Gender identites

• Gender identities

  Identity is formed in schools - peer groups in school, teacher pupil interactions, acceptance or rejection of individuals' external identity - gendered expectations and behaviours- subject choice and career aspiration
• Peer groups

  • Male peer groups reinforce ideas of hegemonic masculinity by rejecting those that do not conform to values of groups
  • Female peer groups reinforce hyperetrosexual identities amongst girls. Girls are dressing in a certain way and act 'girly'
  • Girls can form 'boffin identities' - being a 'geek'/tryhard
  • Boys can reject macho culture and adopt geek identities
• Teacher-pupil interactions


  • Teachers' perceptions of pupils fall into three categories: Ideal pupil -female middle class high achiever, Pathologized pupil-Chinese and Indian males seen as unthreatening and asexual, Demonised pupil- overtly heterosexual white or black working class males
• External identity

  • Formation of 'Nike identities' as a form of symbolic capital - status awarded for wearing branded sportswear, Clashes with school habitus - symbolic violence
  • Hyperhetrosexual identity for girls within makeup, hair, clothes gain status from peers and boys but not school
• Gendered expectations and behaviours

  • Boys monopolise discussions, equipment, space and time in classrooms
  • Girls perceived to be invisible and docile in classrooms
  • Lower expectations of boys shapes their self-efficacy for tasks
  • High expectations on girls increases
• Subject choice and career

  • Female teachers as role models shape career aspirations
  • Homophobic abuse to girls who are seen as sporty
  • Boys discouraged from feminine domains
  • Anti-school subculture cultivates fatalism in boys-crisis of masculinity