ERIC Number: EJ1218974
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2019
Pages: 18
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1468-1811
EISSN: N/A
Teenage Girls Negotiating Femininity in the Context of Sexually Explicit Materials
Carboni, Nicci; Bhana, Deevia
Sex Education: Sexuality, Society and Learning, v19 n4 p371-388 2019
In this paper, we draw from elements of a study that sought to examine how teenage South African girls, both white and black African, articulate their relationship with online sexually explicit materials (SEM). The study contributes to the literature by resisting the dominant discursive practices underlined by the construction of sexuality as an exclusive realm of danger for teenage girls. Challenging this static version of femininity, we focus on the ways in which teenage girls, aged between 13 and 18 years old in two elite private schools, use online SEM to expand their sexual knowledge and engage in pleasurable forms of sexuality. By drawing on individual interviews, focus group discussions and open-ended visual elicitation research methods, we show how girls embrace online SEM in ways that expand the definition of femininity beyond fearing sexuality whilst demonstrating the entanglement with gender inequalities. Girls' relationship with online SEM, whilst tenuous, disrupts normative assumptions around femininity. However, an ambiguous relationship with online SEM is evident as their challenges to dominant femininity are mediated by concerns about respect and innocence, as well as by persistent evidence of male power within online SEM. Implications for school-based sexuality education concludes the paper.
Descriptors: Adolescents, Females, Femininity, Foreign Countries, Sexuality, Blacks, Whites, Private Schools, Selective Admission, Student Attitudes, Gender Differences, Sex Education, Information Sources, Mass Media, Risk, Power Structure, Pornography, Audio Equipment, Illustrations, Secondary School Students
Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 530 Walnut Street Suite 850, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Tel: 215-625-8900; Fax: 215-207-0050; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Secondary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: South Africa (Johannesburg)
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A