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Assignment 5

C.J. Pascoe’s illustrates how students, teachers and the school administration play an intricate role to the cultural meanings of gender and sexuality at River High. Almost, fifty percent of River High’s student population is white and this also plays a role in why the administration and teachers reinforce a negative and masculine image of sexuality. School activities, rituals, curriculum, and administrative discipline all help to foster a homophobic environment and promote a heterosexual one instead.

Pascoe begins Chapter 1 with River High’s ritual activity called Mr. Cougar. This is a competition between six male senior students who want to get gets crowned Mr. Cougar. Mr. Cougar represents the top male senior. The top student gets crowned Mr. Cougar, after preforming a skit mocking and dressing up as a “nerd”. This event is allowed to take place by the administration and by the teachers. Moreover, the student’s mother is invited to cheer him on, further reinforcing that to be masculine you must be strong and not inferior. In the “nerd “ skit the senior talks with a feminine voice and the entire student body cheers him on. The students’ applause further confirms their definition of what it means to be masculine. The “nerds’ are depicted as weak and cannot save their girlfriends. The skits showed that by being strong and having muscles that was the true meaning of being a heterosexual man and the true meaning of being the top Senior at River High. Moreover, the skits also depict black males with an equally negative image as the “nerds”. They are labeled as “gangstas”. In the skits, the black males kidnapped the girlfriends. It is the white males that come to rescue them.

Pascoe argues that gender evolves through a repetitive process and that leads to categorizing individuals. He illustrates that because identity is being explored during the teenage years, these school events like the Mr. Cougar skit, negatively promote strong, muscular males as being the meaning of a masculine heterosexual male. That image is glorified through the students’ cheers, through the administration’s policy to conduct such an event and by the parents who attend these events and applaud their child’s performance.