Children's Acculturation and Gender Identity

I have a friend with two boys, five years apart in age. They are both rather well-adjusted, and completely different in nature. The younger of the two, currently six years old, in times of stress takes on a role rarely permitted to be seen in most homes, and even more rare in school settings where gender roles are reinforced with a multitude of examples where both adults and children guide an individual's choices toward the "right" one based on their genitals.

This boy, who visits my own home on occasion, comforts himself by nurturing a small baby doll. Though sometimes he refers to his baby as "she," he has informed me that his baby is a boy. He routinely comforts it, cradles it, and changes its clothes depending on the time of day (pajamas for bed, day clothes for going out). He will give it a pacifier when he thinks it is necessary.

When I agreed to babysit both boys for their parents' anniversary, I suggested he bring his baby. I knew he had been particularly emotionally raw of late, and had been carrying around my friend's house for a few days previous. He was delighted, and we even talked about how to make a sling so that if he wanted to carry his baby around hands-free, he could do so without worry. The morning after spending the night, he came down, and I asked him if he'd changed, and he said he had. Then I asked if he'd changed his baby, and he ran upstairs to make certain that the pajamas were exchanged for day clothes.

The level of care and nurturing he takes for his baby is unprecedented to me as a parent who's visited many preschools, daycares, and elementary schools. Literature on gender roles that assumes that such things are "natural" have never spent time in a daycare for toddlers where the teachers will remove certain toys from a boy's hands and give them something "more appropriate."

This is acculturation at work, neither good, nor bad. How else are children to learn societal norms and what is expected of them? However, we as participants in culture-making can choose to make different choices as my friends have.

Then again, our children may decide that our assumptions and culture don't work for them anymore. Take, for example, this blog post by Babeland about children bending the gender rules of Disney fairies. Children who use the web site circumvented the gender assumptions made by the company that only allowed for the creation of female fairies within the game by making their characters taller, more slender, and giving them shorter hair styles and androgynous names.

The company, recognizing that there was a demand for male characters within the game, created them, but out of some fear of referring to boys as "fairies" calls them "sparrow men," as though they were a race unto themselves. This not only speaks to an assumption of the roles males "should" play in our society, but also a fear of anything feminine being displayed within young men that might be construed as homosexual in nature. Given the derogatory nature of the word "fairy," I'm surprised that they did not use this opportunity to return its original meaning to those who wish to use it.