Resisting responsibilisation : a narrative-discursive analysis of young peoples' talk about high school sexualities and school sexuality education

Graham, Nicola Susan Jearey

Title: Resisting responsibilisation : a narrative-discursive analysis of young peoples' talk about high school sexualities and school sexuality education
Creator: Graham, Nicola Susan Jearey
Subject: Responsibility in adolescence
Subject: Language and sex -- South Africa
Subject: Teenagers -- Sexual behavior -- South Africa
Subject: Sex instruction -- South Africa
Subject: Sexual health -- Study and teaching -- South Africa
Subject: Sexual ethics
Date Issued: 2014
Date: 2014
Type: Thesis
Type: Masters
Type: MA
Identifier: vital:3230
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1013078
Description: The most widespread intervention in South Africa into the sexualities of young people is school based sexuality education. However there is a dearth of research in this area, and studies that have been conducted highlight major weaknesses with implementation. Research from Western countries indicates that the messages conveyed in sexuality education are resisted if they conflict with the desired sexual subjectivities of young people. This indicates a need for further research into desired youth sexualities, and school based sexuality education. While South African studies of young people‘s talk about sexualities have been conducted, there is a paucity of literature in this area from a discursive perspective. This study is situated within a feminist post-structuralist paradigm, utilising a performative-performance analytical approach which synthesises Butlerian theory with a narrative-discursive methodology. This approach enables an analysis of both the macro-discursive power webs within which sexualities are situated, and the micro-discursive activity through which sexual subject positions are constructed. I used this approach to analyse the talk of groups of students from a Further Education and Training College about the sexualities of High School learners and their own past sexuality education. Findings showed that that the most dominant discursive resources which were utilised to construct sexualities were societal sexual norms discourses. These foundational discourses constructed gendered sexualities of compulsory hyper-heterosex for men, and compulsory compliant girlfriendhood for women. Such gendered sexualities reinforced patriarchal and abusive gendered and sexual practices. Ways in which participants troubled the dominant gendered sexualities through the performance of alternative sexual positions were analysed, as these 'troubling' performances indicate mutable aspects of the normative gendered field. Participants drew on a discourse of disconnect when talking about their school sexuality education, and their parents‘ (lack of) communication with them about sex. This suggests that adultist attempts to construct a 'responsible' sexual subject position for young people are resisted when such a position is constructed in a non-relational manner. Collusion between the constructed gendered sexualities and the discourse of disconnect results in the un-performability of a 'responsible' sexual subject position. These findings were used to provide suggestions for enhancing school based sexuality interventions.
Format: 183 leaves
Format: pdf
Publisher: Rhodes University
Publisher: Faculty of Humanities, Psychology
Language: English
Rights: Graham, Nicola Susan Jearey

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Gender Action Forum (GENACT)

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SDG 05. Gender Equality

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