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The resources and strategies that 10-11 year old boys use to construct masculinities
in the school setting

Jon Swain

Abstract

The data in this paper comes from an ethnographic exploration into the construction of
masculinities in three junior schools in the UK between 1998 and 1999. I argue that the
construction and performance of masculinity is inextricably linked to the acquisition of
status within the school peer group, and I delineate the specific series of resources and
strategies that the boys draw on and use in each setting to achieve this. The different
meanings and practices at each school, and the different array of resources available,
means that there are a different set of options and/or opportunities within each school
setting to do boy, and I classify these as being either open (possible), restricted (more
difficult), or closed (almost impossible). The principal and most esteemed resource used
by the boys was physicality and athleticism, and I highlight the link between masculinity
and the body.

Introduction

Within the last ten years or so, the study of masculinity has become a rapidly growing
field, and the school has become recognised as one of the salient sites where
masculinities are constructed and formed. Although many of the explorations have
concerned boys in secondary schooling, there have been an increasing number of studies
and reviews set in the primary/junior school containing children aged 7-11 (see, for
example, Thorne, 1993; Skelton, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2001; Renold, 1997, 1999, 2000,
2001; Warren, 1997; Adler and Adler, 1998; Benjamin, 1998; Epstein, 1998, 2001;

Francis, 1998, 2000; Gilbert & Gilbert, 1998; Swain, 2000, 2002a, 2000b). These texts
show how masculinities suffuse school regimes, and have established that there is
diversity not just between settings, but also within settings.

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