When women “baby‐sit” and men “transmit knowledge and discipline”: the construction of gender in Hong Kong’s primary schools

Abstract

This paper, based on forty in‐depth interviews with teachers and principals in Hong Kong, utilizes the insights of feminist organization studies to explore the persistence of gender inequalities in primary school teaching. Two common practices, namely the assignment of women and men to teach lower and higher grades respectively and the monopoly of men in positions of disciplining and authority, are centered. The data suggest that schools and teachers actively construct and reproduce gender inequalities by trivializing teaching of young children as babysitting, naturalizing women as natural caregivers, and normalizing the use of threat in disciplinary control. My analysis also argues that these routine and pervasive gendering processes are not often acknowledged or challenged, which have the effects of marginalizing caring work, overlooking the emotional labor of women, valorizing a masculine view of authority, encouraging men and boys to compete for power via aggression, and hence producing a masculinist workplace.

Citation

Kit‐wa Chan, A. (2004), "When women “baby‐sit” and men “transmit knowledge and discipline”: the construction of gender in Hong Kong’s primary schools", Equal Opportunities International, Vol. 23 No. 3/4/5, pp. 7-28. https://doi.org/10.1108/02610150410787701