The Discursive Production of the Male/Female Dualism in School Settings

Abstract

In this paper, the discursive practices through which males and females are created as opposites and through which people become identifiably one or the other are analysed. It is shown how gender is created by individuals and within individuals as they learn the discursive practices through which to locate themselves as individuals and as members of the social world. Particular focus is given to the narratives through which children learn what it means to be male or female, and through which they become locked into (and thus limited by) masculine and feminine subject positions. The special place of the images and metaphors embedded in those narratives in constituting individual psyches, and in setting up patterns of belief and desire organised around a dualistic pattern of maleness and femaleness will be a central focus of the paper.