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Childhood
DOI: 10.1177/0907568202009004004
2002; 9; 415Childhood
EMMA RENOLD
Harassment among Primary School Girls and Boys
Presumed Innocence: (Hetero)Sexual, Heterosexist and Homophobic
http://chd.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/9/4/415
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PRESUMED INNOCENCE
(Hetero)sexual, heterosexist and homophobic
harassment among primary school
girls and boys
415
Introduction
The past 15 years have witnessed a growing awareness and an increase of
research into bullying in primary and secondary schools (Aaora and Thompson,
1987; Elton, 1989; La Fontaine, 1991; Olweus, 1978, 1993; Roland and
Munthe, 1989; Smith and Sharpe, 1994; Smith et al., 1999; Tattum and
Lane, 1989; Tatum, 1993). Much of this work has been designed and conducted
within a psychological paradigm which often neglects and excludes
how bullying behaviour is embedded in relations of power and control
(Smith and Sharpe, 1994) and is part of a continuum which can directly
EMMA RENOLD
Cardiff University
Key words:
bullying, children, gender,
sexual harassment
Mailing address:
Emma Renold
Cardiff School of Social Sciences, Cardiff
University, Glamorgan Building,
King Edward VII Avenue,
Cardiff CF10 3WT, Wales, UK.
[email: renold@cardiff.ac.uk]
Childhood Copyright  2002
SAGE Publications. London, Thousand Oaks
and New Delhi, Vol. 9(4): 415­434.
[0907-5682(200211)9:4; 415­434; 028542]
When sexual harassment and schooling have been
the focus of research, the site of investigation has
been the secondary school and subsequently the
experiences of adolescents. Locating the primary
school as a key arena for the production and
regulation of sexual discourses, practices and
identities, this article examines the neglected area
of preadolescents' experiences of different forms of
sexual harassment. Drawing on data from an
ethnographic study of children's gender and sexual
identities during their final year of primary school,
the author reports on the physical and verbal forms
of heterosexual, homophobic and heterosexist
harassment of both girls and boys and suggests that
such practices are the means by which many
children define, create and consolidate hegemonic
masculinities and femininities, heterosexual
identities and heterosexual hierarchies. The
implications regarding the more damaging practices
of children's sexual cultures and relationships for
policy and practice are discussed briefly in the
concluding section.
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affect all pupils (Askew, 1989). Despite the more recent conceptualizations
of bullying as an abuse of interpersonal power (Duncan, 1999), one of the
most significant absences in the UK bullying literature is its failure to
engage with the contributions from researchers concerned with gender, race
and sexuality as Mac an Ghaill suggests:
A popular discourse has been constructed that serves to depoliticise the sexual
and racial violence taking place at the microcultural level of playground and
classroom. (Mac and Ghaill, 1994: 128)
Indeed, sexual violence and harassment are often absent in definitions of
bullying. The recent collection of cross-national research into the `nature of
school bullying' (Smith et al., 1999), for example, makes no reference to
gender-based or sexualized bullying. Studies which examine the relationship
between bullying, violence and gender come from a wider focus on gender
relations and secondary schooling (Askew, 1989; Askew and Ross, 1988)
and have explored schools as sites for sexual harassment, predominantly
experienced by young women and perpetrated by young men (Davies, 1984;
Halson, 1989; Herbert, 1992; Jones, 1985; Mahony, 1985) ­ although some
studies have extended the concept of interpersonal forms of sexual violence
and oppression to include both boys and girls as `victims' and `perpetrators'
(Lees, 1986, 1993; Wolpe, 1988).
More recent research, which has examined the school as a key site for
the production of masculinities, femininities and sexualities, has explored
and exposed the relationship between gender-based and sexualized forms of
violence and harassment, particularly its role in the production of hegemonic
heterosexual masculinities in school (Blackmore, 1995; Duncan, 1999;
Epstein, 2000; Kehily and Nayak, 1997; Kenway and Fitzclarence, 1997;
Mac an Ghaill, 1994, 1999). However, when sexual harassment and schooling
has been the focus of research,1
the site of investigation has been the secondary
school and subsequently the experience of adolescents. Despite
isolated incidents within the media (Jones and Rose, 1997; Simpson, 1997)
and references within broader projects on the gendered worlds of primary
school children (Best, 1983; Clark, 1990; Connolly, 1998; Davies, 1993;
Francis, 1998; Skelton, 2001; Thorne, 1993), there are very few detailed
accounts that centre the experience of preadolescents (although see Stein,
1996) ­ possibly due to the fact that very few ethnographic studies locate the
primary school as a key arena for the production of sexual identities
(Renold, 2000). This article goes some way to redressing the balance and
draws upon a study which foregrounds the primary school as a key arena for
the production and regulation of sexual discourses, practices and identities to
explore the often neglected accounts of children's experiences of different
types of sexual harassment, which has been conceptualized as `heterosexual',
`homophobic' and `heterosexist' harassment.
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The study: researching children's construction of gender and
sexuality
The data and analysis presented in this article derive from doctoral research
in the form of a year-long ethnography exploring the construction of children's
gender and sexual identities in their final year (Year 6, age 10/11
years old) of primary school (Renold, 1999). The fieldwork was conducted
during the academic year 1995/6 in two primary schools (Tipton Primary
and Hirstwood) situated in a small semi-rural town in the east of England.2
As discussed elsewhere (Renold, 2000, 2002), I did not set out to study children's
sexual cultures. However, as in many qualitative studies, the reflexivity
and indeed flexibility of the ethnographic process led to a shift in focus.
From examining gender relations, I found myself increasingly witnessing a
complex interactive daily network of heterosexual performances by both
boys and girls as they negotiated their gendered selves and thus the interconnectedness
of sexuality and gender. I explored how dominant notions of heterosexuality
underscore much of children's identity work and peer
relationships as they `live out' the categories `girl' and `boy' and how each
are subject to the pressures of `compulsory heterosexuality' (Rich, 1983),
where to be a `normal' boy and girl involves the projection of a coherent and
abiding heterosexual self. To this end I have been examining the acting out
of Butler's (1990) `heterosexual matrix' in which the `real' expression of
masculinity and femininity is embedded with a presupposed heterosexuality.
In particular, I explore how heterosexism, homophobia and heterosexual
harassment are experienced and carried out by both boys and girls, as they
negotiate and maintain gender and sexual hierarchies and hegemonies, both
within and between the genders and within and outside of heterosexual rela-
tionships/practices.
Methods and methodology: researching from the `children's
standpoint'
The study locates itself within the `new' sociology of children and childhood
in which children are no longer perceived as passive bystanders within
processes of socialization, but active constructors and mediators of their
social worlds and realities and worthy of study in their own right (Alderson,
1995; Butler and Shaw, 1996; James and Prout, 1998; Mayall, 1994;
Qvortrup et al., 1994). Indeed, one of the central features of the research was
its commitment to foregrounding children's own experiences and allowing
them to wield some control over the focus of the research. Alanen (1994) has
described this approach as research conducted from the `children's standpoint',
that is giving voice and respecting children as knowledgeable and
active subjects and using the research process as a platform which can
enable children to communicate experiences of importance to them.
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I decided to use exploratory unstructured group interviews as one of
the main ethnographic methods because it maximized children's ability to
create spaces (physical and discursive) from which they could freely discuss
what they felt to be important and significant to them. My `role' during these
interviews was one of facilitator. I refrained from asking direct questions and
as far as possible allowed children themselves to set the agenda and topic for
discussion. Moreover, by repeatedly interviewing children over the year (six
times in total), organizing interviews by friendship groups and limiting the
sample to two Year 6 classes (59 children), it was possible to develop a safe,
comfortable and supportive relationship and environment with which they
could discuss, disclose and share their experiences3
(see Renold, 2002). As a
result, many children allowed me access to their more private thoughts,
experiences and relationships, and previously unreported accounts of children's
sexual cultures, including the more painful and oppressive experiences,
began to surface.
Defining and conceptualizing sexual harassment
Sexual harassment is an ambivalent term and its legal, sociopolitical and
`everyday' usage varies both within and across countries and cultures. For
example, unlike the US, under UK law there is no specific legislation against
sexual harassment or homophobic discrimination.4
Complainants instead
rely on the various provisions set out in the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 or
the more recent Protection from Harassment Act 1997, originally set up to
prevent stalking. European law, however, has sought to define and legislate
against sexual harassment (in the workplace at least) under the European
Commission's 1991 Recommendation on the Protection of the Dignity of
Women and Men at Work. Here, harassment is defined as the `unwanted
conduct of a sexual nature' (including `physical, verbal and non-verbal conduct')
which is `unwelcome, unreasonable and offensive to the recipient'. It
is this definition that I have used to categorize sexualized forms of children's
bullying and harassment because it is an inclusive interpretation that defines
harassment in terms of the subjective experiences of the recipients of harass-
ment.
Indeed, defining harassment in terms of the harm and pain of the recipient
(rather than relying solely on what particular types of behaviour might
constitute harassment) is important insofar as it prioritizes children's own
and often multiple interpretations of events. For example, `bra-pulling' has
several conflicting meanings. It could be experienced by girls positively
(such as a welcome sign of a boy's romantic interest) or negatively (such as
a humiliating recognition of a girl's sexual maturation). Consequently, if it
was experienced as fun and amusing and thus `welcome' it would not be categorized
as harassment. If, however, `bra-pulling' was experienced as
`unwanted' and `unwelcome' and made the girl involved feel uncomfortable
it would be categorized as harassment.5
While such a definition may be
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problematic given the multiple and sometimes conflicting interpretations of
social interactions and accounts, it was the only working definition I felt that
could capture the complexities and ambiguities of sexual harassment and
one which could differentiate between children's `welcome' or `unwelcome'
(boys' and girls') sexualized behaviour.6
The term is further unpacked in the
form of `heterosexual', `homophobic' and `heterosexist' harassment to make
visible the interconnectedness of sexuality and gender and thus to illuminate
the heteronormative cultures within which children make sense of their gendered
selves.
Heterosexual harassment
`He called her a "fucking bitch" ': verbal sexual harassment
Heterosexual harassment from boys to girls commonly took the form of denigrating
girls (and women) through sexually abusive and aggressive language.
Verbal insults predominantly centred around a girl's sexual status
included terms such as `bitch', `slag', `tart' and `slut'. Clark (1990: 40) also
cites examples of girls aged 11 and 12 being called `big tits' and `period
bag', all of which resonate strongly with the well-documented pervasiveness
of heterosexual harassment experienced by girls and young women in the
secondary school (Cowie and Lees, 1981; Duncan, 1999; Hey, 1997; Lees
1986, 1993; Mahony, 1985; Wolpe, 1988). While some of the misogyny was
delivered and justified through humour (Kehily and Nayak, 1997), this was
not always the case, as the following two extracts illustrate:
Juliet starts singing a song when pupils have been told to `be quiet'. Darren
spins on his chair and leans forward in front of Juliet. He then mouths the word
`fuck' at her ­ I am not sure why. He looks annoyed at something.
(Discussing girlfriends)
ER: So what about you Darren?
Pete: Well, he's been out with Mandy, I mean, not Mandy, I mean er er Victoria
about three times in the past three months init?
Darren: Mmm
ER: What happened, why aren't you seeing her any more?
Pete: Because she, because he called her a fucking bitch and/
Darren: I . . . I just always get in a stress over things, like I was in a stress that
time/and I don't know why
The first extract illustrates how some boys would use sexual swearwords to
unsettle and overtly intimidate girls. The second extract seems to be part of a
wider narrative about boys' need to reinstate their heterosexual dominance
often undermined and denied through `real' boyfriend and girlfriend relationships,
in which many of the boys claimed they were `used', manipulated
and ruthlessly dumped by girls (Renold, 2000). For many boys of this age,
who sporadically engaged in heterosexual practices of `fancying' and `going
out', their experiences were nothing short of confusion, fear and frustration
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­ particularly when proximity to girls could be simultaneously contaminating
and masculinity confirming. Indeed, misogynistic discourses via the sexual
objectification and ridicule of girls was most commonly displayed by
boys who failed to, or rarely located themselves within, heterosexual relationships
or discourses.7
`They punch you in the boobs and pull your bra': physical sexual
harassment
Incidents of physical sexual harassment are rarely reported in the primary
school literature, although there have been cases sensationally reported in
the media. Even though they were less frequently reported to me8
than the
various forms of verbal sexual abuse, some girls were experiencing what
they considered as unwanted sexualized forms of harassment from their
male classmates. Indeed, physical sexual violence seemed to be another
means of reasserting and reproducing boys as powerful in social circumstances
which often rendered them powerless or out of their control (Mac an
Ghaill, 1994). Such practices were often engaged in by boys who were
located lower down the hierarchies of heterosexuality and masculinity. What
follows is an example of one of the most extreme cases of physical sexual
violence/harassment reported by girls towards the end of the study. The
boys' response to the incident described is discussed later:
ER: Do boys pick on you like they do their friends?
Trudy: They punch you in the boobs
Anabel: Yeah they punch you in the boobs sometimes and pull your bra
and that really kills/
Trudy: Yeah, they go like that (shows me)
ER: Who does that?
All: Stu
Anabel: And Ryan and that
ER: So what do you do to that/
Anabel: Nothing, we just walk away going like this (hugging chest), `don't
touch me'
ER: Do you think that's some form of harassment?
All: Yeah
Anabel: Yeah, but
ER: You don't tell anyone?
Anabel and Carla: No
ER: Why not?
Kate: Because you . . . /they might think it's a big deal
Trudy: Because w/e're used to it
Anabel: No, we do think it's a big deal but if we told someone/like Miss
Wilson, she'd just say `oh don't be so silly'
Trudy: The/y'd laugh
. . .
Carla: and I'd be too embarrassed
Anabel and Kate: Yeah
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Trudy: Yeah and we don't like causing an argument, we don't I don't like
causing an argument.
. . .
ER: Don't you punch him back? [when he hits you]
Trudy: No, coz you can't really
Anabel: You don't
Carla: They hurt you
ER: Sometimes/
Trudy: Girls really don't fight boys
While echoing encounters of physical heterosexual harassment within the
secondary school, Clark (1990) and Stein (1995) (conducting their research
in Australian and American primary schools respectively) reveal that such
experiences are not peculiar or restricted to adolescents and secondary
schools. Clark (1990), for example, examining the gender divide in the primary
school, describes similar reports of boys punching girls in the breasts.
Stein (1995: 149), in a more focused discussion of school children's experiences
of sexual violence, describes `Friday flip-up days' where `boys in the
first through to third grades flipped up the dresses of their female classmates'.
Moreover, just as Stein describes how such incidents were typically
dismissed as mutual, voluntary and playful playground behaviour, the girls
themselves, like so many reporters of sexual harassment, used discourses
that served to invalidate and undermine their experiences as a form of
harassment despite describing such incidents as unwelcome and unwanted
(Kelly and Radford, 1996).
Indeed, none of the girls reported these incidents to the teaching staff
at either Tipton or Hirstwood. When I asked them why (`don't you tell anyone?'),
their rationales reflect and echo wider cultural issues around girls'
and women's socialized passivity and subordination regarding their personal/private
sexual lives particularly in relation to challenging sexual violence
with either their perpetrators or teaching/ancillary staff. They explain
how `telling' is not an option because of fears of confrontation and conflict
(`causing an argument'), ridicule (`they'd just laugh'), raising/discussing
personal and sensitive topics (`embarrassment') and not being taken seriously
by their class teacher (`she'd say oh don't be silly'). Each girl's experiences
not only remained untold, but, unable to retaliate, given the pervasive
discourse that `girls don't fight boys', they also went unchallenged, thus
reproducing the boys' behaviour as `normal' and `natural' (Blackmore,
1995). Indeed, as the following extract and analysis illustrates, the ambiguity
of this form of harassment coupled with the discourse that `boys don't hit
girls' possibly led one of the boys involved to deny his actions when confronted
by myself and his male peers in a later interview:
ER: So Stu, you don't hit the girls at all?
Stu: No
ER: So are they just making/it all up?
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Sam: I do
ER: I know you do
Sam: Coz they're always going like this (demonstrates hair ruffling)
ER: So you hit them back?
Sam: Yeah
ER: They were telling me that sometimes you thump them in the chest [I
obtained the girls' consent to confront the boys]
Sam: Yeah yeah he does (laughing)
Stu: No
James: He's, he's a women beater he is
Sam: Man slaughter9
Jake: He's like someone out of Cracker10
James: Stu can't beat up boys so he beats up girls
Stu: Oh yeah, I could beat you up (Sam laughs)
James: Come on then
ER: So is it true?
Stu: No
Sam: He's gone /all red
Stu: It isn't true
Sam: It is
Stu, the boy in question, was part of the dominant peer group, but was continually
teased by the other boys for his sporting skill and often came out the
loser in one-on-one fights and fighting games. One interpretation of why he
`punched girls in the chest' could be his struggle to access successfully the
`tough' and `sporting' discourses that produced boys as `boys'. However, the
socially unacceptable behaviour, revealed by Ryan's reaction, in which he is
positioned as a `women beater' thus potentially threatening his masculinity
(as `real men' don't hit women), and ultimately his (hetero)sexuality (given
the common conflation of questionable masculinities and `homosexuality'),
does not fully explain Stuart's actions. An alternative interpretation could be
that the overwhelming need to disassociate himself from and subordinate the
`feminine', which ultimately led to a physical domination, transgressed the
social acceptability of his behaviour. Even if that is taking a rather deterministic
view of psychoanalytic theories,11
Stu's behaviour towards Anabel and
Carla does however highlight the contradiction and struggle in trying to perform
a coherent hegemonic masculine identity, and all that that entails, particularly
when girls are physically bigger and sometimes stronger than boys
at this age. Stu was, by comparison, a small boy. This analysis confirms
Collinson and Hearn's (1996) thesis, among others, that sexual harassment is
not just about sexuality but about violence and power (Hanmer and Maynard,
1987; Kenway and Fitzclarence, 1997; Morgan, 1987). Despite the
humour through which Stu's friends interpreted and commented upon his
actions, his behaviour towards Anabel and her friends must be taken seriously.
These practices, despite being unchallenged by their production as
`just fun', `produce and privilege' boys in their `complicity', which Connell
claims is the way boys and men benefit from the `patriarchal dividend'
(Connell, 1995: 79).
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Challenging the male sexual gaze: predatory girls and violent
relationships
Despite the regulation and surveillance of girls' (hetero)sexual practices,
many girls found their positions as `girlfriends' and their new-found sexual
knowledges as particularly powerful (Renold, 2000). Thus, while much of
the heterosexual harassment, both verbal and physical, was experienced by
girls at the hands and mouths of boys, there were cases of dominant girls
sexually intimidating subordinate boys (`predatory girls') and
boyfriend­girlfriend relationships in which girls as `girlfriends' were physically
violent to their prospective boyfriends. In the following extract, Tina
and Sally seem to delight in sexually teasing/harassing and verbally abusing
an unpopular, subordinate boy, Charles, insofar as their heterosexual
advances are unwanted, unwelcome and mocking in their tone:
Tina: Do you remember that time when we kept going round to Charles Hatherton
. . . the fat one . . .
Tina: He's got ginger hair
Sally: He's so horrible
ER: Why, because of the way he looks?
Sally: No, he's just so annoying
Tina: Yeah he goes right, if you go erm . . . he just walks around like this (she
displays his walk, very camp)
Sally: And he's really a drag and stuff, he's just such a (lowers voice) knobby12
person (the others laugh)
Tina and Carrie: Yeah
. . .
Sally: They're scared of us . . . and you go `Oh Charlie, Oh Charlie' (singing
style)
ER: Are you teasing him?
Sally and Tina: Yeah
Sally: And he goes `OH NO' and I go, `Tina your lover is here to see you' and
he runs off and then she goes, `oh you're really ugly'
. . .
Sally: He's so sad
ER: Don't you think this might upset him?
Tina and Sally: No no
This was not an isolated incident. There were many occasions when girls of
a high heterosexual ranking would engage in these types of scenarios, using
their sexual prowess to subordinate and heterosexualize other, less desirable
and often effeminate boys. Lees (1993), Duncan (1999) and Dubberly
(1993) also found how girls were far from passive and would sometimes
mock and sexually tease and derogate other boys. Duncan (1999), for example,
cites the popular practices of `de-bagging', where a group of girls would
pull a boy's trousers and underpants down. Dubberly (1988) graphically
describes a gang of girls `raping' a boy with special needs as an example of
female sexual power. Indeed, the preceding extract does go some way to
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challenge old stereotypes of girls as passive sexual beings and possibly challenges
the male gaze, albeit temporarily, in terms of the girls' ability to disrupt
the gendered power relations of dominant masculinity/boys and
subordinate femininity/girls. However, while Sally and Tina's behaviour
may have challenged the male gaze on the surface by engaging in what is
usually associated with boys and men, their actions (bullying `effeminate'
boys) simultaneously shamed and thus policed alternative/different masculinities
and thus reinforced wider cultural and social gendered power
dynamics.
In addition to the predatory behaviour, there were also two cases of
girls being physically violent towards their boyfriends. One girl, Jo, engaged
in predatory behaviour, by almost stalking her boyfriend, William, chasing
him round the classroom, following him at playtime and pestering him for
kisses. Her relationship with him was turbulent and violent sometimes, as
the following extract describes:
ER: So Jo how are things how are things with you and er William?
Jo: All right
Amanda: She whacked him the other day and he had a red mark like a hand
shape/
Jo: That's because during the summer holidays he comes round my house and
he does this thing with a pipe cleaner . . . he takes these little bits off and goes
like that (hand across face) and I got these cuts straight down here
Jane: eeer/
ER: He did that/to your face
Hayley: You always hit him, all, all the time
Jo: Yeah
ER: So you slapped him?
Jo: Yeah I slapped him/
ER: Coz he made a mark on your face?
Jo: Yeah, coz
Hayley: He had a hand mark on his back/(almost defending William)
Amanda: She slaps him all the time/
Jo: He hits me (defensive tone)
ER: So if he hits you, you hit him back/or do you hit him and he hits you back?
Jo: Yeah, . . . no he hits me and I hit him/back
Amanda: If he thumps you though you don't think you'd want normally to keep
hitting him do you?
Jo: (Laughs) and nods
ER: You like that do you?
Jo: He doesn't but I do/
ER: You like hitting him?
Jo: Yeah/
Another girl, Kelly, in the parallel research site (Tipton Primary), used to hit
and stamp on her boyfriend's toes. She even sent him an anonymous letter
saying `watch it I'll get you' and threatened to scratch and kick him when
their relationship had terminated. Both these cases in a similar way to the
`predatory girls', illustrate how some girls were transgressing conventional
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heterosexual expressions and performances. Indeed, Jo's heterosexual relationship
with William contrasts with Davies's (1993: 136) construction of
girls' heterosexual engagements as predominantly fragile and vulnerable.
However, dominant heterosexual codes governing how children conducted
their relationships with each other prevailed, and are explored in the final
section of this article.
Homophobia: `they say I'm gay, they say I'm like a girl'
I have briefly discussed earlier how, in the pursuit of hegemonic masculinity,
heterosexual identifications were defined through misogynistic discourses
and practices which I have conceptualized as heterosexual harassment. As
many secondary school ethnographies have illustrated (Duncan, 1999; Mac
an Ghaill, 1994; Nayak and Kehily, 1997) boys also formed their masculinities
and heterosexualities via homophobic practices ­ which in this study
involved labelling other boys as `gay'. As the following extract reveals, this
could entail everyday interactions within friendship groups and often formed
part of everyday classroom interactions:
As Colin walks into the classroom, he clips Aaron around the head. Aaron
responds with `get off baby' to which Colin, horrified, shouts, `urgh, you gay'.
Aaron laughs this off and tells me about the latest fight between two girls in the
playground.
Homophobic performances, such as name-calling, teasing and labelling were
also directed at those boys who failed or chose not to access hegemonic
masculine discourses and practices. Two boys were regularly called `gay' by
their classroom peers because they did not engage in the three routes that
were perceived to secure hegemonic heterosexual masculinities ­ football,
fighting and girlfriends. True to Butler's (1990) framework, displaying an
`abnormal' or questionable `masculine' identity also threw into doubt boys'
heterosexuality, thereby creating potential for their behaviours to be homo-
sexualized.13
Indeed discourses of homophobia were expressed vehemently
by boys who did not engage in overt heterosexual boyfriend­girlfriend relationships
and more frequently than by boys who did have girlfriends and
who were going out. Differentiating oneself and subordinating homosexualities
by shouting out and positioning other boys as `gay' were all ways in
which these boys asserted and attempted to make coherent their heterosexual
identities and were a means of policing the boundaries of hegemonic heterosexual
masculinities (Nayak and Kehily, 1997). Thus, homophobic performances
and misogyny seemed to offer a way of producing `heterosexual
coherence', which in turn signified a coherent `masculine' identity. More
common, however, was the heterosexist bullying of children, boys and girls
alike, who transgressed dominant masculinities and femininities, and dominant
heterosexualities.
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Heterosexism
Heterosexism has been defined by some as the superiority of heterosexuality
over other forms of sexuality such as gay, lesbian and bisexualities (van de
Ven, 1996). Given that there are multiple forms of heterosexuality (note for
example, Mac an Ghaill's (1999) `fashionable' and `explicit' heterosexuals
and Haywood's (1996) `subordinated', `hyper' and `dominant' heterosexuals),
heterosexism is maybe more about those performances which keep the
heterosexual presentation within acceptable boundaries which are often
located within a paradigm of dominant masculinity and submissive femininity
(Hinson, 1996; Renew, 1996). It is thus about maintaining dominant
forms of heterosexuality. Heterosexism, as a pedagogy of heterosexuality, is
also `used against those children and young people who do their gender in
ways that conflict with dominant hegemonic practices . . . [that is] those who
do masculinity and femininity in non-traditional ways' (Hinson, 1996: 235).
(Hetero)sexual outsiders: gender misfits and gender hierarchies
Bullying behaviours towards those girls and boys who did not invest in dominant
and hegemonic forms of masculinity and femininity were particularly
common and affected over a third of all children interviewed. Much of this
bullying took the form of exclusion, verbal abuse, ridicule and ritual humiliation,
which Adler and Adler (1998) have conceptualized as `out-group subjugation',
`stigmatization' and `expulsion' and was a way of policing and
maintaining dominant gender and sexual identities. Epstein (1993: 18) for
example, notes how it is by drawing boundaries that subjects establish and
secure identities, where the processes of Othering `create the terms of cultural
hegemony' and are `the means through which we establish our identi-
ties'.
In Tipton Primary and Hirstwood there were two groups of boys who
either through choice or failure did not take up and construct their identities
through hegemonic masculine discourses. They were boys who were studious,
pro-school, played fantasy games instead of football, who preferred
romantic ballads (`Whitney Housten') over heavy rock (`Nirvana') and did
not adopt the popular modes of dress, which, at the time of research,
included baggy trousers and oversized T-shirts. Each of these boys was positioned
as Other within a hegemonic masculine matrix which equated all of
these activities and practices with girls, things feminine and non-masculine
ways of being. Girls were positioned as Other if they did not or failed to cultivate
their femininity within dominant heterosexual/feminine discourses.
This often took the form of endlessly evaluating other girls and positioning
and repositioning them within the regime of the male gaze by calling them
`fat', `loud', `unfashionable', `tarty' ­ particularly those girls who were not
interested in boys romantically. The capacity of girls to position girls as
Other via an erasure of alternative/different femininities as legitimate `subC
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jects of girlhood' resonates closely with Hey's (1997: 84) ethnography of
girls' friendships and peer relationships.
While much of the gendered bullying and harassment was conducted
within same-sex peer groups, with girls positioning other girls and boys
positioning other boys as `outsiders' and `others', there was also a case of
girls bullying `failed males' (Thorne, 1993):
The class has just finished tidying out their drawers and they are slotting them
back into place, one by one. Stuart goes to put his back and then Sophie. Sophie
however leaves a gap. Mrs. Fryer does not notice at first until Georgina goes to
put hers back and then she is asked to fill the gap. Georgina moves Sophie's
into the gap and places her tray below Sophie's. Sophie lets out a squeal and
says `I'm not having mine next to his' and promptly moves it below Georgina's.
Mrs. Fryer then tells Sophie not to be so silly and to fill the gap. Sophie refuses
and eventually Damion fills the gap. He is thanked.
. . .
Jo: Stuart
Hayley: He's horrible/
Jane: I used/to have some really close male friends like in my old school though
Amanda: Everyone hates Stuart, when they touch him they go urrrgh lurgy14
ER: To who?
Jane: Stuart
ER: Do they?
Jane: Yeah they say he's got the lurgy and stuff/
Amanda: Yeah say you're Stuart, you touch him and go errrrrrrr (they
laugh)sort of thing/
Jane: And it goes round the whole class
Amanda: If you cross your fingers/
Jo: Then you can't get it/unless??????/
Jane: It's a bit childish really because you can't really get a lurgy from touching
someone really can you, even if you just don't like them
Such discourses of disease and pollution have predominantly been cited in
primary schools as something which boys do to girls (Best, 1983; Davies,
1984; Thorne, 1993 ­ although see Douglas, 1966). However, there were
many examples such as refusing to stand next to Stuart when lining up for
assembly, to sit in his chair if chairs were moved around or be in close proximity
to him, or making a cross with their fingers against contamination.
Other boys who were described as `dorks', `geeks' or like Stuart as `gay'
were also verbally abused and mistreated in a similar fashion. Some girls
would push them, kick them, tease them and laugh at them. It seemed one of
the ways in which girls could access more powerful ways of being (when in
other contexts they would be at the receiving end of boys' jibes, jokes and
insults). It was also a way, as Duncan (1999) has suggested in his ethnography
of sexual bullying in secondary schools, of children consolidating and
normalizing dominant modes of femininity and masculinity.
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Heterosexual failures
Transgressing gender norms or choosing not to invest in dominant modes of
masculinity and femininity often produced `heterosexual failures' insofar as
`aggressive' or `weird' femininities and subordinate effeminate masculinities
positioned them as heterosexually undesirable by popular boys and girls.
Even if they became `girlfriends' or `boyfriends' and engaged in practices of
`going out' and `dumping' it was usually within their own isolated `subordinate'
groups, at the bottom of the heterosexual hierarchies, which subsequently
reinforced their positioning as `heterosexual failures'. To this end,
they were used by `popular' boys and girls, at the top of the heterosexual
hierarchies, as objects of sexual ridicule. For example, `messengers' who
acted as go-betweens and matchmakers could cruelly position unpopular and
sexually undesirable girls as potential girlfriends of popular boys, as a way
of mocking and belittling boys' heterosexual masculinity and maintaining
the girls' status as `heterosexual failure'.15
Duncan (1999) describes similar
incidents by both girls and boys as a means of maintaining heterosexual
hierarchies. Davies (1993) also cites how only high-status boys and girls
were considered attractive and Connolly (1998) describes how girls would
not play kiss chase with South Asian boys because of their perceived effeminacy,
and, I would suggest, given the conflation of gender with sexuality,
their perceived non-heterosexuality.
Disinterested heterosexuals
Similar forms of sexualized bullying included girls16
who were not interested
in producing their femininities through heterosexual practices and discourses.
In this study they were a group of white, middle-class girls who differentiated
themselves from dominant feminine performances evidenced by
their lack of interest in street fashion and the popular pursuit of boys as
potential boyfriends (see Renold, 2001). Indeed, all four girls reported a
strong disinterest in fashion, in terms of modes of dress and physical appearance
and a disinterest in and rejection of the dominant heterosexual narratives,
i.e. desiring or having a boyfriend. The combination of these factors
produced the girls as `different', as `Other' and they became an easy target
and object of ridicule and exclusionary techniques. As each of the previous
subsections have illustrated, such behaviour was one of the predominant
means by which heterosexism was employed by both boys and girls as a
means of policing dominant modes of masculinity, femininity and heterosex-
uality.
Conclusions
In her article on sexuality and education, Kelly (1992) states that sexuality is
not only denied in primary schools, but actively excluded. Exploring the
relationship between schooling and sexualities, Epstein and Johnson (1998)
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suggest that such silences come about and are produced through discourses
of childhood innocence, which as a kind of desirable ignorance not only produces
confusing messages for children who overtly engage with or enjoy
their sexuality, but in the case of this presentation, endangers those who
experience sexuality as threatening or as harassment. I have attempted elsewhere
to break the silence regarding young children's sexual cultures and
`presumed innocence' by exploring the primary school as a key site for the
production of sexual identities and how hegemonic masculinities and femininities
involve the `heterosexual presumption' (Renold, 2000). I have also
explored how children are active in the formation of their gender and sexual
identities and how sexuality and specifically heterosexuality is part and parcel
of their gender identity constructions. This article has expanded some of
this analysis and focused upon the neglected and underreported area of
young children's experiences of different forms of sexual harassment ­ not
as isolated and unconnected incidents, but as part of children's everyday
interactive social worlds, peer networks and relationships (Blackmore,
1995). In sum, I have explored how homophobia, heterosexism and heterosexual
harassment provide ways of resecuring gender dichotomies, creating
and maintaining dominant masculinities and passive subordinate femininities,
and policing heterosexual hierarchies.
While there is obviously a need for further research regarding the practices,
experiences and coping strategies of sexual bullying in the primary
school, the findings from this study suggest the need for sexuality to be
included as an equal opportunities issue. However, such policies and practices
need to be able to deal and resonate with the everyday realities of children's
experiences and go beyond sex education practices and pedagogies
which are embedded in the `prevention and plumbing' of biological reproduction
and engage with sexuality not just as physical acts but as processes
of identity constructions and social relations. As Epstein (1999) concludes:
We need to grasp the nettle of sex education and develop a broader sexuality
education, in schools, where sexuality in its broadest sense is recognised, and
where difference is valued and respected.
To this end, not only can the more damaging practices of misogyny, heterosexism
and homophobia be legislated against, but all the hidden injuries
embedded in the more fluid forms of dominance and subordination (Kenway
et al., 1997) can be recognized and supported. While this will prove challenging,
given the current media moral panics, confusion and political tensions
regarding Section 28 of the Local Government Act (see note 1) and the
discussion of children's sexuality more widely, only a curriculum and policy
framework that reflects and is sensitive to children's own sexual cultures can
support the more damaging and oppressive side to children's developing
sexual and gender identities and peer relationships.
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Key to transcripts
... Pause
(...) Material edited out
/ Moment when interruption begins
` ` Direct quotation in fieldnotes
??? Inaudible response
Notes
1. As a result of some of this research and public campaigning, there has been a recent
shift in education policy to recognize and tackle homophobic bullying in the recent UK government
circular 10/99 on social inclusion (DfEE, 1999), which includes a specific reference
to peer bullying as a result of sexual orientation (Section 4.44) and includes strategies to
address sexual and racial harassment (Section 4.47). The government's anti-bullying pack for
schools (DfEE, 2000) also offers detailed advice and guidance to prevent bullying because of
perceived or actual sexual orientation. However, such a shift to combat sexualized bullying
and harassment sits uneasily alongside Section 28 of the Local Government Act which prohibits
local authorities from `promoting homosexuality' as a `pretended family relationship'
despite two defeated repeals (see Redman [1994] and Epstein [2000] for a wider discussion).
2. Tipton Primary's catchment area served white `working'- and `middle'-class families,
while Hirstwood served predominantly white, `middle'-class families.
3. For a wider discussion of children's sexual cultures within the primary school setting
see Renold (2000).
4. In 2002, the UK will be required by a European directive to create legislation to combat
discrimination because of sexual orientation. However, this legislation will apply to employment/workplace
only.
5. Most of the `harassment/'bullying' disclosures presented in this article are unprompted
self-disclosures. This is especially true of the more serious reports of physical sexual harass-
ment.
6. However, it is also necessary to stress that the term `harassment', while serving a useful
analytic function as a concept and language of description, was not a term widely used by the
children in the study. Consequently, it is not possible to explore the meaning that `harassment',
as a category of behaviour, has for them.
7. Some boys would also position their teacher as sexually subordinate (Walkerdine,
1981). For example a group of boys called their teacher a `slag' and a `bitch' ( in an interview)
when football was banned in the playground and when, on another occasion, they felt they
were receiving unnecessary disciplinary treatment in the classroom.
8. None of the girls reported incidents of sexual harassment to the teaching staff at either
Tipton or Hirstwood.
9. `Man slaughter' is legal jargon adopted by the boys to denote through hyperbole and
humour the violent potential of Stu.
10. Cracker is a title of a UK television crime drama series in which the central protagonist
is a criminal psychologist.
11. See Henriques et al. (1984) and Redman (1997) for a fuller discussion of a psychoanalytic
approach to exploring how gender and sexual identities are constructed.
12. `Knob' is slang for penis. The term `knobby' was often used to describe a person who
for many reasons was socially positioned as negatively different from others (e.g. having `ginger
hair', being `fat', walking in a `camp' way). I am unsure if the children in the study were
aware of the term's sexual connotation.
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13. Interestingly, girls who transgressed dominant femininities were not homosexualized.
Derogatory sexual terms such as `dyke' and `lesbo' had not entered the verbal repertoire of
pupils from the two research schools. They were, however, masculinized and called `boys' and
were routinely labelled `weird'.
14. `Lurgy' was a slang term used by the children to indicate a social disease or virus that
could be passed on to other children by physical touch or by even sitting in the same seat as
the boy/girl who possessed the `lurgy'.
15. Alternatively, heterosexual hierarchies were maintained by coupling `subordinate' boys
and girls together. One episode involved teasing Stuart (discussed earlier) that his `prefect
match' would be Julia (constantly positioned as `weird', and `unfeminine'). The implication
was that Julia as `failed female' would be the perfect partner for Stuart as `failed male'.
16. It was just about possible for boys to postpone an active interest in pursuing girls for
`girlfriends', there being more than one route to performing and securing hegemonic masculinities
(see Renold, 1999).
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