures, where there seems to be a much stronger emphasis (more embedded cultural acceptance, perhaps?) in schools and general life about gender equality, and equality of opportunity.

Men have more free time than women to play sport.

I agree, but as someone else said, when women exercise it is literally 'on the treadmill'.... Men have teams sports they are taught to play that only require a ball and a couple of jumpers for goal posts. They socialise at school with their friends playing sport and so it wouldn't be weird for a male colleague to ask another - "do you fancy going out for a kickabout?" - whereas if a female colleague asked that of another it would be extraordinary and weird. It is really difficult to get a female 'team' together for that reason...

I'm still thinking here - also, I have had sexual harassment when I've been jogging and I wonder if being 'out on show' makes women and girls worry about being judged and perved over when it comes to outdoor sports?

Foodunit - interesting, Woman sports get treated with respect every 4 years, but still it's only individual sports, you still don't hear much about female teams.

That it is not taken for granted that men will look after their children. In Sweden, it is standard for the wife to do the first six months of childcare and the husband to do the second six months. This is built into the legislation and if the man doesn't take a certain proportion the allowance is lost to the family altogether. In our system, women are entitled to up to a year of mat leave and there is no expectation or allowance in the system for men to take part of this "maternity" leave.

This is why some men talk about looking after their own children as babysitting. It's something unusual that you might do as a favour not something you do because it is your responsibility every day.

"Women's clothing at all stages of life being more revealing/tighter than men's?" Not to mention restricting too - heels that make it hard to really do anything active.

foodunit - agree re running. The arrival of lighter evenings always turns running into a spectator sport....

And with regard to girls being and boys doing....boys skate-boarding around car parks and skate parks etc accompanied by a group of girls without skate boards who were just there to hang around with the cool boys I assume

I think also of the frisson that went round when a little boy (aged 2) turned up to a party in a cinderella dress like his sister. But no one objected to the little girls dressed up as pirates. It's still horribly transgressive for a child (even a baby) boy to be dressed as a girl. Girls are just "less" than boys - it is hard for society to tolerate a boy dressed as a girl (because it's demeaning somehow). Fathers particularly struggle with this I think as it seems to reflect negatively on their own status.

Of course I think this is hugely damaging for boys.

DontmindifIdo Woman sports get treated with respect every 4 years, but still it's only individual sports, you still don't hear much about female teams.

I too have pondered this - and I think that there is something genuinely sinister in it. I think the sight of a group of women united and cooperating to achieve a common competitive goal is absolutely terrifying - it would be such a misogynist myth busting spectacle. Imagine:

A group of athletic and strong (not waif like and submissive) women, focused (not distracted by inconvenient/ restrictive clothes/ anxieties about their appearance) on working as a team (not being 'bitchy'/'catty'/or other divisive stereotypes), to achieve a goal (not just support others in doing so) - for the sake of their own glory (not to impress or seduce or flatter men)....

I think it is dangerous to those who hold misogynist stereotypes dearly.

Sport is a huge passion of mine, and I find some of the statements here a bit chicken and egg. Is discussion of this derailing the thread? If so, I will start another thread. However, it does seem relevant to genders being shoehorned into different roles at a very early age, as kids witness participation from a very early age.

I'm interested too Sanjeev and happy chatting - though I suppose it is taking the thread in a new direction - OP hasn't visited in a little while - perhaps enough inspiration has been gleaned?

Did my thesis on this too. If you start with the theories and how it all works (the nuts and bolts of 'why' and 'how'), the examples are too many to list I found. Which are you using?

I will wait until she pops up again then. Cheers FoodUnit.

Primary school teachers, who have a very nurturing role as the pupils are so young, are nearly all women.
Just a quibble: I don't like "we" sentences. They always raise my hackles in journalism. Every time someone writes that "we" do this or that I always think "Who do?" and half the time, "I don't".

Ahh, sport, a little obsession of mine. I tweet daily on the percentage of male to female stories in the freebie paper. #halfthepopulation

It's also more subtle than mere visibility. Note how in the press you have the GB Team and the GB Women's Team. The male is the norm and the female is the addendum. The only time this changes is in predominantly female sport e.g. netball where there appears to be no need to flag up the inferior team because men wouldn't bother playing it (though perversely in NZ the most popular participation sport for men is actually netball. Go figure)

Oakmaiden: I think your first assumption about baby changing units needs to be revisited as from my fairly large experience they are mostly in the disabled toilet which is unisex.

Hi - have popped back again!

Sanjeev - go right ahead derailing - I have finished my paragraph now!

twirlyagogo - erm... my lit review is VERY short - on 2000 words (my university believe in very little dissertations, which makes it blooming hard to fit everything I need to say in!). I am talking about the case for an evolutionary basis to gender differences, and then about development of gender identity and knowledge (using Kohlberg amongst others) and then onto where gender knowledge comes from and what affect stereotyping has on children's development and aspirations. Which is quite a lot to fit into 2000 words.
I am actually coming at this from the educational perspective (as I am an Ed Studies student, not a psychology one) so hope to bluff my way around the bots I am a bit hazy on... Probably shouldn't admit that on an open forum...

Not the full shilling - I think you are right to a great extent in a lot of places - although the change is fairly recent. But where there is no disabled toilet, then child facilities still tend to be in the ladies.

vezzie - you are right too - I have already rewritten it. I get a bit carried away sometimes...

2000 words - that's going to be so hard! Much more difficult to write short than long, I think. If you do ever take it further, do feel feel free to get in touch and I can point you in the direction of what I did as it sounds similar re impact of stereotyping on aspirations etc. Good luck!

Birthday cards, lots of 'hidden' messages.

Men in suits on tv, women in little dresses.

Jewellery.
The meaning of swear words.
The readership of female vs male authors.
'hobbies' as a male pursuit.
The invisibility of women in history.

I'm not sure if the sports I mentioned way upthread will be any use, but you might like to know that BBC Breakfast has just featured a new report about sport in schools, how girls are being put off by existing PE curriculum, and how more "girl-friendly" options (such as dance and trampolining) should be offered.

Once again, the boys are the norm, and girls are "other".

The number of women doing the shopping and school run with 2+ children. At that time of day you see the occasional man with 1 child but never with several.

I have two daughters and many have assumed we need a third child, a boy. Somehow DH is being deprived

Oakmaiden - I know you've written it now...but I do hope you didn't make the mistake of writing that evolutionary and social explanations of gender differences are competing theories and that evidence of one disproves the other (and vice versa)?

On stereotyping I would add the tendency for people to assess boy's career choices and their expectations within them against the benchmark of earning a 'family wage' whereas the long term earning capacity of girls career choices are not seen as so important. This goes for expectations of parents and teachers, the 'dating market',
parents in law etc...

E.g. A girl with a degree in art or nursing is not seen as a "worse catch" than an accountant or a doctor.

Whereas a boy working in these fields will raise concerns about whether he will earn enough to support a family, unless he sets his sights really high for success within it.

I know that sounds old fashioned, buy I do think people judge the phrases "she has a little business making jam", and "he has a little business making jam" quite differently!