Preschool Girls' Gender and Pretend Kitchen Play

• In Event: 25.083 - MTCC Roundtable Session Eight
  In Roundtable Session: 25.083-5 - The Role of Play in Young Children's Learning

Abstract

This pilot study aims to understand how preschool girls negotiate gender during pretend kitchen play in a preschool setting. I consider young girls pretend kitchen play in light of American kitchen culture, looking at the ways femininities are produced in space and through evolving discourses where Kitchen play and femininity have changed in the 21st century, domestic work is considered as a chic trendy feminine work. Data was collected using feminist “girl method” including participant observation and interviews. Using feminist poststructural perspectives, I examine how young girls negotiate their identities play at ‘kitchen’ in a preschool setting. Results indicate girls use kitchen spaces to express conflicting performances of gender.

Authors

• Sungryung Lyu, The Pennsylvania State University

• Allison Sterling Henward, The Pennsylvania State University