Gendered and Racialised Regimes in Italian Secondary Schools

Abstract

In this chapter, findings about gender equality in Italian schools are presented. The analysis presents an interesting juxtaposition of a popular discourse of inclusive schools and commitment to educating for gender respect, in line with formal educational policy, and a heavily gendered ideology permeating all aspects of school life and sustaining the gender regimes. No substantial differences were observed across the gender regimes of the three Italian pilot schools. Schools’ gendered ideology and practices were heavily racialised and embedded within a context of whiteness and assumed European superiority, encapsulating notions of female emancipation and freedom as almost inherent to contemporary Italian education and society. Within such school regimes and a wider Islamophobic context there was little room for challenging the racialisation of gender.