Gender
Issues
Sex-based harassment curtails behaviour through sexual stereotyping. Sex-based harassment includes name-calling, sexual innuendo, sexist comments, sexist jokes, displaying offensive materials and behaviour such as flashing and 'dakking'.
Terms such as 'slut', 'whore', 'bitch' and 'butch' are used to regulate girls' behaviour – to suggest that they are not 'doing' their femininity appropriately. Equally, terms such as 'poof', 'wuss' and 'girlie' can be used to deny the legitimacy of boys' behaviours when they operate in different ways from the acceptable or dominant forms of masculinity.
Sex-based harassment often comes from boys – and some girls and adults – who are stronger, older or more powerful, and whose abuse of power may be condoned by the dominant cultures. Students who suffer this behaviour sometimes find that the harassment is perceived as their individual, personal problem.
This violence needs to be named for what it is – not the problems of individual students, but part of learned social behaviour that sets up masculinity in opposition to femininity, that devalues femininity, that restricts individual choice and that operates to the detriment of all students.
It is also important to understand that the frustrations and resentments
that many boys feel in school, and that are manifested in disruptive behaviour,
are also experienced by many girls, but that girls have learned to be more
compliant.
Communities speak
"I usually get a hard time about talking with and playing with girls in class and at lunchtime. Because I spend time with girls, I get called faggot and a tryhard towards girls. When I get called names it makes me feel like I have been excluded from the boy race."
"I'm a girl. I hate make-up and dresses. I am more like a boy my friends
say, because I like footy, soccer and baggy clothes. I mostly get teased due
to me playing with the boys. I get called a boy, and a suckup. It makes it worse
when the
boys stick up for me. People should not be
bullied because of stereotypical images."
"I came here from another school this year ... kids here understand different people better. Teachers take it seriously if you tell them something has happened and it might have been a joke in some other culture but it isn't in mine."
"A lot of people don't realise that boys and girls can be friends, and don't have to be going out. They have very stereotyped ideas about relationships between males and females. Sometimes even kids' parents tease them about boyfriends and girlfriends if they see their young children playing or talking with the other sex. The more boys and girls who show that you can be friends with someone because you get on with them and it doesn't matter about sex, race or anything else, the better."
"In order to challenge violence within schools, boys' violences need to be seen as a masculinity issue. Violence by boys should not simply be regarded as the playing out of individual pathological behaviours. Nor should such violence be seen as the product of boys' 'nature'. Instead, attempts to develop an understanding of boys' violence should entail a focus on the ways in which violence, domination, and oppression are implicated in the construction of certain behaviours as 'normal boy behaviour'. Such a focus necessitates a consideration of homophobia and misogyny."
Challenges
School communities need to:
- acknowledge that gender is a vital issue in whole-school planning against violence, bullying and harassment
- research the nature and extent of sex-based harassment among students
- inform teachers and students of their legal responsibilities in relation to sex-based harassment
- draw on the national policy Gender equity: A framework for Australian schools, which provides outcomes statements, indicators of improvement and additional readings on the topic
- provide strategies and resources across the core curriculum that allow boys and girls to explore and challenge the ways in which 'acceptable' or dominant understandings of masculinity and femininity shape or distort their beliefs.
Resources
- Anti-Discrimination and Anti-Harassment
Policy Support Materials: Understanding gender diversity
http://www.education.tas.gov.au/school/educators/health/inclusive/ antidiscrimination/gender
Department of Education Tasmania.Sexuality and gender are a fundamental part of a person's identity. This information is designed to assist teachers and schools in supporting students with diverse gender identities. It describes concepts related to gender diversity and includes policy information, curriculum ideas, and a glossary of key terms.
'Just boys, just girls and just schooling: Curriculum, behaviours (including bullying) and gender',
Equity cross curriculum perspectives to support learning outcomes, April
http://www.sacsa.sa.edu.au/index_fsrc.asp?t=ECCP&ID=E3.1A2
Gender Equity Curriculum Policy Directorate (2001)A professional development paper that examines gender perspectives and power relations across the curriculum, and ways these issues might be addressed through curriculum, teaching and learning in all educational settings including child care, kindergarten, preschool and early primary contexts. Includes case studies from primary schools.
-
Years K-12 Gender Education
http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/learning/yrk12focusareas/
gendered/index.php
Department of Education and Training NSW
Professional support and resources available to schools -
Addressing Gender Issues in PDHPE
http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/secondary/
pdhpe/crosscurriculum/gender/index.htm
Department of Education and Training, New South Wales
This section of the PDHPE Unit web site explores gender in the new PDHPE Years 7–10 Syllabus and looks at resources available to support teachers to understand gender construction and how to implement explicit teaching of gender in the PDHPE curriculum. -
Boys Gender and Schooling
http://education.qld.gov.au/students/advocacy/equity/
gender-sch/index.html
Department of Education, Training and the Arts, QLD
Information for teachers, administrators and parents to address issues in boys' education. -
Gender Education
http://www.education.tas.gov.au/school/health/inclusive/gender
Department of Education, Tasmania
Gender equity resources for schools including curriculum support materials. - Enough's Enough! Sexual Harassment and Violence: A resource kit for primary schools
Department of Education Queensland (1994)
A kit examining the nature and impact of gendered violence including sexual harassment in primary schools. Consists of three books (a project report; a guide to research in schools; and teaching strategies, resources and posters) and a video which is also available with captions. The resource won a National Prevention of Violence Award in 1995. (Not available for sale; may be possible to order as an inter-library loan)
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