Each student should browse through 2 books Discuss what you can find about gender socialization for age 9 up to pre-adolescent children.
, develop a summary of what you found. This may include consistencies, inconsistencies in how male and females were portrayed (using the guiding questions and concepts from the text). You might opt to make a table with results based on age to supplement a very brief summary. Some teams have turned the questions into a table (again using the guiding questions and similar to the sense of self assignment). So for example, looking at the question “Are female figures shown as frequently as male figures?” Thus, each student could want to place his/her answer or comment about this in a summary table with the student’s initials next to his/her answer. Guiding questions are below.
Consider the following questions (but feel free to go beyond these guiding questions in related areas:
Samples of things to look at to draw conclusions*:
• Are female figures shown as frequently as male figures?
• Are male figures shown as frequently as female figures?
• Identify and explain any images, words, phrases you deem to be bias or stereotypical.
• Do female and male figures engage equally and cooperatively in activities?
• Are females pictured as subservient to males in some way?
• Do females have more of their bodies displayed than men?
• Are females and males shown in a variety of roles, tasks, or occupations? (e.g., is the mother cooking? )
• Are both females and males given domestic concerns and responsibilities? Are these alluded to for the children in the book in any way?
• Do the males or females in the book (adults, children or animal characters that are depicted as gendered) express any emotions? If so are there any differences in the emotions expressed based on gender?