Engendering debate: how to formulate a political account of the divide between genetic bodies and discursive gender?
TL;DR: In this article, the Sign Woman on gender studies and feminist theory, Robyn Weigman identified the most profound challenges for contemporary feminist theory as twofold: "not simply to address the divide between genetic bodies and d\scursive gender but to offer a political analysis of the socially constructed afflictions between the two".
Abstract: In her article on ‘the Sign Woman’ on gender studies and feminist theory, Robyn Weigman identified the most profound challenges for contemporary feminist theory as twofold: ‘not simply to address the divide between genetic bodies and d\scursive gender but to offer a political analysis of the socially constructed afflictions between the two’. This article seeks to engage these challenges. It attempts to chart the terrain of dilemmas for gender theory from which analyses of gender as performed distinct from ‘sexed’ bodies has emerged, and which these analyses offer to resolve. It then seeks to interrogate the conception of identification and analysis of gender as distinct from the sexed body for application in empirical work, teasing out both benefits and limitations of this theoretical position for empirical (and theoretical) practice. In the final sections of the article, theoretical pathways that may lend fruitful analytical tools for the empirical study of gender productions, incorporating recognition o...
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TL;DR: For instance, this article found that the majority of young children have positive attitudes to science at age 10 but this interest then declines sharply and by age 14, their attitude and interest in the study of science has been largely formed.
Abstract: The concern about students' engagement with school science and the numbers pursuing the further study of science is an international phenomenon and a matter of considerable concern among policy makers. Research has demonstrated that the majority of young children have positive attitudes to science at age 10 but that this interest then declines sharply and by age 14, their attitude and interest in the study of science has been largely formed. This paper reports on data collected as part of a funded 5-year longitudinal study that seeks to determine how students' interest in science and scientific careers evolves. As an initial part of the study, six focus group discussions were undertaken with schoolchildren, age 10–11, to explore their attitudes toward science and interest in science, the findings of which are presented here. The children's responses are analyzed through the lens of identity, drawing on a theoretical framework that views identity as an embodied and a performed construction that is both produced by individuals and shaped by their specific structural locations. This work offers new insights into the manner in which students construct representations of science and scientists. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Sci Ed94:617–639, 2010
523 citations
TL;DR: In this article, it is argued that although cases of female masculinity and male femininity are identified, such labels can usefully be applied to only a very small number of pupils, and even here there are profound problems in the conceptual application.
Abstract: Recent gender theorising has been enlivened by post‐structuralist accounts of gender as ‘disembodied’; the reading of gender performances as distinct from sexed bodies. However, there has been little application of such theoretical positions to empirical analysis in gender and education. This article employs two such positions – that of ‘female masculinity and male femininity’, and that of ‘gender monoglossia and heteroglossia’ – to data raised from a research project on high‐achieving pupils. It is argued that although cases of female masculinity and male femininity are identified, such labels can usefully be applied to only a very small number of pupils, and even here there are profound problems in the conceptual application. The concept of gender heteroglossia appeared applicable to a far larger number of pupils. It is argued that this latter concept offers a less rigid application, that can incorporate analysis both of continuing patterns of gender inequality (as reflective of gender monoglossia), and...
143 citations
Cites background or methods or result from "Engendering debate: how to formulat..."
...While I have argued for the necessity of such analysis in gender and education research (e.g. Francis 2002, 2008b; Francis and Skelton 2008), my application of such analyses to empirical data has so far been relatively limited....
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...…‘female masculinity’: certainly this is very different to Halberstam’s (1998) analysis of Drag Kings, and takes us into the realms of categorising masculinity exclusively via behaviour rather than aesthetic appearance (as in the case of Margaret Thatcher which I posit elsewhere, see Francis 2008b)....
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...This concept has already been applied fleetingly in gender and education research (e.g. Mendick 2006; Renold 2007), including to ‘male femininity’ (Francis 2008a, 2009)....
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...(1981, 282) I have argued that Bakhtin’s concepts of monoglossia and heteroglossia (and monologism and dialogism) can be usefully transposed to gender (Francis 2008b)....
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...…incorporating contradiction, and readable as associated with different genders depending on the specific circumstances and associated discourses (Francis 2008b).7 Hence gender heteroglossia operates within the individual gender ‘attributes’, as well as within individual performances, and more…...
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TL;DR: The authors reviewed some of the key imperatives of working with "intersectional theory" and explored the extent to these debates are informing research around difference in education and Physical Education (PE) and argued for a continued focus on the specific context of PE within education for its contribution to these questions.
Abstract: Researching the intersection of class, race, gender, sexuality and disability raises many issues for educational research. Indeed, Maynard (2002, 33) has recently argued that ‘difference is one of the most significant, yet unresolved, issues for feminist and social thinking at the beginning of the twentieth century’. This paper reviews some of the key imperatives of working with ‘intersectional theory’ and explores the extent to these debates are informing research around difference in education and Physical Education (PE). The first part of the paper highlights some key issues in theorising and researching intersectionality before moving on to consider how difference has been addressed within PE. The paper then considers three ongoing challenges of intersectionality – bodies and embodiment, politics and practice and empirical research. The paper argues for a continued focus on the specific context of PE within education for its contribution to these questions.
140 citations
Cites background from "Engendering debate: how to formulat..."
...However, not all agree that such analyses are helpful, warning that an over-emphasis on difference and diversity should not be at the expense of ignoring enduring, material inequalities that remain evident (Francis 1999)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on a sample of 12-13 year-old pupils, identified as high achieving and popular, to examine classroom subjectivities, with attention to their practices around gender and educational achievement.
Abstract: In spite of research showing that pupils—particularly boys—tend to experience tension between high academic achievement and popularity with peers at school, some pupils continue to maintain simultaneous production of both. This article focuses on a sample of 12–13 year‐old pupils, identified as high achieving and popular, to examine classroom subjectivities, with attention to their practices around gender and educational achievement. Data are drawn from a qualitative study funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, which involved observation of classes at nine different co‐educational state schools in England, and interviews with 71 high‐achieving pupils, including 22 that were identified as high achieving and popular. The study findings belie the notion that high‐achieving pupils necessarily jeopardise their social standing with classmates. However, it also demonstrates the importance of embodiment and even essential attributes in productions of subjectivity that successfully ‘balance’ popularit...
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19,485 citations
01 Jan 1979
17,729 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors present La Volonté de Savoir, the methodological introduction of a projected five-volume history of sexuality, which seems to have a special fascination for Foucault: the gradual emergence of medicine as an institution, the birth of political economy, demography and linguistics as human sciences, the invention of incarceration and confinement for the control of the "other" in society (the mad, the libertine, the criminal) and that special violence that lurks beneath the power to control discourse.
Abstract: This writer who has warned us of the “ideological” function of both the oeuvre and the author as unquestioned forms of discursive organization has gone quite far in constituting for both these “fictitious unities” the name (with all the problems of such a designation) Michel Foucault. One text under review, La Volonté de Savoir, is the methodological introduction of a projected five-volume history of sexuality. It will apparently circle back over that material which seems to have a special fascination for Foucault: the gradual emergence of medicine as an institution, the birth of political economy, demography and linguistics as “human sciences,” the invention of incarceration and confinement for the control of the “other” in society (the mad, the libertine, the criminal) and that special violence that lurks beneath the power to control discourse.
15,794 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1980
TL;DR: The Eye of Power: A Discussion with Maoists as mentioned in this paper discusses the politics of health in the Eighteenth Century, the history of sexuality, and the Confession of the Flesh.
Abstract: * On Popular Justice: A Discussion with Maoists * Prison Talk * Body/ Power * Questions on Georgraphy * Two Lectures * Truth and Power * Power and Strategies * The Eye of Power * The Politics of Health in the Eighteenth Century * The history of Sexuality * The Confession of the Flesh
15,638 citations
"Engendering debate: how to formulat..." refers background in this paper
...…environment – however, they remain Othered and pathologised by dominant discursive practices, and consequently at risk of discipline and punishment (cf. Foucault 1980, 1977).6 As Butler (2004) recognises, performance of gender is not a straightforward ‘choice’, and not an equal choice (for…...
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Book•
18 Apr 2012
TL;DR: Foucault shows the development of the Western system of prisons, police organizations, administrative and legal hierarchies for social control and the growth of disciplinary society as a whole as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: In the Middle Ages there were gaols and dungeons, but punishment was for the most part a spectacle. The economic changes and growing popular dissent of the 18th century made necessary a more systematic control over the individual members of society, and this in effect meant a change from punishment, which chastised the body, to reform, which touched the soul. Foucault shows the development of the Western system of prisons, police organizations, administrative and legal hierarchies for social control - and the growth of disciplinary society as a whole. He also reveals that between school, factories, barracks and hospitals all share a common organization, in which it is possible to control the use of an individual's time and space hour by hour.
11,379 citations