Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilligan–influential feminist psychologist and author–is worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called “the little book that started a revolution” by Harvard University Press) electrified the pundit class with its premise that girls were fundamentally misread and oppressed by American society. The advocacy programs promoting equality for girls that resulted from Gilligans call-to-arms have had an impact few would deny. In fact, they may have worked too well, as schools generally acknowledge that girls now outshine boys in grades and high level-course enrollment (even in math and science, says the National Center for Education Statistics) and outnumber them in formerly male bastions such as honor societies, debating clubs and student government. Colleges today are scrambling to increase male enrollment.
Somewhere in these pages you may find a new “Literal Problem” that is not particularly new to me. Perhaps it is time to ask myself: Which of the following are you “missing”?
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilligan‗is worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾮthe little book that started a revolution• by Harvard University Press) electrified the pundit class with its premise that girls were fundamentally misread and oppressed by American society. The advocacy programs promoting equality for girls that resulted from Gilligans call-to-arms have had an effect few would deny. In fact, they may have worked too well, as schools generally acknowledge that girls now outshine boys in grades and high level-course enrollment (even in math and science, says the National Center for Education Statistics) and outnumber them in formerly male bastions such as honor societies, debating clubs and student government. Colleges today are scrambling to increase male enrollment.
[…]
An article in The New York Times Magazine in August 2008 noted that the percentage of Hispanic students whose parents are white is much more than that of students from other ethnic groups, because these ethnic groups, despite the overwhelming majority of their educational achievements, do not have the skills necessary to support themselves in the workforce.
We are also seeing the rise of men from those ethnic groups that lack academic opportunities and experience.
In addition, our knowledge of the history of science has not diminished over the past few decades. In 2006 the world reported its largest increase in the percentage of students who earned at or above a certain level of literacy between 1989 and 2002. (Since then, the total number of students who have attained at least a 1.0) Since that time, our national population has increased an average of 33% since 1989, which is more and more an increase compared to the national percentage of students who have the “academic quality” of 30%, a trend that many believe to be unsustainable for a population that is increasingly dominated by white males.
The increasing influence of men on public opinion has been well documented by sociologists John Dower, John Tilton and other sociologists of this subject in recent years.
[…]
The Problem
The Problem: The Education of Girls
“You seem pretty darn young in terms of your age and how many questions you ask of girls in this essay. Have you considered the impact on girls’ lives at higher or lower grades for girls who do not speak a language? Can these high or lower grades effect future aspirations of girls in such ways as their participation in university scholarships and other forms of higher education, and even their future careers?”
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilliganis worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾐthe little book that started a revolution̩. The most important change in this essay is that girls’ grades have been reduced at the expense of their academic ability — to say nothing of the impact on boys’ grades or high level-course enrollment they have as well. But, I’ll grant, we may well want to think of that a little darker or we may wonder if the “sickeningness” of girls still appears in the education curriculum as well. As the sociologist Mary Sue White has put it, “girls who get into college through high school are often little more than the victims of boys’ poor grades– the kids who are stuck paying for everything you buy, whose parents are stuck going to the doctor’s office, and who who, rather than want to go to college, decide on going to college, and getting a job.”The Problem: The Education of GirlsYou seem pretty darn young in terms of your age and how many questions you ask of girls in this essay. Have you considered the impact on girls’ lives at higher or lower grades for girls who do not speak a language? Can these high or lower grades effect future aspirations of girls in such ways as their participation in university scholarships and other forms of higher education, and even their future careers?”
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilliganis worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾆthe little book that started a revolutionᾬ. I am not surprised to see that girls were still more likely than boys to have an early
Somewhere in these pages you may find a new “Literal Problem” that is not particularly new to me. Perhaps it is time to ask myself: Which of the following are you “missing”?
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilligan‗is worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾮthe little book that started a revolution• by Harvard University Press) electrified the pundit class with its premise that girls were fundamentally misread and oppressed by American society. The advocacy programs promoting equality for girls that resulted from Gilligans call-to-arms have had an effect few would deny. In fact, they may have worked too well, as schools generally acknowledge that girls now outshine boys in grades and high level-course enrollment (even in math and science, says the National Center for Education Statistics) and outnumber them in formerly male bastions such as honor societies, debating clubs and student government. Colleges today are scrambling to increase male enrollment.
[…]
An article in The New York Times Magazine in August 2008 noted that the percentage of Hispanic students whose parents are white is much more than that of students from other ethnic groups, because these ethnic groups, despite the overwhelming majority of their educational achievements, do not have the skills necessary to support themselves in the workforce.
We are also seeing the rise of men from those ethnic groups that lack academic opportunities and experience.
In addition, our knowledge of the history of science has not diminished over the past few decades. In 2006 the world reported its largest increase in the percentage of students who earned at or above a certain level of literacy between 1989 and 2002. (Since then, the total number of students who have attained at least a 1.0) Since that time, our national population has increased an average of 33% since 1989, which is more and more an increase compared to the national percentage of students who have the “academic quality” of 30%, a trend that many believe to be unsustainable for a population that is increasingly dominated by white males.
The increasing influence of men on public opinion has been well documented by sociologists John Dower, John Tilton and other sociologists of this subject in recent years.
[…]
The Problem
The Problem: The Education of Girls
“You seem pretty darn young in terms of your age and how many questions you ask of girls in this essay. Have you considered the impact on girls’ lives at higher or lower grades for girls who do not speak a language? Can these high or lower grades effect future aspirations of girls in such ways as their participation in university scholarships and other forms of higher education, and even their future careers?”
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilliganis worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾐthe little book that started a revolution̩. The most important change in this essay is that girls’ grades have been reduced at the expense of their academic ability — to say nothing of the impact on boys’ grades or high level-course enrollment they have as well. But, I’ll grant, we may well want to think of that a little darker or we may wonder if the “sickeningness” of girls still appears in the education curriculum as well. As the sociologist Mary Sue White has put it, “girls who get into college through high school are often little more than the victims of boys’ poor grades– the kids who are stuck paying for everything you buy, whose parents are stuck going to the doctor’s office, and who who, rather than want to go to college, decide on going to college, and getting a job.”The Problem: The Education of GirlsYou seem pretty darn young in terms of your age and how many questions you ask of girls in this essay. Have you considered the impact on girls’ lives at higher or lower grades for girls who do not speak a language? Can these high or lower grades effect future aspirations of girls in such ways as their participation in university scholarships and other forms of higher education, and even their future careers?”
Penn StateEssay Preview: Penn StateReport this essayCarol Gilliganis worried. Gilligans 1982 book In Another Voice (called ᾆthe little book that started a revolutionᾬ. I am not surprised to see that girls were still more likely than boys to have an early
Is the “mean girls” phenomenon a media smokescreen?Courtesy GettySo, given these bragging points, why is Gilligan worried? In her view, a backlash against girls is taking place, led by scholars and authors who are sometimes critical of Gilligans research methods and conclusions. “At a point when people have started to look at girls and see their strength, suddenly this comes up,” she has said.
By “this,” Gilligan means the explosion of “mean girl” books and movies, portraying girls as equally as–if not more–aggressive than boys, in their own conniving and manipulative way.
“I dont know if Id call it a backlash,” says Marnina Gonick, Penn State education and womens studies professor, “but I would agree that the mean girl idea is troubling. Im especially critical of the way these problematic relationships between girls are represented in the media.”
But what is it about the concept that has galvanized peoples interest right now?“I think, in part, its a reflection of social anxiety about girls success,” Gonick tells me. “Girls and boys both endure a lot of pressure in the times were living in. There are fewer social programs to support kids and the cost of failing is so high. Young people are expected to maintain the same class status as their parents, and thats getting harder to achieve.”
Are girls the scapegoats for a public frustrated by intensifying resource competition? “Yes, I think so,” says Gonick. “Anxiety about changes in the social system of the culture may be driving the “mean girl” phenomenon. The basic fallacy of so many of the books and movies on this topic is that theres something inherent in femaleness that creates these kinds of (abusive) behaviors.”
“The other problem with the way “mean girls”