Discussing Discrimination: children's construction of sexism between pupils in primary school

Abstract

Primary school children's interview responses are examined to investigate whether they construct gender as a source of discrimination in their school lives. Their reported experiences and descriptions of sexism in school are discussed, as well as their reports of strategies they employ to cope with or resist it. As social‐constructionist analysis is applied to the data, the children's discussion and reports of sexism are interpreted as their constructions in a particular interactive environment (interviews with a white, female adult), rather than as necessary expressions of ‘truth’. After contextualising this research in a discussion of developments in feminist theory in the area of gender in the primary school, this analysis begins by reporting the large number of children who claimed to have observed incidents of sexism in school. It then discusses how a majority of girls maintained they had been victims of such sexism. The constructions of those who said sexism did not occur in school are also considered. Analysing children's discussion, it is explained that children reported various types of sexism to be practised by fellow pupils. These are listed and explored, and it is suggested that sexism is an excess of gender category maintenance, which can be utilised as a form of power or control. Finally, children's reports of a variety of strategies of resistance to sexism are examined. It is argued that, while some methods of resistance were reported to be more successful than others, there was some suggestion that girls may be prevented from assertive resistance due to their constructions of femininity as passive or facilitating.