Sex and Gossip: The Presence of the Gendered Bodies of Men in the Elementary School

• In Event: Roundtable Session 49
  In Roundtable Session: Critical Analysis of Race, Class, Gender, and Ethnicity in Elementary School Contexts

Abstract

We know little about the experiences of men who teach in elementary schools. This qualitative, gendered study’s purpose was to explore, critique, and disrupt the discourses surrounding men elementary teachers in order to better understand the lives of men and women educators following Collective Memory Work methodology (Haug, 1983/1987). Study participants met in facilitated, collective discussion in order to identify avenues for inquiry, determine a writing focus, and perform collective analysis on those narratives (Kivel and Johnson, 2009). Analysis revealed that men continue to struggle with their presence in elementary schools because of the established discourse of gender boundaries, more specifically they struggle with how to be present in their sexual bodies while in a professional setting.

Author

• Christopher Michael Hansen, Illinois State University