Gender-based harassment of girls: School personnel's perceptions and institutional responses /

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Bibliographic Details
Author / Creator:Wilson, Fallon, author.
Imprint:2015.
Ann Arbor : ProQuest Dissertations & Theses, 2015
Description:1 electronic resource (172 pages)
Language:English
Format: E-Resource Dissertations
Local Note:School code: 0330
URL for this record:http://pi.lib.uchicago.edu/1001/cat/bib/10773165
Hidden Bibliographic Details
Other authors / contributors:University of Chicago. degree granting institution.
ISBN:9781321910063
Notes:Advisors: Charles Payne Committee members: Beth Richie; Dexter Voisin.
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Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 76-12(E), Section: A.
English
Summary:Gender-based harassment of girls in schools is a national problem. Several large-scale surveys reveal how common it is for girls to experience such acts and the many academic, behavioral, and emotional consequences of such abuse. Fewer studies examine in-depth how professional and nonprofessional staff in a school make sense and respond to such acts of violence against girls. The present study draws on feminist and queer theory to contribute to the understanding of this relationship. In this study, gender-based harassment of girls is defined as students who, without the consent of girls, target girls with gender-based comments about their body, their sexuality, and their sex; who send text, email, and/or gesture gender-based comments or images about girls' body, sexuality, and sex without consent from girls; or who touch girls in a sexual manner without consent. Using interviews with school leaders, teachers, and non-teaching staff (N = 30) conducted within one high school, this study was designed to address two specific questions: 1) How do school leadership, teaching staff, and non-teaching staff in a high school understand gender-based harassment of girls? 2) How do school leaders, teaching staff, and non-teaching staff in a high school address gender-based harassment of girls?
The study sample included 9 school leaders, 10 teachers, and 11 non-teaching staff members from one high school, with interviews ranging from 45 minutes to 60 minutes. The study concludes that social construction of the appropriate performance of female gender shapes school personnel perceptions of gender-based violence. Contrary to expectations, many school personnel identify girls as the main perpetrators of gender-based violence. Both professional and non-professional staff stress the inappropriate ways girls harass and fight each other. Furthermore, school personnel believe that girls are not overcoming their female nature, which exposes them to being messy, emotional, and promiscuous. They believe girls harass other girls because they want to be the "queen bee" on campus and because they learn it from their homes, specifically their mothers. Ultimately, they see gender-nonconforming girls (actual or perceived) as responsible for their own victimization.
There are a myriad of ways the school, as an institution, addresses the issues of violence including two school-wide, anti-bullying prevention programs, social and emotional counseling services (e.g., Family Resource Center Counselor and STARS Counselor), and zero tolerance procedures. However, none of these interventions are gender specific outside of the Family Resource Center's Real Girl group that seeks to teach young women who harass other girls how to build positive relationships with other young women. Though both professional and non-professional staff members are similar in their use of institutional means to address incidences of gender-based violence, non-professional staff members whose jobs are not central to the academic operating of the school (e.g., domestic engineers and cafeteria workers) respond to perpetrators and victims of gender-based harassment using persuasive and empathetic arguments.
The results of this dissertation have important research implications. Researchers should design additional studies that apply an intersectionality framework to how stereotypes of girl perpetrators shape how schools blame and discipline girls for their own victimizations. They should try to compare the way girls understand their harassment to the way staff do. This study's findings also highlight the need for school districts to develop a comprehensive anti-bias harassment policy that specifically enumerates the challenges gender-nonconforming youth and LGBTQ youth experience in schools. Lastly, this study recommends that school districts examine the use of zero tolerance policies and its effectiveness in addressing violence against girls.