Abstract
This article reviews the ways in which gender and literacy have been linked in educational contexts and the different patterns of intervention this has led to. In particular, it will highlight the switch in the literature from a focus on the formation of (girls’) gendered identities to a focus on (boys’) gendered patterns of attainment within the literacy curriculum. The emergence of boys’ underachievement in literacy as a policy problem will be linked to the current dominance of performance-management cultures within governments and the accompanying processes of large-scale education reform which they have led to around the globe. Often, such interventions are designed with the aim of securing maximum homogeneity in outcomes from education. This provides a new context in which to consider the range of social explanations for inequalities in educational performance, their currency, and the challenges that “governing by numbers” (Grek 2009) poses for feminist politics.
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Moss, G. (2017). Gender and Literacy. In: Street, B., May, S. (eds) Literacies and Language Education. Encyclopedia of Language and Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02321-2_8-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02321-2_8-2
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Gender and Literacy- Published:
- 16 May 2017
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02321-2_8-2
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Gender and Literacy- Published:
- 31 January 2017
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-02321-2_8-1