Pete's Tool: Identity and sex-play in the design and technology classroom

Abstract

ABSTRACT The paper explores the 'interactional work' of one boy in a technology lesson as he elaborates, through 'play' with workshop tools, a sexual fantasy of masturbation and penetration. This action is contextualised by his relations with others, and by the dominance of a prevailing myth of male sexuality in his construction of a masculine identity in the classroom. The role of the teacher in interpreting pedagogic style is considered. It is suggested that the dominance of hegemonic masculinity does not erase differences amongst boys; that it is 'taken up' differently by groups and individuals in the interplay of other cultural texts/discourses. It is suggested that viewing the work of identity as both a personal and a social project, in which individuals act distinctly and yet 'within pattern', provides a starting point for understanding the contingent but committed construction of heterosexual gender relations of domination.