Thorne & luria, sexuality and gender

This chapter analyzes how children of both sexes grow up together while still being somewhat segregated. Two researchers Barrie Thorne and Zella Luria go to four different elementary schools to study the interactions and own behaviors of the boys and girls. Reading this chapter made me think back on my experiences in elementary school. During their research Thorne and luria noticed that it wasn’t just the school that would segregate the boys and girls, but the boys and girls would choose to segregate themselves. This wasn’t surprising to me I always say at the boys table during lunch even though the school would let boys and girls sit together. Occasionally we would play sports with girls but it would mostly be with other guys. When kids have the freedom to integrate they choose not to and this is because when your young you see the opposite gender as “gross”. I would get teased if I hanged out with a girl at the playground cause the other kids would see us as liking each other.Girls sometimes talk about who likes who and there are relationships at this age but most I remember last like a week because kids arnt really mature enough to be in relationships.

As boys get older they learn more inappropriate words and ideas. And this is almost always from other boys. By the fourth grade boys will start calling each other “faggot” or “queer”. Kids would always ask me a trick question “are you gay?” I would say no, then they would say “does your mom know your gay?” If you say no again then they would be tricking you into admitting that your gay because to young boys, being gay is seen as the most disgusting thing on the planet. These kids would always get these jokes from some other boy, it was never original. Boys and girls in schools usually segregate themselves. Occasionally they will choose to spend time together but children choose to be segregated for sexual reasons as it’s a stigma to them to hang out with the opposite sex.