Sociology of the School. Deakin Univ., Victoria

DOCUMENT RESUME ED 290 668 SO 018 704 AUTHOR Porter, Paige TITLE Gender and Education: Sociology of the School. INSTITUTION Deakin Univ., Victoria (Australia). REPORT NO ISBN-0-7300-0400-7 PUB DATE 86 NOTE 145p. AVAILABLE FROMDeakin University Press, Deakin University, Victoria, Australia 3217 ($14.50). PUB TYPE Books (010) EDRS PRICE MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS. DESCRIPTORS *Access to Education; Educational Opportunities; Elementary Secondary Education; *Equal Education; Equal Opportunities (Jobs); Feminism; Sex Bias; *Sex Discrimination; Sex Role: Sex Stereotypes; Vocational Education; *Womens Studies IDENTIFIERS *Australia ABSTR...3 This book presents a comprehensive review of the progress in equal education for females through an introductory discussion and six readings. The introductory discussion examines the the-ry that the state and consequently, the education system are seen as having the promulgation of the dominant class hegemony as an important part of its function. The document also traces the interaction between gender and education in the domestic curriculum, vocational opportunities, and the working conditions of women teachers. In the first three readings, Sara Delamont looks at ways to counter sexism during the child's formative -'ears; Dale Spender discusses the different ways that males get i.ore attention in the classroom; and R. W. Connell, D. J. Ashenden, S. Kessler and G. W. Dowsett point out that schools differentiate between male and female students in ways which reinforce sex stereotypes. The results of study carried out in 1974 by the Schools Commission on "Girls, School and Society," is discussed in reading four. In reading five, Jean Blackburn discusses removing formal barriers to access to education for girls and boys, and in the final reading Jane Kenway and Sue Willis offer alternatives to single-sex schooling as a solution to unequal education. An annotated bibliography is appended. (SM) *********************************************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original doct .nt. *******************************************4 *************1.*********** Sociology of the school Gender and education PAIGE !PORTER Murdoch University Deakin University This book forms part of the EED423 Sociology of the School course offered by the School of Education in Deakin University's Open Campus Program. It has been prepared for the EED423 Sociology of the School course team. Course team Lawrence Angus David Dawkins (ci:airperson) Kaye Lont (course developer) Fazal Rizvi Peter Watkins Consultants Jennifer Nias Paige Porter The course includes: Lawrence Angus, Schooling for Social Order David Dawkins, Economics, Politics and Education Jennifer Nias, Teacher Socialisation Paige Porter, Gender and Education Fazal Rizvi, Ethnicity, Class and Multicultural Education Peter Watkins, High Tech, Low Tech and Education These books are available from Deakin University Press, Deakin University, Victoria 3217. Students enrolled in the course also receive supplementary material. Published by Dcakin University, Victoria 3217 Distributed by Deakin University Press First published 1986 @ Deakin University 1986 Edited, designed and typeset by Deakin University Production Unit Printed by Deakin University Printery National Library of Australia Cataloguinginpublication data Porter, Paige H. Gender and education. Bibliography. ISBN 0 7300 0400 7. 1.Sex discrimination in education. 2.Educational equalization. I. Deakin University. School of Education. Open Campus Program. II Title. III. Title: Sociology of the school. 370.19'345 Series introduction One feature of education is the gap that exists between academic interests and teacher practice. The theoretical and research interests of academics, on the cne hand, are not readily available to teachers; till practical concerns of teachers, on the other hand, may not be taken account of by academics. It is hopes, that this series of monographs will provide a link between academic thought and research and the practice of teaching. Each volume in the series discusses contemporary educational issues and research in a way that can inform educational practice. They do not provide a set of prescriptive recommendations, but present a discussion of theory and research with the intention of highlighting the implications for ilducational practice in a way that can inform teachers. The issues discussed in this monograph series include: the relationship between the political and economic institutions of society and the education system, suggesting a link between socio-political conditions and educational policies and programs: the experience of teaching, em- phasising the importance of the self-concept of teachers in their socialisation into a professional role; ethnicity and multicultural policy, suggesting that these are best understood in terms of social class and what this might mean for teachers; a view of gender-related inequalities in education that suggests that these are best understood in terms of ideology about the family; the impact of new tech- nology on society and the implications this may have for education; and the possibilities that confront the education system and the practising teacher. It is hoped that these monographs will clarify some of the complex issues confronting educationists raid will stimulate thought and discussion among teachers that will inform their own practice and add to the continuing Debate. k),,,,,:-04an,tir"---,4 David Dawkins Course team chairperson iii 5 Contents Series introduction iii Gender and education 1 Introduction 3 Social reproduction theory 3 Conceptualising social change and human agency 6 Conceptualising gender: Making women visible 9 Arenas for analysis: The development of bureaucracy in education and the relationship between the family and education 13 Examples of the interaction of gender and education: Public schools in twentieth-century Western Australia 18 The domestic education curriculum 22 Choice of course by student:. 24 Vocational opportunities 26 The working conditions of women teachers 33 Discussil n 37 References 39 Readings 43 1 The formative years: Nursery, infant and junior schooling 45 Sart. Delamont 2 Make troublegec results 71 Dale Spender 3 Kids, their schools and the organisation of sociol life 82 R. W. Connell, D.J. Ashenden, S. Kessler & G. W. Dowsett 4 Girls, scho0 and societyeight years on Working Party on the Education of Girls 97 5 On education and women 105 Jean Blackburn 6 Countering sexism the single-sex way: A flawed proposition 116 Jane Kenway & Sue Willis Annotated bibliography 13b, About the author 143 Acknowledgments 144 6 Gender and education . .40111104,.. ---- *oast!10,-*_.**i-44, ,- in igir,4wg :011 agsz8, s.* s* % 41_0 , Atiggp lii- I 7 In 1971 Michael Young, a well-known British sociologist and education- Introduction alist, edited his seminal book on the sociology of knowledge. Knowledge and Control. In this book he drew together a number of authors who tried to delineate the ways in which much of what we accept as everyday 'knowledge', including school 'knowledge', is socially constricted, meaning that it is a creation of particular dominant groups in a particular kind of society at a particular point in time andserves to help maintain them in power. Furthermore, the air of truth and of tradition that is conveyed with regard to such knowledge ensures that for the most partwe do not ordinarily question whether these assumptions reallyare the best or indeed the only way to understand the world, whether they mask hiddenpower relationships and structures, or even whether they limitour perspective., in ways which might actually be detrimental to ourselves. In the preamble to that book, Young (1971) includeda short poem by Robert Desnos. a French pont., which illustrates in simple form thecom- plexities of some of the related social theories and concepts to which I will refer in this monograph on gender and education, including social reproduction theory, the concept of hegemony, the concept of ideology and the concept of utopia. The stanzas by Desnos follow. One day young Captain Jonathan, he was eighteen at the time, Captured a Pelican On an island in the Far East. In the morning, This Pelican of Jonathan's, Laid a white egg and out of it came A Pelican Astonishingly like the first. And this second Pelican laid in its tarn A white egg, From which came inevitably Another Who did the same again. This sort of thing can go on a very long time, if you don't make an omelette. IDesnos, in Young 1971, p.i) Social reproduction theories are theories which try to explain why pelicans Social keep producing white eggs which keep producing pelicans which keep reproduction producing white eggs, and so on. Specifically, social reproduction theories developed as an attempt to understand just how capitalist systems seemed theory to be able to hold themselves together and to continue relatively unchanged, or how they were able to reproduce themselves. Thiswas of both real and theoretical interest, given Marxian predictions regarding the self-destruction of capitalist states. For example, Antonio Gramsci 11 8 (1891-1937), Italian political theorist, developed a different interpreta- tion of Marxian thought which concentrated more on the superstructure social institutions which grew from the production systemthan on the economic base itself (Gramsci 1971). In explaining how capitalism was able to maintain itself he focused on

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