Page 127 - Šolsko polje, XXXI, 2020, 5-6: Teaching Feminism, ed. Valerija Vendramin
P. 127
m. hrženjak ■ sporty boys and fashion girls ...
gendered beings subjected to disciplining discourses and gendering prac-
tices related to body practices; and 3) both approaches omit heterogenei-
ty within their categories (young, women) and the effects of intersected
social locations (ethnicity and class) on gendered identity constructions.
I continue by analysing clothing practices as a marker of engendering in
girls and boys at the intersection of both theoretical approaches, but from
the aspect of the listed deficiencies of the two approaches.
Regulated Body and Techniques of the Self
When asked, what is most typical of boys and girls, teenagers answered:
Blaž (m, aged 14): “Well, boys don’t use make-up, and they don’t have
so many clothes as girls do. Girls use make-up, they have different clothes,
they don’t do the same sports as boys, or boys don’t do those, where girls are.”
Katja (f, aged 14) says: “Boys don’t like shopping, that’s first and fore-
most. Hmm, then they don’t feel so strongly about their looks, they don’t
spend over an hour in the bathroom every morning, I guess. Hmm, but there
are exceptions that I know of, and who spend on their looks and all.”
Tine (m, aged 14) thinks: “Yes, we’re more into bikes or such. Don’t
know, we do, say, football, which I think girls don’t do so much, but also.
Girls dress more fashionably than boys or such. They care about their weight,
figure, yes. That’s it, I guess.”
These answers show that teenagers of both genders construct gender
difference by referring to “typically feminine” (fashion, taking care of how
they look) and “typically masculine” (sports, ignorance of outfit) activities
related to the body. Body and looks are shown as an important medium of
the production of gendered subjectivity, and different body practices rep-
resent the ways and means of identity negotiations, conformity or trans-
gression. Foucault (1991) provided an insight into the “regulated body”,
for which the dominant discourses inscribe gendered norms, also through
the clothing rules and caring for one’s looks, which work through femi-
nine and masculine subjectivities. A subject’s (self)regulation of their own
body while striving for conformity or resistance to the dominant gender
norms may be understood as a mechanism for constructing the subject
as a male or female. From this aspect, the “techniques of the self ” (ibid.),
such as engaging in sports in the case of the interviewed boys, or taking
care of their outfit in the case of the interviewed girls, can be understood
as practices of the normalisation of adolescent gender identity into the
normative masculinity and femininity. What happens here is a shift from
the natural, biological body as the central mechanism of the naturalisa-
tion of sexual difference to the discursive body, suggesting that engen-
dered bodies are produced through discursive norms and power relations
125
gendered beings subjected to disciplining discourses and gendering prac-
tices related to body practices; and 3) both approaches omit heterogenei-
ty within their categories (young, women) and the effects of intersected
social locations (ethnicity and class) on gendered identity constructions.
I continue by analysing clothing practices as a marker of engendering in
girls and boys at the intersection of both theoretical approaches, but from
the aspect of the listed deficiencies of the two approaches.
Regulated Body and Techniques of the Self
When asked, what is most typical of boys and girls, teenagers answered:
Blaž (m, aged 14): “Well, boys don’t use make-up, and they don’t have
so many clothes as girls do. Girls use make-up, they have different clothes,
they don’t do the same sports as boys, or boys don’t do those, where girls are.”
Katja (f, aged 14) says: “Boys don’t like shopping, that’s first and fore-
most. Hmm, then they don’t feel so strongly about their looks, they don’t
spend over an hour in the bathroom every morning, I guess. Hmm, but there
are exceptions that I know of, and who spend on their looks and all.”
Tine (m, aged 14) thinks: “Yes, we’re more into bikes or such. Don’t
know, we do, say, football, which I think girls don’t do so much, but also.
Girls dress more fashionably than boys or such. They care about their weight,
figure, yes. That’s it, I guess.”
These answers show that teenagers of both genders construct gender
difference by referring to “typically feminine” (fashion, taking care of how
they look) and “typically masculine” (sports, ignorance of outfit) activities
related to the body. Body and looks are shown as an important medium of
the production of gendered subjectivity, and different body practices rep-
resent the ways and means of identity negotiations, conformity or trans-
gression. Foucault (1991) provided an insight into the “regulated body”,
for which the dominant discourses inscribe gendered norms, also through
the clothing rules and caring for one’s looks, which work through femi-
nine and masculine subjectivities. A subject’s (self)regulation of their own
body while striving for conformity or resistance to the dominant gender
norms may be understood as a mechanism for constructing the subject
as a male or female. From this aspect, the “techniques of the self ” (ibid.),
such as engaging in sports in the case of the interviewed boys, or taking
care of their outfit in the case of the interviewed girls, can be understood
as practices of the normalisation of adolescent gender identity into the
normative masculinity and femininity. What happens here is a shift from
the natural, biological body as the central mechanism of the naturalisa-
tion of sexual difference to the discursive body, suggesting that engen-
dered bodies are produced through discursive norms and power relations
125
