He said he said: boysplaining in a primary classroom

ABSTRACT

The past two decades has seen widespread academic and public concern about boys’ academic achievement and the emergence of discourses that identify girls as academic ‘winners’ in the primary classroom; however, this article aims to problematise these trends. Drawing on ethnographic research carried out in a primary school classroom in London, this article draws attention to ‘boysplaining,’ a set of behaviours carried out by certain boys which constituted a form of hegemonic masculinity in this classroom. Boysplaining, a younger version of mansplaining, manifested both verbally and physically, and appears to affect how girls navigate the classroom. This research indicates how boysplaining disadvantages girls, raising questions about the extent to which girls are ‘winning’ in primary school classrooms today. The article calls for further research on boysplaining in other classrooms, in particular to examine the academic, social and emotional consequences of these behaviours on girls and non-hegemonic boys.

KEYWORDS:

• Masculinities
• femininities
• primary education
• childhood
• equality
• boysplaining

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lara Schiffrin-Sands

Lara Schiffrin Sands is a PhD Student in the Department of Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research interests include the sociology of childhood, the sociology of education and ethnography. In particular, she focuses on how school disciplinary regimes shape students' class, gender and racial socialisation.