The Two Cultures of Childhood

From: Haley

            Gender Socialization is a huge topic in today’s society that is consistently discussed world-wide. What sparked my interest and made me decide on my photograph was the extreme difference in the qualities and characteristics given to boys by people when asked, versus the qualities and characteristics that would be given to girls. I chose five individual creative techniques when setting up my photograph which are symbolism, color, background, camera angle, and framing space. I chose to set up my photograph on a downward camera angle because when a male individual is struggling emotionally, mentally, and even physically in life it is highly frowned upon and looked down on in society, but not at all for girls. When girls are seen struggling with their mental and psychical health, they are given endless support and people to reach out to because it is ‘apart of being a girl’. The background of my photo is the phrases and characteristics on the mirror that are color-coded symbolisms on what is expected of a boy growing into a man in today’s society. For example, being tough, working out, or having your peers respect is a key to being a ‘real man’. “Psychological health” is one of the ones crossed out in red because it is looked down on to care about or be in society. I chose red because it is a color associated with anger, violence, and hate. And although, psychological health is not cared about in men and little boys aren’t raised to care about it either, it can lead to the extremity of anger, violence, mental illness, and hate growing up. Girls are taught the complete opposite by making sure they’re happy with themselves because ‘you can’t be a good mother, wife, or daughter if you’re not emotionally or mentally there’. Next, I wrote all of the words and phrases in black because black is associated with darkness and all of the characteristics and qualities are just a handful of the morals and codes boys are raised by that very dark, twisted, and blatantly wrong. Meanwhile, girls are raised by brightness and vibrance with constantly being pushed to express every single emotion they’ve ever felt in their entire life, or letting their husband support them with his well-paying job, or even taking people’s crap because ‘it’s the right and lady like thing to do’. “The Two Cultures of Childhood” reading adequately explains how a child’s environment and socialization with society creates this defined two cultured gender type behavior between girls and boys. For example, “Gender schemas associate maleness and femaleness with myriad different attributes, behaviors, and objects, defining masculine as rougher, tougher, and more active and feminine as nicer, softer, and more passive” (Rudman, 60). Last but not least, I used the male in my photo for framing space and made him smaller than the rest of the picture. I did this because all of the weight from the phrases and characteristics on the mirror eventually adds up and makes these boys feel so small with a huge weight on their shoulders in this cruel world. The two different gender cultures in todays society is a very real thing and it need to be put to an end.

Works Cited

Rudman, Laurie A., et al. "The Two Cultures of Childhood." The Social Psychology of

Gender: How Power and Intimacy Shape Gender Relations. The Guilford Press, 2015, 59-63.