Gender performativity and normalizing practices

In this chapter we examine the normalizing regimes of practice that impact on the various ways in which young people at school define desirable forms of masculinity and femininity. Attention is given to the particular role that compulsory heterosexuality and gender duality play in prescribing appropriate behavior for boys and girls. By drawing on interviews with adolescent boys, a 13-year-old self defined "tomgirl," and an adult transgender woman, and examining written responses by girls, we highlight the kinds of issues that impact on their lives at school. We also consider the invisibility of transgender
and intersexual perspectives in most educational debates on gender and sexuality.

Sex-role traits and the comorbidity of symptoms of disordered eating and problem drinking

The symptoms of problem drinking and disordered eating were studied independently in relation to sex-role traits and also for evidence of comorbidity in a student sample of 217 women. The participants completed surveys that assessed positive and negative sex-role traits, reported drinking levels, alcohol dependence, problem drinking, bulimic symptoms, dietary restraint, and drive for thinness. Eating symptoms were related to both the negative and positive traits of Femininity, but self-descriptions involving negative traits (passivity, dependence, unassertiveness, etc.) showed the strongest relationship. High scores on identification with the traits typically labelled as Masculinity were related to drinking but there was an important difference between drinking per se (which was related to Positive Masculinity) and drinking found to be associated with drinking problems, which was related to Negative Masculinity (aggression, showing-off, rudeness, etc.). Feminine traits were also related to drinking. Low identification with the traits of Negative Femininity was associated with non-problem drinking, whereas low identification with the traits of Positive Femininity were associated with problem-related drinking. Young women who displayed comorbid symptoms described themselves by a high identification with the traits of both Negative Masculinity and Negative Femininity. It was argued that comorbidity reveals a more extreme form of the sex-role conflict previously described in relation to disordered control over both eating and drinking when considered independently.

Negative perceptions about self-control and identification with gender-role stereotypes related to binge eating, problem drinking, and to co-morbidity among adolescents

Purpose
To examine the role of both positive and negative styles of self-control, and gender-role stereotypes in binge eating and problem drinking.

Method
Participants were 428 adolescent boys and 555 girls from predominantly Anglo-Australian backgrounds who attended regional state schools in New South Wales, Australia. Students completed standardized questionnaires that assessed problem drinking, binge eating, self-control styles, and identification with gender-role stereotypes. ANOVA and post hoc Tukey tests were conducted to examine differences among adolescents who reported problems in binge eating, drinking, and both domains.

Results
Adolescents who reported eating and drinking problems also reported a high negative and a low positive sense of self-control coupled with self-identification with the traits that typically describe negative dimensions of gender-role stereotypes. Regardless of gender, problem drinking was mainly related to traits of negative masculinity (bossy, noisy aggressive, etc.) whereas binge eating was mainly related to negative femininity (shy, needs approval from others, etc.). Participants who reported eating and drinking symptoms recorded low scores on positive control, high scores on negative control, and also high scores on the negative dimensions of masculinity and femininity.

Summary
A negative and passive style of self-control coupled with an identification with negative dimensions of gender summarizes the type of self-regulation that is implicated in both binge eating and problem drinking, and co-morbid symptoms. There is a need for interventions working toward a more balanced gender self-concept and a positive sense of self-control.

Shaping the self through psychotherapeutic means : gender and cross-generational perspectives

This paper explores psychotherapeutic themes and modes of thought emerging in interviews with mothers and daughters participating in a cross-generational study of young women 'on the margins'. The focus of the discussion is two-fold. First it discusses current theoretical debates concerning the ascendancy of psychotherapeutic modes of constituting the self, and argues that we require closer attention to the gendered and differentiated ways in which these are registered and articulated. Second, it considers the significance of 'happiness' and the ways in which pairs of mothers and daughters draw upon a repertoire of psychotherapeutic discourses to represent their relation to schooling, self, family, and work. It concludes with some speculative observations about the significance of attending to the psychotherapeutic turn for understanding contemporary femininity, the desire for openness as a measure of a good relationship (and of democracy), and contemporary aspirations of happiness.

Who wears the pants? The (multi) cultural politics of 'The sisterhood of the travelling pants'

Novels that prioritise the connectedness and strength of girls’ friendships without employing the pervasive trope of “mean girls”—those who typically divide in order to conquer other girls—are potentially empowering in their refusal to perpetuate limited and binary accounts of adolescent femininity. While Ann Brashares’ cult novel (now film), The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (2005a; originally 2002) appears to be representative of this textual shift, underpinning the overt call to value girls’ relationships is a deeply conservative, assimilationist narrative that relies on an acceptance of traditional patriarchal values. This article analyses the ways in which the novel appropriates “multicultural difference” to valorise, sustain and naturalise the central position and authority of patriarchy in the lives of young girls, regardless of their cultural heritage.

"Our fingers were never idle" : women and domestic craft in the Geelong region, 1900-1960

This thesis is an exploration of women's domestic crafts in the Geelong region, between 1900 and I960, Through analysing oral testimony and the women's handicraft artefacts, the nature of the domestic production of handicrafts and the meanings the makers have constructed around their creations and their lives is illuminated. The thesis is organised around the themes of work, space, the construction of femininity, memory, time and meaning. The thesis argues that until recently, the discipline of history has privileged the experiences of men over those of women. It challenges the trivialising of women’s handicrafts. It also argues that within the restrictive social structures around them and within the confined nature of their situations, the women of my study asserted themselves to transform their environments and to improve their situations through labour in the home. In ‘making do’, recycling materials and creating functional and decorative needlework items for their homes and families, the women were often finding solutions to pressing practical and economic problems. Doing handicrafts was rarely just a passive way of filling in time. Rather, making and creating was for these women a multi-layered activity that similtaneously fulfilled a complex range of needs for themselves and their families. A multiplicity of deeply personal, aesthetic, familial, social, practical and economic needs were met in the making of domestic craft artefacts, whose symbolism reflected the values and meanings of the women's cultures, homes and families.

Little boys : the potency of peer culture in shaping masculinities

This study explores the peer group understandings of five male friends between the ages of six and eight years and seeks to examine the ways in which the group’s social dynamics interact to define, regulate and maintain dominant and collective understandings of masculinities. Within a self-selected affinity context, and drawing on their lived and imagined experiences, the boys’ enact and interpret their social worlds. Adopting the principles of ethnography within a framework of feminist poststructuralism and drawing on theories of ‘groupness’ and gender(ed) embodiment, the boys’ understandings of masculinities are captured and interpreted. The key analytic foci are directed towards examining the role of power in the social production of collective schoolboy knowledges, and understanding the processes through which boys subjectify and are subjectified, through social but also bodily discourses. The boys’ constructions of peer group masculinities are (re)presented through a narrative methodology which foregrounds my interpretation of the group’s personal and social relevances and seeks to be inductive in ways that ‘bring to life’ the boys’ stories. The study illuminates the potency of peer culture in shaping and regulating the boys’ dominant understandings of masculinity. Within this culture strong essentialist and hierarchical values are imported to support a range of gender(ed) and sexual dualisms. Here patriarchal adult culture is regularly mimicked and distorted. Underpinned by constructions of ‘femininity’ as the negative ‘other’, dominant masculinities are embodied, cultivated and championed through physical dominance, physical risk, aggression and violence. Through feminist poststructural analysis which enables a theorising of the boys’ subjectivities as fluid, tenuous and often characterised by contradiction and resistance, there exists a potential for interrupting and re-working particular masculinities. Within this framework, more affirmative but equally legitimate understandings and embodiments can be explored. The study presents a warrant for working with early childhood affinity groups to disrupt and contest the dominance and hierarchy of peer culture in an effort to counter-act broader gendered and heterosexist global, state and institutional structures. Framing these assertions is an understanding of the peer context as not only self-limiting and productive of hierarchies, but enabling and generative of affirmative subjectivities.

The future of football is female : a case of fan-tastic imaginings?

Consistent with FIFA president Sepp Blatter’s proclamation that the future of football is female, the Australian Football League (AFL) has instituted a range of initiatives in an attempt to present a ‘female friendly’ face and garner women’s support for the national game. Given the large number of women who follow the AFL, especially in comparison to other football codes nationally, it’s worth considering the motivations behind the AFL’s tactics. To what extent does what the AFL think women want correlate with women supporters’ experiences and realities of being a football fan? This paper presents findings from semi-structured and focus group interviews with female AFL fans to gauge their perceptions of being an Australian rules football supporter and its impact on their lived experiences and sense of self. The responses of women supporters are critically assessed in order to contemplate how women negotiate gender identity through their support of a male dominated sport. As well as offering insights into the role gender plays in leisure pursuits such as sport spectatorship, this paper considers how femininity and masculinity might be contested and/or remade through the practice of following football in the Australian context. By demonstrating the range and diversity of women’s experiences, this research has the capacity to generate alternative imaginings of fanship and sporting community beyond gender stereotypes.

L. Bernard Hall and the feminine in Australian painting 1885-1935

This thesis draws on images to explore the processes by which an individual - Lindsay Bernard Hall - and a categorical concept - the feminine - became devalued in Australia's national tradition. It celebrates Hall's contribution to Australia's cultural heritage and the significance of his art in the visual record of modernising womanhood.

Maternal realms : an exegesis and novel

Combines a novel and exegesis. The fictional autobiography, "The wardrobe drawer", describes a girl's prepubescent experiences in a dysfunctional family. The exegesis explores the process of life writing and renegotiates terms for motherhood and femininity by drawing from feminism, autobiography, queer theory and psychanalytic theory.

Red shoes : obsessive and contagious narratives

The fairytale motif of the red shoes continues to fascinate many contemporary authors and artists. What inspires these obsessive and contagious narratives? The raw, unfettered femaleness of the red shoes, reminiscent of the pre-oedipal realm, suggests a means of escaping confining patriarchal conceptions of woman, desire and creativity.

Who will be an entrepreneur? How cultural mechanisms and social network structure together influence entrepreneurial participation

Using data collected from 35 countries over five years, this study provides an investigation of the combined influence of cultural factors and social network structure on whether or not an individual, anywhere in the world, becomes an entrepreneur. Results show that knowing someone who has started a business recently, across the world, has a significant impact on entrepreneurship participation. Regarding the potential cultural influences, it seems that importance attached to personally knowing entrepreneurs differs significantly between individuals operating in different cultures. In cultures with high power distance, personally knowing a person who recently started a business is relatively less important as a driver of entrepreneurship participation compared to cultures with low power distance. On the other hand, in cultures where the Hofstede’s ‘masculinity’construct predominates, it is more important than in cultures characterised by ‘femininity’.

Chora-challenging maternal space

This thesis is an argument for the restoration of how the female body is perceived and experienced in the world. It argues for valuing and rediscovering female subjectivity as well as elucidating the identity of the feminine body. My artistic creations operate as agitation, discipline, observation, power and desire as a means of rediscovering the lived experiences of women's bodies.

Sociocultural influences on body image and physical self-concepts among children

Children's body image was examined in relation to both sociocultural influences and physical self-concepts, which included sporting ability. Findings showed that physical self-concepts more stongly predicted boys' body image, while girls' body image was more strongly predicted by media pressures. Femininity predicted physical self-concepts among both boys and girls.