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Sex and gender : a case-study of sex education in one comprehensive school
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Rocheron, Yvette (1983) Sex and gender : a case-study of sex education in one comprehensive school. PhD thesis, University of Warwick.
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Official URL: http://webcat.warwick.ac.uk/record=b1463428~S1
Abstract
The thesis examines Sex Education lessons integrated to the fourth
and fifth year core curriculum of a mixed comprehensive school. It
studies their stated objectives, contents and implementation in the
classroom and analyses how pupils interpret curricular meanings
with regard to their gender expectations from sexuality, employment
and domesticity. A variety of qualitative methods - in particular,
participant observation and informal interviews - has been used.
The first chapter argues that sexual and gender socialisations
must be understood from a materialist position and that the Sex
Education curriculum may be structured by the fundamental functions
of schooling in a gender - and class - divided society. The second
chapter locates the marginal position of Sex Education within the
Health Education course of the deeply divided school. Strategies
for control over curriculum and classroom social relations developed
by both Sex Education teachers and pupils constitute the theme of
the third chapter with illustrations from the lesson on childbirth
and pregnancy. Contraception, sexual intercourse and marriage are
discussed in the next three chapters which follow the same pattern.
Each considers the selection of curricular meanings, their transmission
in the class and boys' and girls' perceptions of these
topics.
The last chapter underlines the dominance of traditional views
on sexuality, gender and marriage in teachers' and pupils' perceptions
alongside a liberal reformist theme. Both dominant and negotiated
meanings form the ideology of personal relationships which blends
objective information with commonsense knowledge of sexual and
gender conflicts. Consistent with the social democratic views of
education, this ideology serves to negotiate the fundamental
contradiction between the socialisation of pupils to ascribed
positions (sexual, familial and occupational) and individuals'
self-determination with regard to these. By and large, pupils'
accommodative strategies based on conflicting sexual - and gender - interests validate this ideology but also give them some limited
control over definitions of appropriate behaviour.
Item Type: | Thesis (PhD) | ||||
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Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB1603 Secondary Education. High schools |
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Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Sex instruction -- Great Britain -- Case studies | ||||
Official Date: | April 1983 | ||||
Dates: |
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Institution: | University of Warwick | ||||
Theses Department: | Department of Sociology | ||||
Thesis Type: | PhD | ||||
Publication Status: | Unpublished | ||||
Supervisor(s)/Advisor: | Lovell, Terry ; Burgess, Robert G. | ||||
Extent: | v, 314 p. | ||||
Language: | eng |
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