Barrie Thorne, “Borderwork,” and the Social Space of Schools

If someone had told me that the way to pick a research project was to scan my bookshelf, find my absolute favorite studies, and figure out what they have in common, I’d have done a school ethnography. It was Barrie Thorne’s Gender Play (1993) that made me want to go to graduate school. I just learned that she retired and thought it might be a fitting time to talk about how much her work inspires me.

When sex role theory was the way to talk about gender, scholars and activists interested in discussing gender inequality focused on key socializing institutions (where “sex roles” and their associated expectations were thought to be primarily produced) like the family, education, religion, etc. I have always thought that school ethnographies emerged out of this period – though Parsons‘ structural functionalism seems a distant memory to much of this research. Incidentally, Barrie Thorne was among the group of feminist scholars who collectively explained why sex role theory was and is inadequate as a theory.

[SIDE NOTE: Terms like “class roles” and “race roles” were never as popular as “sex roles.” Yet scholars dealing with race and class were certainly navigating similar concerns. Paul Willis’ Leaning to Labor (1977) is a prime example, illustrating how working-class youth are making a choice to enter working-class jobs. But it’s a choice that is structured by much more than their individual desires.]

Lately, I’ve gone back through a number of my favorite school ethnographies to read more about how scholars discuss the role of space in the structuring of children’s experiences of school, the perpetuation of inequality within schools, and the fostering of performances of self at school.

The Bachelor Pad: Myths and Reality

There is not actually a great deal of literature on “man caves,” “man dens,” and the like–save for some anthropological and archeological work using the term a bit differently.  There is, however, a substantial body of literature dealing with bachelor pads.  The “bachelor pad” is a term that emerged in the 1960s.  It was a style of masculinizing domestic spaces heavily influenced by “gentlemen’s” magazines like Esquire and Playboy.  Originally referred to as “bachelor apartments,” “bachelor pad” was coined in an article in the Chicago Tribune, and by 1964 it appeared in The New York Times and Playboy as well.

It’s somewhat ironic that the “bachelor pad” came into the American cultural consciousness at a time when the median age at first marriage was at a historic low (20.3 for women and 22.8 for men).  So, the term came into usage at a time when heterosexual marriage was in vogue.  Why then?  Another ironic twist is that while the term has only become more popular since it was introduced, “bachelorette pad” never took off–despite the interesting finding that women live alone in larger numbers than do men.  I think these two paradoxes substantiate a fundamental truth about the bachelor pad–it has always been more myth than reality (see here, here, here, here, and here).

Sean Payton and the Masculinization of Football

In case you’ve been on the moon recently and missed it, football is a gendered space.  While girls and boys, women and men continue to play sports on different teams, at different times, on different courts and fields, and often with subtly different equipment or rules, it’s also true that by and large, they’re playing many of the same sports.  There are only a few sports that have remained the province of men.  Olympic ski jumping is probably my favorite example.  In a classically awful way, it turns out that a woman (Lindsey Van) holds the world record in ski jumping but cannot compete in the Olympic event because it is sex segregated and there is no women’s event.  Football is one such space as well.  Women don’t play.  They don’t play as girls and they can’t play professionally as women.

[SIDE NOTE: It is true that there is a Lingerie Football League that started in 2009 (and yes… it’s exactly as awful as it sounds).  Women play full contact indoor football in the same arenas where men’s professional sports are played.  The game is unsafe and there are a great deal of injuries as a result.  The women wear less padding, but are extreme athletes and go “all out” in front of screaming audiences of men.]

The most recent issue in the NFL is the suspension of the New Orleans Saints’ coach, Sean Payton for what’s being considered unsportsmanlike conduct off the field.