‘Girls don’t play soccer’: children policing gender on the playground in a township primary school in South Africa

ABSTRACT

This paper is based on an ethnographic study conducted between 2012 and 2014 with a group of 64 boys and girls aged 6–10, all attending the same township primary school in South Africa. The paper explores how the young children construct gender ‘boundaries’ and ‘police’ gender ‘transgressions’ on the school playground during break-time. The findings illustrate the ways in which these young boys and girls learn to ‘do’ gender through practices of inclusion, exclusion and ‘policing’ during play. The findings challenge dominant teacher constructions of the playground as a ‘free space’ and demonstrate how the playground operates as a site of learning gender through forms of ‘policing’ that involve boys bullying girls and boys who do not conform to gender norms. The findings raise implications for the development of curriculum material and teaching practices that would assist primary schoolteachers to reflect more deeply on young learners’ personal experiences and perspectives around gender and play.

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• play
• playground
• gender policing
• gender transgression
• primary school
• South Africa

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my supervisor, Prof. Rob Pattman, for his support and guidance during the research project upon which this paper is based. I would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their suggestions and constructive comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. This is a pseudonym to protect the identity of the participant. Throughout the paper, pseudonyms are used to protect identities of all participants in the study.

2. In terms of Section 10 of the South African Schools Act (1996), corporal punishment in South African schools is illegal. However, corporal punishment continues to be used to maintain discipline in many public schools in South Africa. Morrell (2001) argues that the reasons for the persistent and illegal use of corporal punishment include the absence of effective alternatives, the historical legacy of authoritarian education practices and the popular assumption that corporal punishment is necessary for orderly education to take place. Furthermore, Morrell (2001) argues that corporal punishment persists because many parents use it in the home and support its use in school.