Gender-Neutral Children’s Clothing: Options Matter!

Abigail Walsh, M.A., M.Ed.

Photo from: http://www.instyle.com/fashion/clothing/target-toca-boca-collection

In the past few years, we have seen a boom in gender-neutral clothing lines. Ellen DeGeneres made headlines when she collaborated with the Gap to create a not-so-girly line of clothing for girls, and later boys, citing the importance of “celebrating what makes you unique” (Clinton, 2015). Target, having already eliminated gender labels in their toy aisles, released a gender-neutral clothing line (pictured above) this summer (Whittaker, 2017).  John Lewis, a British retailer, recently announced that they would be labeling clothes as “for girls and boys” and “for boys and girls”, after consulting with Let Clothes Be Clothes, a group dedicated to ending gender stereotyping in the design and marketing of children’s clothes (Levine, 2017). Although each of these instances have been met with predictable backlash about political correctness, they have also been met with overwhelming support. These are just a few examples of companies that believe children shouldn’t be limited by the gender labels attached to their apparel. And we should be applauding these gender-neutral efforts, because gender appearance does matter.

As children start to understand the social categories of gender they seek out cues in their environment to inform what those categories mean (Martin, Ruble, & Szkrybalo, 2002). Gender-typed appearance, how feminine or masculine people dress, is a very salient cue to children about other people’s gender, as well as a representation of their own gender and gender identity. Clothing in particular, tends to be a fairly constant indication of gender, given how persistent these representations are in our society. Young children rely on physical appearance as an aspect of person perception, when differentiating others’ gender (Cahill, 1989; Zucker, Yoannidis, & Abramovitch, 2001). What we wear can also signify to others the social categories to which we belong (Feinberg, Mataro, & Burroughs, 1992; Freitas, Kaiser, & Hammidi, 1996; Freitas et al., 1997; Hutson, 2010). As such, clothing and appearance are closely tied to social constructions of gender in our society (Bartlett, 1994; Flanagan, 2008). If we desire to break down barriers associated with these social constructions, it would make sense to start with one of the most visible and identifiable markers of gender, our gender-typed appearance.

We also know that gender-typed appearance in childhood is associated with children’s gender-stereotyped cognitions. Studies have shown that wearing gender-typed clothing was associated with children’s gender-stereotypicality, how rigid they conceptualize the categories of gender, over time (Halim et al., 2013; Halim et al., 2014; Halim et al., 2016). One study found that children who believed gender to be important also dressed in stereotypical ways (Halim et al., 2014). A recent study found that simply having more knowledge and use of category labels (e.g., “girl”, “boy”, “lady”, etc.) was associated with dressing in gender-typed ways (Halim, Ruble, Tamis-LeMonda, Zosuls, & Walsh, under review). Knowledge of these categories has been tied to higher rates of gender-typed play in young children (Fagot & Leinbach, 1993; Weinraub et al., 1984; Zosuls et al., 2009, Zosuls et al., 2014), so it’s not surprising that there are similar findings with children’s gender-typed appearance.

This isn’t to say that children dressing in gender-stereotyped ways is necessarily a bad thing. Dressing in stereotypical ways is simply associated with conceptions of gender that are more stereotypical and rigid. These conceptions of social categories matter at a time when children are figuring out the limitations associated with each category (Martin et al., 2002). Removing gender-labels on clothing, or designing clothing targeted toward all children, helps to reduce these category-based limitations. Offering children gender-neutral clothing options may encourage children to think more flexibly about gender categories in person perception, and in the limitations, that come along with what boys and girls, men and women, are allowed to do in society. By expanding their wardrobe options, we may be expanding their minds.

~ Written by Abigail Walsh, M.A., M.Ed. 

References:

Bartlett, K. T. (1994). Only girls wear barrettes: Dress and appearance standards, community norms, and workplace equality. Michigan Law Review, 92, 2541-2582. doi:10.2307/1290002
Cahill, S. E. (1989). Fashioning males and females: Appearance management and the social reproduction of gender. Symbolic Interaction, 12, 281-298. doi:10.1525/si.1989.12.2.281
Clinton, L. M. (2015, July 10). The heartwarming reason Ellen DeGeneres has teamed up with the Gap for a new collaboration. Retrieved September 17, 2017, from https://www.glamour.com/story/ellen-degeneres-gapkids-ed
Fagot, B. I., & Leinbach, M. D. (1993). Gender role development in young children: From discrimination to labeling. Developmental Review, 13, 205-224. doi:10.1006/drev.1993.1009
Feinberg, R. A., Mataro, L., & Burroughs, W. J. (1992). Clothing and social identity. Clothing & Textiles Research Journal, 11, 18–23. doi:10.1177/0887302X9201100103
Flanagan, V. (2008). Into the closet: Cross-dressing and the gendered body in children’s literature and film. New York, NY: Routledge.
Freitas, A., Kaiser, S., Chandler, J. D., Hall, C. D., Kim, J. W., & Hammidi, T. (1997). Appearance management as border construction: Least favorite clothing, group distancing, and identity not!. Sociological Inquiry, 67, 323–335. doi:10.1111/j.1475-682X.1997.tb01099.x
Freitas, A., Kaiser, S., & Hammidi, T. (1996). Communities, commodities, cultural space, and style. Journal of Homosexuality, 31, 83–107.
Halim, M. L., Ruble, D., Tamis‐LeMonda, C., & Shrout, P. E. (2013). Rigidity in gender‐typed behaviors in early childhood: A longitudinal study of ethnic minority children. Child Development, 84, 1269-1284. doi:10.1111/cdev.12057
Halim, M. L., Ruble, D. N., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Zosuls, K. M., Lurye, L. E., & Greulich, F. K. (2014). The case of the Pink Frilly Dress and the avoidance of all things “girly”: Children’s appearance rigidity and cognitive theories of gender development. Developmental Psychology, 50, 1091-1101. doi:10.1037/a0034906.
Halim, M. L., Ruble, D. N., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Zosuls, K. M., Walsh, A. (under review). The roles of self-socialization and parent socialization in toddlers’ gender-typed appearance.
Halim, M. L., Zosuls, K. M., Ruble, D. N., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Baeg, A. S., Walsh, A. S., & Moy, K. H. (2016). Children’s dynamic gender identities across development and the influence of cognition, context, and culture. In C. S. Tamis-LeMonda & L. Balter (Eds.), Child Psychology: A Handbook of Contemporary Issues (3rd ed.) (pp. 193-218). New York, NY: Psychology Press/Taylor & Francis.
Hutson, D. J. (2010). Standing out/fitting in: Identity, appearance, and authenticity in gay and lesbian communities. Symbolic Interaction, 33, 213-233. doi:10.1525/si.2010.33.2.213
Levine, N., John Lewis gender neutral children’s clothes. (2017, September 5). Backlash Grows Over Retailer's Decision To De-Gender Its Kids Section. Retrieved September 17, 2017, from http://www.refinery29.com/2017/09/170901/john-lewis-gender-neutral-childrenswear
Martin, C. L., Ruble, D. N., & Szkrybalo, J. (2002). Cognitive theories of early gender development. Psychological Bulletin, 128, 903-933. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.128.6.903
Weinraub, M., Clemens, L. P., Sockloff, A., Ethridge, T., Gracely, E., & Myers, B. (1984). The development of sex role stereotypes in the third year: Relationships to gender labeling, gender identity, sex-typed toy preference, and family characteristics. Child Development, 55, 1493-1503. doi:10.2307/1130019
Whittaker, A. (2017, July11). Target ass a gender neutral kids collection after dropping Mossimmo and Merona. Retrieved September 17, 2017, from http://www.instyle.com/fashion/clothing/target-toca-boca-collection
Zosuls, K. M., Ruble, D. N., & Tamis-LeMonda, C. S. (2014). Self-socialization of gender in African American, Dominican immigrant, and Mexican immigrant toddlers. Child Development, 85, 2202-2217.
Zosuls, K. M., Ruble, D. N., Tamis-LeMonda, C. S., Shrout, P. E., Bornstein, M. H., Greulich, F. K. (2009). The acquisition of gender labels in infancy: Implications for gender-typed play. Developmental Psychology, 45, 688-701. doi:10.1037/a0014053
Zucker, K. J., Yoannidis, T., & Abramovitch, R. (2001). The relation between gender labeling and gender constancy in preschool children. Scandinavian Journal of Sexology, 4, 107-114.

Mrs. Trump: Victim, Bystander, or Accomplice//Colleen Kase, B.A.

Photo from: http://www.usmagazine.com

Thousands of think pieces have been dedicated to Melania Trump, wife of Donald Trump and First Lady of the United States. To conservatives, she is a straightforward beacon of beauty, poise, and traditional femininity, constantly bullied by the mainstream media. To many liberals, she is an as-yet-undiscovered victim, who is attempting to communicate her pleas for rescue through facial expressions, blinks, and Tweets, prompting the rise of the hashtag #FreeMelania on social media. Whether she is adored or pitied, these narratives commit the same error – they strip her of agency, intelligence, and ultimately, blame. They relegate her to the uncontroversial “pink ghetto” of First Lady-hood, and ignore her complicated history. Indeed, the most searched Melania-related terms include “pink dress,” “stilettos,” “fashion,” and “age.”

Melania herself seems more politically perceptive than either side gives her credit for. She steadfastly supported her husband’s racist claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States, even going on national television to defend it in 2011. She publicly supported him throughout the election, lending his campaign a patina of grace and respectability. This was particularly important after allegations of sexual assault against Donald Trump were made public in the fall of 2016, following the release of an audio recording in which he bragged about using his power to sexually assault women. Melania likened her husband to a teenage boy and dismissed the women’s allegations as lies orchestrated by the Democratic party to discredit him. Beyond these moments, she was complicit in every step of her husband’s racist, sexist, xenophobic, Islamophobic, homophobic, transphobic campaign. She made speeches in support of him and stood smilingly by his side, convincing voters that he could be trusted. Her support likely helped win over the 53% of White women who voted for him. And she has admitted that she hopes to profit off her high-profile position by launching a lifestyle brand, even suing media companies who she perceives as hurting her ability to do so. These are not the actions of pitiable victim or an apolitical wife, but of a savvy, fully autonomous political operator.

This makes her decision to launch an anti-bullying initiative as First Lady even more galling. She is correct that bullying, both in-person and online, is an important problem for today’s children and teens. However, I believe her silence and support as her husband bullied his way into the presidency disqualifies her from championing this cause. He publicly mocked a reporter with a disability, and Melania stood silent. He suggested that reporter Megyn Kelly treated him unfairly during a debate because she was menstruating, called a Latina contestant in his Miss Universe pageant “Miss Piggy” and “Miss Housekeeper,” called Mexicans “rapists,” and “criminals,” and banned immigrants from Muslim-majority countries from entering the US, and Melania said nothing. When he suggested that reporter Mika Brzezinski had had a facelift, Melania defended her husband as an equal-opportunity bully, saying “As you may know by now, when you attack him he will punch back 10 times harder. No matter who you are, a man or a woman, he treats everyone equal.” He banned transgender troops from serving in the military and welcomed the deeply homophobic Mike Pence into his administration, and Melania did not have the courage to defend LGBTQ+ youth, who are at the highest risk for bullying, parental rejection, and suicide. She enabled his vitriolic bullying towards marginalized groups at every turn, so she does not deserve to take on the mantle of anti-bullying champion, nor should she be excused as a victim. Melania is a making her own choices, and she should be held fully accountable for her hypocrisy.

~Written by: Colleen Kase, B.A.

http://nypost.com/2017/09/20/melania-touts-the-golden-rule-at-un-luncheon/
http://people.com/politics/melania-trump-anti-cyberbullying-advocate-defends-trump-twitter-attack/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/melania-trump-condemns-bullying--and-raises-some-eyebrows--in-her-first-un-speech/2017/09/20/9973d77a-9e1e-11e7-8ea1-ed975285475e_story.html?utm_term=.9cd524e7db10
http://fortune.com/2017/02/07/melania-trump-daily-mail-law-suit-flotus/
http://www.teenvogue.com/story/melania-trump-supported-her-husbands-racist-birtherism-claims-on-tv
http://www.marieclaire.com/politics/features/a27464/melania-trump-ivanka-trump-enable-donald/

Hashtags Chip Away at Menstruation Taboo//Annika Johnson

Photo from: www.helloclue.com

For centuries menstruation has been a longstanding taboo. Women have long felt uncomfortable and embarrassed to discuss their menstrual symptoms, often at the expense of their own health and well-being. While Menstruation is a healthy and normal bodily function, many people struggle to say the word “period” out loud without embarrassment. We are taught from a young age not to speak of our periods, not to acknowledge our bodies and our experiences; by censoring our language, we continue to promote fear and stigma regarding menstruation.

A survey conducted by Clue and the International Women’s Health Coalition revealed over 5000 euphemisms for the word “period”.  Within English speaking countries the most common were:

• Aunt Flow
• Time of the month
• On the rag
• Red tide/river/sea/moon
• Code Red
• Monthly visitor
• Mother nature
• Lady Time
• Crimson wave/tide
• Bloody Mary
• The blob
• Shark week
• Having painters in

Unfortunately, this taboo does not just exist in our social lives, but it also impacts what we are willing to discuss with our healthcare providers. Failing to share our menstrual symptoms with our healthcare providers can pose significant risks to our health. Menstruation taboo has also led to a significant lack of adequate research on menstruation, which is unacceptable when examining the high prevalence rates of conditions such as dysmenorrhea, endometriosis, polycystic ovary syndrome, and PMS.

However, it appears the “Red tides” are changing, and women are tired of trying to cleverly disguise such a normal and frequent event. Recently, Clue rolled out their “#Justsayperiod” campaign, which is aiming to eliminate period euphemisms. As they state on their blog, “If we can openly talk about these things, they won’t be such a big deal anymore. Words matter — they shape our feelings about our bodies and their place in the world.”  The hope at Clue is to shine a light on the way we talk about our periods, and to “Bring menstruation out of the shadows.” #Justsayperiod joins several other menstruation hashtags aimed to deconstruct the taboo, such as, #Menstruationmatters, #Periodproblems, #Tweetyourperiod, #Redsummer, and #Happytobleed. The use of such hashtags is a loud proclamation from women that we no longer feel the need to hide our menstrual experiences. As Rosa Pippas, founder of #Tweetyourperiod stated,

“Most of the world has to deal with it, so why should it remain hidden? Why should be we be forced to accommodate the disgust and fear of men? Why are we not being accommodated? The shame and silence of the period is just one pillar in the foundation of oppression women are trapped under.”

Seems like it’s time to start calling it what it really is, for the sake of women’s health- period.

~Written by Annika Johnson

Resources

https://www.bustle.com/articles/163946-the-tweet-your-period-red-summer-twitter-hashtags-are-destigmatizing-menstruation-and-its-a-much-needed

https://medium.com/clued-in/still-using-a-euphemism-for-menstruation-its-time-to-justsayperiod-b6a39bd55916

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/menstruation-study-finds-over-5000-slang-terms-for-period-a6905021.html

“Wanna Watch the Game?” // Maggie Brennan, M.A.

Photo by: Boiler Television Network

“Wanna watch the game? If anyone’s watching tomorrow let me know and we can watch together!” This request from a classmate was met by positive, albeit non-committal, responses from our friends. Football season had officially started. Some of us were excited about it and some of us were just excited about having an excuse to spend time together.  I found myself falling into both of those camps.  As I was thinking about it later, I kept coming back to one question - why don’t people ever offer to hang out and watch women’s sports?

The Women’s Sports Federation (W.S.F), based on the research of Sabo and Veliz, reports that by age fourteen, the age at which I stopped participating in sports, “girls are dropping out of sports at two times the rate of boys (2017).”  The W.S.F. provides a list of reasons for why girls quit organized sports at that age, with the primary motivator being lack of access.  “Girls have 1.3 million fewer opportunities to play high school sports than boys have,” which is the result of both reductions in physical education classes in schools and the smaller sizes of women’s sports teams in high schools, if teams for girls even exist (W.S.F., 2017).
   
The W.S.F. also cites the effects of social stigma as a major detriment to girls’ participation in athletics. Those stigmas are applied to athletic women at all levels of performance.  Not only are adolescent girls often derided for participation in athletics, including being subjected to bodyshaming (for being both too fit and not fit enough), but their sexuality and status as women is often called into question.  This is not only harmful to the recipient, but also perpetuates deeply entrenched homophobia and transphobia.  Even women who are considered to be the greatest in the history of their sport are subjected to this denigration, as was perfectly encapsulated in a response to J.K. Rowling’s celebratory tweet of Serena William’s victory at Wimbledon in 2015.

Credit: Tweet by @diegtristan8 

 In his tweet, @diegtristan8 not only diminishes the incredible effort and energy Serena Williams has devoted to her sport, but also plays into the stereotype that any athletic woman is actually just a man playing (pun intended) at being a woman.  In Serena Williams’ case, the implication that she is manlike is particularly egregious due to the centuries’ long history of robbing Black women of their sexuality, thereby depriving them of having the femininity afforded to White women, held to be the standard.  Olympic gymnasts Simone Biles and Aly Raisman also faced bodyshaming when pictures of themselves in bathing suits drew criticism of their abs.

Unfortunately the negative treatment of female athletes is not merely limited to attacks on their physical appearance, but also the diminishment of their athletic feats in comparison to those of their male counterparts.  A widely circulated image of a newspaper clipping about the 2016 Rio Olympics speaks perfectly to this phenomenon.

Credit: Taken from a tweet by @nancyleong

 Despite becoming the new “best in the world” in her event, Katie’s accomplishment was still deemed less important than the second-place finish of her male colleague.  Granted Michael Phelps is the most medalled swimmer in the history of the sport, and, as some have reasonably argued, his fame could be used to sell papers.  My issue with that argument, however, is that Michael Phelps wasn’t always famous.  He became famous by gaining attention from interested individuals and having his accomplishments celebrated by the media.  Female athletes are never going to be famous enough to “sell papers” if they aren’t given appropriate credit for their accomplishments.  The real danger of not celebrating the accomplishments of successful female athletes at the Olympic and professional levels is that it teaches adolescent girls they can be the best in the world, but their accomplishments will be overshadowed by a second-place man.
   
Going back to my original question, why don’t we as a society commune around women’s sporting events in the way we do men’s? It is evident the answer is multifaceted.  As they age, young women’s athletic opportunities decrease. At the same time, they are faced with increasingly sex-typed stereotypes related to athletics (Eccles, 2014). This not only leads many young girls to drop out of sports, but also to become disinterested in sports in general. Matched with the shaming and diminishing of the accomplishments of women athletes, women’s sports as a whole is robbed of some of its appeal.  Finally, and perhaps most insidious of all, if one has the desire to view women’s sports it can be incredibly challenging.  The WNBA does not show games on network television like the NBA does, the college women’s basketball tournament is largely, if not completely, overlooked during March Madness, and popular women’s sports like volleyball and softball don’t have professional leagues. This not only means they receive less attention, it also means that whenever college matches are shown on television they’re usually on one of the more exclusive ESPN channels.  Making them harder to view means less support, ad money, and interest in women’s athletics. This perpetuates the belief ingrained in our society that women’s sports just aren’t as important, or as the other excuse for not watching women’s sports goes, “as fun to watch.”

Now, I understand that I am as much to blame in perpetuating this cycle because this past week I didn’t watch Venus Williams have her most impressive showing in a decade, or watch Sloane Stephens and Madison Keys compete for the title at the American Open.  This past summer, I only begrudgingly sat with my mom as she watched Stanford’s volleyball team win the National Championship.  Despite my love of figure skating, I haven’t watched a single competition in years and have no idea who’s currently competitive in the U.S. field.  If I can, however, lend my eyes and implicit support to a three hour football game on Sunday, put on by a league that perpetuates an ideal of hyper- and often toxic masculinity (Thomas, 2016), then I should absolutely put my explicit support behind women’s athletics which have been shown in many cases to increase self-confidence and foster healthier body images (W.S.F., 2017).  I guess what I’m saying is, I’d love to watch the game with you, but only if The Girls are playing.

                                                                                                   ~Written by Maggie Brennan, M.A.

References

Do You Know the Factors Influencing Girls’ Participation in Sports? (2016). Women’s Sports  
        Foundation. retrieved from: https://www.womenssportsfoundation.org/support-us/do-you-    
        know-the-factors-influencing-girls-participation-in-sports/.
Eccles, J. S. (2014). Gender and achievement choices. In E. T. Gershoff, R. S. Mistry, & D. A.
          Crosby (Eds), Societal contexts of child development: Pathways of influence and
          implications for practice and policy (pp. 19-34).
Sabo, D. and Veliz, P. (2008). Girls drop-out at different rates depending on where they live. Go
         Out and Play: Youth Sports in America. East Meadow, NY: Women’s Sports Foundation.
Thomas, Kelsey. (2016). Personal Foul, unnecessary roughness: Throwing the flag at the NFL’s
         domestic violence problem. FEMPOP. retrieved from:
         http://fempopculture.blogspot.com/2016/11/personal-foul-unnecessary-roughness.html.