Gendered Harassment in Secondary Schools - Meyer

Gendered Harassment in Secondary Schools: Understanding Teachers’ (non) Interventions – Meyer

Elizabeth Meyer begins her article by defining the three main types of harassment that she explores throughout her research.  The first, “gendered harassment, is defined as any behavior, verbal, physical, or psychological, that polices the boundaries of traditional heterosexual gender norms and includes (hetero)sexual harassment, homophobic harassment, and harassment for gender non-conformity” (2)  Specific examples of this may include name-calling and telling jokes that are sexist, homophobic, or transphobic.

The second type of harassment, homophobic harassment, is “defined as unwelcome behaviours that can include physical, verbal, and non-verbal conduct that denigrate people who are, or are perceived to be, gay, lesbian, bisexual or queer.” (4)  Meyer considers this type of harassment to fall in the the category of sexual harassment, because most of these behaviors are comprised of sexual or gender components. Examples of this type of harassment would include anti-gay epithets or harassment of a female for being too ‘masculine’.

The third type of harassment described is harassment for gender non-conformity, which Meyer describes as, “Individuals whose bodies and identities transgress dominant notions of masculinity and femininity disrupt the dominant paradigm of a gender binary.” (5)  She mentions that some studies have started to examine this topic, but more research is required in this area.  

After Meyer presented those definitions, she began to examine the role that teachers play when it comes to harassment and bullying in their schools/classrooms.  Overwhelmingly, teachers shared that they did not feel supported by their administrators when dealing with these issues and therefore, often did not combat them.  In addition to lack of administrative support, teachers also felt that they were already overworked with the amount of material they were expected to cover, felt a complete lack of training unless they sought it out themselves, and expressed a lack of written clarity on the policies of bullying in their schools.  Meyer describes all of these as institutional influences and I could easily relate to these topics, because they are issues that we have brought up consistently over the semester when dealing with a variety of issues.  Although we haven’t had our class discussion yet, I have a feeling that these same sentiments reflected here are present in many of our schools today.

One big issue that Meyer highlights is how the beliefs and actions of the administration reflect the culture and climate of the entire school.  (Parents were briefly mentioned in her report, but not discussed to the degree of the impact of administration.)  This is extremely important, because as Meyer presents as her conclusion, “it is not possible to create safer and more positive learning environments until school leaders initiate a whole-school process that would transform the formal and informal structures of the school.”  (20)  Before reading this article I had never really thought about how significant the administration team is in setting the school climate.  I think that part of the reason is that in my current position, there is no relation between the students and the administrators at the public school.  The climate in my classroom is only impacted by administration during my observations, and this is not enough to have any type of result on the students.  Although, in thinking back over the teaching jobs that I have had in the past, I can clearly see what a big role administrators do have on the school community.

My article this week highlights a documentary, It’s Elementary (1996), that acts as a guide for teachers who want to cover LGBT issues in the classroom.  Below is an excerpt from this documentary that shows examples of teachers who are covering this topic in their classroom.  This clip shows teacher led discussions, classroom conversations, a school exhibit education initiative, and the reaction from parents when this topic came up. I believe, in addition to the beliefs/practices of administrators of a school, that this type of education is a piece of what Meyer is saying is necessary in order to confront the problem of harassment and bullying in our schools today.