Abstract
Few studies have examined how groups of individuals enact different patterns of gender relations within and across contexts. In this article, I draw upon nine months of fieldwork and 15 semistructured interviews conducted with eight- to 10-year-old swimmers on a co-ed youth swim team. During focused aspects of swim practice, gender was less salient and structural mechanisms encouraged athletes to interact in ways that illuminated girls’ and boys’ similar athletic abilities, undermining categorical, essentialist, and hierarchical gender beliefs pertaining to athleticism. However, in the swimmers’ unfocused free time, the salience of gender was high and structural mechanisms encouraged swimmers to engage in “borderwork.” In this context, similarities between the genders were obscured and girls and boys instead interacted in ways that affirmed essentialist and categorical—but nonhierarchical—meanings of gender. By paying attention to structural mechanisms and the variable salience of gender, we can thus see the various conditions under which children deploy different patterns of gender relations, and how less oppressive gender relations can potentially “spill over” from one context to the next.
Although it is only eight o’clock in the morning, the swimming pool at the Sun Valley Aquatics Center is bustling with activity. 1 It is a warm, sunny day in southern California, and 300 kids are participating in a Sun Valley Swim Team (SVST) swim meet. Girls and boys as young as five years old rummage through their swim bags, grabbing goggles and swim caps as they walk toward the starting blocks. Between races, swimmers slather their arms with waterproof sunblock, laugh with their friends, and offer each other bites of half-eaten bagels. To my right, three 11-year-old boys, Alex, Kevin, and Andrew, are sitting in a semicircle, scrutinizing a “heat sheet” that lists the names of other boys and girls they are racing against in their upcoming events. 2 Alex notices he is the only boy in his race, sparking the following conversation:
They’re all girls! That’s sad.
That must suck.
I know her [points to a name on the paper]. You’re the only male! Have fun! You have the second-fastest time—she’s first, you’re second.
What’s her time?
[Sophia’s] really fast. She was in Sharks.
Andrew flips the page, and the boys continue looking at their other events.
Throughout their conversation, Alex, Kevin, and Andrew draw upon multiple and contradictory meanings of gender. Although they agree that it “sucks” to be the “only male” in an “all girls” event, the boys then discuss Sophia’s athleticism in a relatively unremarkable manner. Instead of teasing Alex for being slower than a girl, Andrew nonchalantly informs Alex that Sophia is “really fast,” something neither Alex nor Kevin contests. How was it possible for gender to simultaneously be of minimal and significant interest to the swimmers?
Because gender is a social structure that is embedded within individual, interactional, and institutional relations, social change toward gender equality is uneven across the gender order (Connell 1987, 2009; Lorber 1994; Martin 2004; Risman 2004). The salience of gender varies across contexts, allowing some contexts to support more equitable patterns of gender relations than others (Britton 2000; Connell 1987; Deutsch 2007; Schippers 2002; Thorne 1993). Within a context, both structural mechanisms and hegemonic beliefs play an important role in determining whether individuals draw on and affirm group boundaries between the genders—what Thorne (1993) calls “borderwork” (see also Messner 2000; Morgan and Martin 2006; Ridgeway 2009; Ridgeway and Correll 2004). Although scholars have theorized that alternative patterns of gender relations may shape social relations when gender is less salient (Britton 2000; Connell 1987; Deutsch 2007; Ridgeway 2009; Schippers 2007), few empirical studies have followed a group of individuals across different contexts to understand how gender relations and meanings may change. As the dialogue among the boys on the swim team suggests, because individuals negotiate different systems of accountability as they move from one setting to the next, gender can take on multiple meanings as a result of contextually specific, group-based interactions.
In what follows, I analyze nine months of participant observation research and 15 semistructured interviews conducted with eight- to 10-year-old swimmers at SVST. I build upon scholarship that examines the contextual salience of gender (Britton 2000; Deutsch 2007; Messner 2000; Morgan and Martin 2006; Thorne 1993; Ridgeway 2009; Ridgeway and Correll 2004), arguing that the variable salience of gender played an important role in shaping the meanings swimmers associated with gender within and across different contexts at the pool. To do so, I outline the “gender geography,” or the divisions of space and activity between girls and boys (Thorne 1993), within two contexts at the pool: focused situations when swimmers followed their coach’s instructions, and unfocused free time when swimmers had fun with their friends. Within the most focused aspects of practice, gender was less salient and structural mechanisms encouraged the swimmers to interact in ways that undermined hegemonic patterns of gender relations. When the swimmers hung out with their friends before and after practices, however, gender was highly salient and the swimmers engaged in borderwork. In this context, similarities between the genders were obscured and the swimmers affirmed categorical and essentialist—but nonhierarchical—meanings of gender. Because the swimmers associated nonhierarchical meanings with gender across both contexts, I conclude by considering whether more equitable gender meanings and relations can potentially “spill over” from one context to another.
The Variable Salience of Gender Across Contexts
Existing scholarship has identified specific structural mechanisms, such as formal and informal policies and practices, within an array of institutions that help explain how gender becomes a salient organizing principle in interactions (Messner 2000; Thorne 1993). In schools, the formal age separation and large number of students encourages boys and girls to engage in borderwork (Thorne 1993). At the same time, teachers can implement rules and seating charts that allow children to interact in “relaxed and non-gender-marked ways” (Thorne 1993, 64; see also Moore 2001). Similarly, bureaucratic policies reduce the amount of discrimination women experience within office workplaces (Morgan and Martin 2006; Ridgeway and Correll 2000). Yet the organization of many out-of-office business settings—such as having different tees for men and women on golf courses—continues to hold women professionals accountable to normative conceptualizations of gender (Morgan and Martin 2006).
In addition to structural mechanisms, hegemonic cultural beliefs also impact the salience of gender within interactions (Ridgeway and Correll 2000, 2004; Ridgeway 2009, 2011). Although the “default expectation” (Ridgeway and Correll 2004, 513) may be to treat individuals in accordance with hegemonic beliefs, these beliefs can be less salient within interactions depending on a context’s gender composition, gender-typing, and institutional frame (Ridgeway and Correll 2004; Ridgeway 2009, 2011). However, even when structural mechanisms allow for less oppressive gender relations within some contexts, individuals often “implicitly fall back on cultural beliefs about gender” in new and unscripted settings (Ridgeway 2009, 156), thus reinscribing hegemonic patterns of gender relations.
Although individuals are often framed by hegemonic patterns of gender relations within interactions, interactions can also be framed by less oppressive patterns of gender relations and meanings (Deutsch 2007; Hollander 2013; Ridgeway 2009; Ridgeway and Correll 2000, 2004; Schippers 2007). However, the processes that allow individuals to enact alternative patterns of gender relations remain undertheorized within existing scholarship (for exceptions, see Finley 2010; Hollander 2013; Schippers 2002; Wilkins 2008). As sociologists have argued, there is not always a direct relationship between the cultural order and the meanings individuals associate with cultural representations (Connell 1987; Eliasoph and Lichterman 2003; Fine 1979; Swidler 1986). Instead, hegemonic meanings are negotiated and contested within group-based interactions (Eliasoph and Lichterman 2003). When applied to gender theory, the meanings people associate with gender may vary, perhaps dramatically, across contexts depending on whether gender is a salient organizing principle within group-based relations. Furthermore, if a context allows for nonhegemonic patterns of gender relations, perhaps aspects of the more egalitarian patterns of social relations can transfer across contexts (Hollander 2013).
Competitive youth swimming is an ideal setting to examine how gender boundaries and meanings are constructed and negotiated within everyday life (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000). Within the United States, sport has historically played a visible role in naturalizing hierarchical, categorical, and essentialist differences between the genders (Kimmel 1996; Lorber 1994; Messner 2011). Because the institutional “center” of sport often affirms hegemonic masculinity (Messner 2002), girls’ and boys’ interactions within athletic contexts often help strengthen hierarchical and categorical group boundaries between the genders, thus maintaining the power, prestige, and resources boys have over girls (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000; Thorne 1993). Yet at the same time, research finds that girls’ and women’s athleticism is becoming normalized (Ezzell 2009; Heywood and Dworkin 2003; Messner 2011), potentially calling into question hegemonic gender meanings pertaining to athleticism (Kane 1995; Messner 2002). Since it may be easier for individuals to enact alternative patterns of gender relations within contexts that are considered feminine (Finley 2010), the enactment of alternative patterns of gender relations may be especially apparent within competitive youth swimming, a sport that has historically been considered acceptable for white, middle-class girls to participate in (Bier 2011; Cahn 1994).
In this article, I follow a group of eight- to 10-year-old swimmers across different contexts at swim practices, asking: Do the meanings swimmers associate with gender vary as a result of their contextually specific, group-based interactions? If so, what are the conditions that allow swimmers to associate alternative cultural meanings with gender? To answer these questions, I outline the “gender geography” of swimmers’ gender relations within two main contexts, arguing that when gender was less salient and children could “see” athletic similarity between the genders, children interacted in ways that undermined hegemonic beliefs about gender. Yet when the salience of gender was high and structural mechanisms encouraged kids to engage in borderwork, swimmers affirmed beliefs in essentialist and categorical—but nonhierarchical—differences between the genders. By paying attention to structural mechanisms and the variable salience of gender, we can thus see whether and how children associate different meanings with gender across contexts. Furthermore, because the swimmers enacted nonhierarchical gender relations in both contexts, this article contributes to gender theory by introducing the concept of “spillover,” theorizing that aspects of less oppressive gender relations may transfer across contexts.
Methods
From November 2011 to August 2012, I conducted participant observation research with the Sun Valley Swim Team (SVST), a competitive youth swim team in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. Among girls and boys under the age of 10, athletes were separated into three groups based on ability: Dolphins, Piranhas, and Sharks. Given the close link between athleticism and boys’ social status, boys who excel in sports often have much at stake in preserving hegemonic patterns of gender relations (Adler and Adler 1998; McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 1992; Thorne 1993). Consequently, I chose to study the Sharks group—composed of the fastest “10 and under” swimmers on the team—in order to witness the ways that kids construct and negotiate gender boundaries.
About twice a month, Sharks swimmers attended weekend swim meets, and SVST placed in the top five at several regional and statewide swim meets during the 2011-2012 swimming season. 3 Throughout the nine months I spent at the pool, the Sharks group was composed of 16 girls and six boys. Seven of the girls were white, six were Asian, one was Latina, and two were multiracial (identifying as Asian and white). Three of the boys were white, one was Latino, and two were multiracial (identifying as Asian and white). With the exception of one eight-year-old girl, all the athletes in the Sharks group were nine or 10 years old. The swimmers were from predominately middle- and upper-middle-class backgrounds, and Elizabeth—a white, middle-class former Olympic swimmer in her mid-30s—coached the group.
At the pool, I spent my time before and after practices “hanging out” with swimmers, approaching fieldwork from the assumption that children actively negotiate and challenge adult-generated knowledge and values within their peer groups (Corsaro 2003; Prout and James 1997; Thorne 1993). To gain access to the kids’ peer groups, I distanced myself from adult authority figures, like the swimmers’ coaches, during research. I helped establish rapport by talking with the swimmers about my own experiences in competitive youth swimming and collegiate athletics. As the swimmers became more comfortable with my presence, many of the athletes began to break team rules and discuss “taboo” topics around me. Once, for example, several of the Sharks boys told me about watching a “puberty video” in school. While observing events that transpired before, during, and after swim practices, I made mental and brief written notes, which I developed into field notes after returning home from the pool (Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw 1995).
Between May and July 2012, I conducted 15 semistructured interviews with Sharks swimmers, six boys and nine girls. Three of the boys I interviewed were white, one was Latino, and two were multiracial (identifying as Asian and white). Five of the girls I interviewed were white, three were Asian, and one was multiracial (identifying as Asian and white). I interviewed all but one of the swimmers at the pool before or after swim practices, and swimmers chose between completing the interview alone or with a friend. Cody, Jon, and Elijah completed the interview together, as did two girls, Molly and Zoe. Brady’s interview became a group interview when his best friend Nick—who had previously been interviewed—started talking with Brady. Because Brady became more animated with Nick, Nick participated in the remainder of Brady’s interview. During interviews, I asked swimmers the same general questions about various aspects of swim practice, their involvement in other extracurricular activities, and what they enjoyed the most and the least about swimming. Because of the athletes’ age, the interviews were brief, ranging from 25 to 60 minutes. Fourteen of the interviews were recorded and transcribed. 4
Field notes and interview transcripts were read numerous times and coded according to key themes that inductively emerged during fieldwork (Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw 1995; Glaser and Strauss 1967). There is reason to believe, however, that my social location as a white, middle-class woman influenced the themes that developed throughout this project. As I outline in the findings section of this article, the swimmers at SVST drew on and reinforced gender boundaries much more frequently than racial or class boundaries. Because of my own childhood experiences in middle-class extracurricular activities like youth sports (Lareau 2003), I may have been desensitized to some of the class-based aspects of the swimmers’ day-to-day experiences and the colorblindness present within their racial ideologies (Bonilla-Silva 2010; Perry 2002; Wilkins 2008). It is also possible that the Asian and Latina/o swimmers may not have felt comfortable openly discussing racial issues with a white researcher.
Although I remained cognizant of the ways that my class and race privilege may have influenced my research, I used my socioeconomic status and whiteness to my advantage when conducting fieldwork. The fact that I shared a class background with the swimmers and previously participated in competitive swimming helped minimize age-related power dynamics between the young swimmers and me. Additionally, because my speech patterns and presentation of self closely aligned with the metacommunicative routines at the pool—which were implicitly based on white, middle-class styles, values, and demeanor (Cooky and McDonald 2005)—I was able to minimize the scrutiny I faced from gatekeepers, such as parents and coaches, which allowed me to study the team in a relatively unobtrusive manner.
The “Gender Geography” of Sun Valley Swim Team
On my first day of research with SVST, Coach Elizabeth started Sharks swim practice with a team meeting. The day before, she explained, she had to “excuse” the athletes from practice early for misbehaving—something she had not done to a group of swimmers in more than three years. While solemnly addressing the swimmers, Elizabeth reminded the athletes that they were the fastest swimmers in their age category; she thus expected more from them than if they were in the Dolphins or Piranhas groups. Elizabeth told the swimmers that while they were at swim practices, “There are a time to listen and a time for fun.” When it was “time to listen,” Elizabeth stressed that the swimmers should pay attention, remain focused, and follow her instructions. By doing so, they would achieve their goals of becoming faster swimmers.
As Elizabeth’s speech suggests, there were two main contexts that organized swimmers’ relations at the pool: focused athletic contexts in which swimmers were expected to follow their coach’s instructions, and unfocused free time in which swimmers had fun with their friends. As summarized in Figure 1, the variable salience of gender at the pool played an important role in shaping the different meanings swimmers associated with gender within and across these contexts. As a result of the structural mechanisms instituted by Coach Elizabeth during focused aspects of practice, gender was less salient in this context, and the swimmers interacted in nonantagonistic ways. While doing so, the swimmers regularly witnessed athletic parity between the genders and associated alternative, nonhegemonic meanings pertaining to athleticism. Because the gender meanings changed across contexts at the pool, however, gender was highly salient during the swimmers’ free time. Structural mechanisms instead encouraged the kids to engage in borderwork in this context. Because swimmers tended to interact in antagonistic ways in their free time, similarities between the genders were less visible, ultimately encouraging the swimmers to associate gender with categoricalism and essentialism.
The “Gender Geography” of Sun Valley Swim Team
Racing “For Times”: Focused Aspects of Practice
The most focused aspects of Sharks swim practices occurred when athletes raced “for times.” While racing “for times,” athletes swam a distance, such as 50 or 100 yards, as fast as they could—like they did during formal competitions. Afterwards, the athletes calculated how fast they swam the interval and reported their times to Coach Elizabeth. In interviews, athletes described racing “for times” as having “to sprint and go as fast as you can” while trying “to get the same time [as] in the [swim] meet.” Zoe, a nine-year-old Asian girl, told me that during these workouts, she compares herself to Olympians like Michael Phelps and Natalie Coughlin, reminding herself, “If you were one of them, you wouldn’t be able to stop, so just try to push through it and work hard and think of something else besides how hard it is.” As Zoe’s strategy suggests, racing “for times” was not a time to goof around. Instead, in this context, swimmers were expected to work hard, swim fast, and push themselves when tired.
During these workouts, Elizabeth often organized swimmers into groups according to their athletic ability. While assigning the swimmers to lanes, Elizabeth either instructed the fastest athletes to share a lane or assigned several fast swimmers to each lane. To motivate the athletes, Elizabeth often encouraged the swimmers to race the swimmers next to them, catch the swimmers in front of them, and compare times with other swimmers in their lanes. Because the girls and boys had relatively equal athletic abilities, racing for times was a context where swimmers of both genders regularly trained and raced together. The following example is representative of the swimmers’ interactions while racing for times: The kids are swimming 200-yard Individual Medleys [IMs] for times. Sophia (10, multiracial), Jon (10, multiracial), and Nick (9, multiracial) are each leading their respective lanes. The swimmers finish in the following order: Sophia, Nick, Jon, Allison (9, white), Lesley (10, white), Cody (9, white), and Joanna (9, Latina). After asking each of the athletes for their times, Elizabeth says, “Lesley, come over here and go second.” She points to the lane that Jon and Cody are in, indicating that Lesley will go after Jon and before Cody. On the next 200-yard IM, as the athletes push off the wall, Elizabeth reminds them to try to catch the person swimming in front of them and to race the people swimming in the lanes next to them. Halfway through the 200, Sophia looks to the side, gauging where she is in relation to Nick and Jon. Sophia swims the 200-yard IM in 2 minutes and 36 seconds [2:36], Nick swims a 2:43, and Jon a 2:45. Elizabeth calls out their times as they touch the wall. Before starting the next 200, Elizabeth tells Nick and Jon, “Boys, faster on the first hundred. Don’t let Sophia get so far in front of you.” Nick looks up at Elizabeth and nods.
As evidenced by this example, during focused aspects of practice, Coach Elizabeth organized lanes based on athletes’ fastest times, not gender. While following Elizabeth’s instructions to race other swimmers, Nick and Jon compared themselves to Sophia—a girl. After hearing Lesley’s time on the first 200-yard Individual Medley, Elizabeth instructed Lesley to swim with faster swimmers—both were boys. Instances where the girls and boys compared times and raced each other occurred regularly in this context.
As previous scholarship has argued, gender is often highly salient when kids engage in mixed-gender competitions—especially within athletic contexts (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000; Moore 2001; Thorne 1993). While racing “for times,” Sophia could have teased Nick and Jon for losing to “a girl,” or Jon could have told Lesley that “girls suck” at swimming. However, when coaches or athletes directly compared girls’ and boys’ performances during SVST practices, I never heard athletes use these comparisons as an opportunity to evoke antagonistic interactions. Instead, similar to how teachers can encourage boys and girls to interact in relaxed, nonantagonistic ways by dividing students by reading abilities instead of gender (Thorne 1993), the informal policies instituted by Coach Elizabeth minimized the salience of gender within this context. The swimmers were instructed to complete tasks with specific goals (Moore 2001; Ridgeway 2011), allowing the girls and boys to interact in ways that did not affirm group boundaries between the genders.
“It’s Just, Like, the Same Thing”: Alternative Meanings of Gender
Because gender was less salient during focused aspects of Sharks swim practices, the swimmers interacted in ways that allowed them to associate alternative meanings with gender. This became clear when the athletes discussed instances they raced against swimmers of the other gender. Without nervously giggling or averting his eyes, Jon talked about getting “killed” by Sophia when they swam breaststroke. Cody leaned back and shrugged as he told me, “It doesn’t matter . . . it’s just, like, the same thing” if he loses to a girl or a boy. When asked who he races during practices, Nick spontaneously compared his times to Sophia’s: When Brady (11, white) was in the group I always raced against him. Now that he’s gone the only one left is Sophia. Which, 200 IMs, no question, she’s gonna win because my breaststroke sucks. Butterfly . . . I’ll usually [win]—well, most of the time. Backstroke, it’s a 50-50 game, and freestyle, 50-50. Breaststroke, no doubt she’s in front.
Without a hint of defensiveness about losing to a girl, Nick made detailed comparisons between himself and Sophia. Even in butterfly, his fastest stroke, Nick recognized that he wins only “most of the time.” Although boys often have much at stake in maintaining hierarchical and categorical differences between the genders (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Thorne 1993), at SVST the boys instead associated alternative meanings with gender while talking about racing “for times,” where athleticism was not associated with hierarchy or difference.
The girls also talked about racing “for times” in ways that suggested they were not inferior or fundamentally different athletes because of their gender. Chelsea, a 10-year-old Asian girl, told me that boys are “not always faster [in swimming], sometimes they can be slower.” Similarly, Anna, a 10-year-old white girl, discussed a race she lost to Elijah, a 10-year-old white boy. Instead of justifying defeat by saying that boys are always faster than girls, Anna identified a specific reason why she lost. She explained that when she dove into the water, “I [dove] to the side. It was not a good dive.” Even Wendy, a nine-year-old white girl—one of the slowest athletes in the group—told me that because Sophia is as fast as Nick, there was “not really” a difference between the girls’ and boys’ swimming abilities.
There are two reasons Sharks swim practices were an ideal context for swimmers to enact nonhegemonic patterns of gender relations pertaining to athleticism. First, the Sharks swimmers were the fastest group of “ten and under” swimmers on the team, and highly committed to athletics. Many of the Sharks swimmers told me they attended practice to “get better times” or to “get better” at swimming. Several of the boys and girls expressed a desire to swim in the Olympics one day, and Grace, a 10-year-old white girl, even chose to attend swim practice instead of her best friend’s birthday party. Because of the athletes’ commitment, the majority of swimmers willingly followed Elizabeth’s instructions—even if it meant sharing lanes with swimmers of the other gender. Swimmers in the other “10 and under” groups on the team, however, did not always follow their coaches’ instructions as readily. I occasionally noticed girls and boys in the Dolphins and Piranhas group make faces and shriek when instructed to share lanes with swimmers of the other gender—something Sharks swimmers never did while racing “for times.” As a result of the Sharks swimmers’ commitment to athleticism, acting in accordance with the structural mechanisms instituted by Elizabeth likely mattered more than it did to other “10 and under” athletes.
Additionally, while following Elizabeth’s instructions to share lanes and race one another, the swimmers compared times, a relatively transparent measure of ability. If the athletes were playing a team sport like basketball or soccer, where athleticism is assessed through less quantifiable skills, such as dribbling or blocking ability, it may have been easier for the boys to marginalize or masculinize the girls’ abilities (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Thorne 1993). Indeed, during interviews, several of the girls and boys discussed instances during recess and physical education classes when boys invoked hierarchical and categorical notions of gender while playing team sports, such as when they refused to play with girls or became upset after losing to girls. During Sharks swim practices, however, the swimmers were frequently provided with specific, quantifiable instances of girls beating boys and boys beating girls. Through these time-based comparisons, it became clear that the girls’ and boys’ abilities overlapped (Kane 1995). As a result, within a context where swimmers willingly interacted in ways that illuminated similarities between the genders, girls and boys associated nonhegemonic meanings with gender.
Having Fun with Friends: Unsupervised Free Time
The least focused aspects of swimming occurred during the swimmers’ free time. Sharks swimmers were never completely unsupervised on the pool deck, but there were times—such as before swim practices or between races at swim meets—when SVST coaches were busy coaching other swimmers. As opposed to focused aspects of practice, which were “hard” and “tiring,” unsupervised free time was a chance for the kids to have fun with their friends. David, a 10-year-old Latino boy, explained that before and after swim practice, he and his friends had “lots of fun together.” Grace told me, “It’s always fun to come here and see [my friends],” and Chelsea similarly said that she had “fun” while “hanging out” with her friends before practices.
The unsupervised aspect of the swimmers’ free time played an important role in shaping kids’ social interactions with their friends. At the pool, I did not observe patterns of age and racial separation that other scholars have observed among children in schools and summer camps (Lewis 2003; Moore 2001; Perry 2002). In interviews, furthermore, most of the swimmers had a difficult time naming their closest friends on the team, explaining that they were close friends with “everyone” and had “a lot of good friends [on the team].” Despite the ostensive unity among the swimmers, none of the swimmers reported being friends with kids of the other gender. For example, Nick, a multiracial nine-year-old, named every male swimmer and male coach he could think of when describing his “good friends”:
Who are some of your good friends on the team?
Let’s see, we have . . . Brady (11, white)! It’s gonna be a very long, very, very, long list. So beware. Let’s see, we have Coach Tom (mid-20s, white)!
He’s one of your friends?
Yeah, we often chat a lot. I have Coach Brad (mid-30s, white), Jayden . . . um . . . Jon (10, multiracial), Andrew (11, Latino), David (10, Latino), Cody (nine, white), Justin (11, white), Derrick (10, white), Dominick (10, white) . . . well, he used to be on the swim team. Let’s see, we have . . . Samantha—my sister (eight, multiracial), although she can be very annoying at some times. . . . Let’s see . . . um . . . one of the people who works in the café, he gives me a lot of free samples. And he once let me get a discount, so that’s pretty good. Zach (11, white) . . . did I say Caleb (11, white)?
Nick’s “good friends” range from boys in the Sharks group to one of the men who worked at the pool’s café. Like other swimmers in the Sharks group, moreover, Nick developed friendships across racial and age categories. Although the requirements for being Nick’s friend are not particularly stringent—you simply needed to “chat a lot” or give him a discount on food—the only girl he mentions is his sister, who can be “very annoying.” This is striking because Nick’s parents were good friends with the parents of Chelsea, a girl in the Sharks group. On several different occasions, Nick talked about going fishing with Chelsea’s family and having her family over for barbecues. Once, he even told me he dreamed about raiding her family’s food pantry. Based on Nick’s criteria, Chelsea should count as a friend. However, when I asked Nick if he ever “hangs out” with Chelsea, he simply responded, “No.” When asked to elaborate, he explained, “I don’t hang out with girls.”
As Nick’s comments suggest, gender was a highly salient category that structured kids’ friendships during their free time. Among swimmers in the Sharks group, this gender separation was marked with extensive physical separation. After changing into their swimsuits in sex-segregated locker rooms, the girls would set their swim bags near the right end of the bleachers that lined the length of the pool. The boys would walk past the girls, often without even glancing in their direction, to the far end of the benches, placing their bags almost 50 meters from the girls’ space.
There were three reasons why gender became a highly salient organizing principle within the kids’ group-based relations during unsupervised free time. First, as opposed to when Coach Elizabeth instructed the girls and boys to share lanes and compare times, in unsupervised aspects of practices, no policies encouraged the boys and girls to interact. Because the swimmers’ unsupervised free time was not formally scripted, the kids relied on gender as a highly salient criterion when developing friendships (Ridgeway 2011). Furthermore, similar to how formal gender segregation on soccer teams and golf courses can increase the salience of gender within interactions (Messner 2000; Morgan and Martin 2006), the policy of physically separating the swimmers into gender-segregated locker rooms before and after practice formally marked the boys and girls as different when they entered and exited the pool deck. And finally, the crowded nature of the pool deck may have contributed to the salience of gender in this context (Thorne 1993). Because there were often between 50 and 100 kids on the pool deck during SVST practices, there were plenty of witnesses who could tease kids for having “crushes” on kids of the other gender, making it risky for the girls and boys to socialize with each other. Thus, in the swimmers’ free time, rather than developing friendships based on similar interests or athletic ability, the lack of rules, the threat of heterosexual teasing, and gender-segregated locker rooms helped create a context where gender was highly salient.
“Boys Are Always Wild” and “Girls Are Very Nice and Sweet”: Hegemonic Meanings of Gender
Given the high salience of gender boundaries during swimmers’ unsupervised free time, the girls’ and boys’ interactions often strengthened gender-based group boundaries during unsupervised aspects of practice (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000; Thorne 1993). Once, before practice, Nick shouted his last name while jumping toward Katie. While mimicking his motion, Katie shouted, “Weirdo!” back at him. Several times, I watched Nick, Brady, and Sophia dump cold water on one another’s heads after practice. After a swimming fundraiser, Katie, Jon, and Cody spent 10 minutes hitting and splashing one another with foam swimming “noodles” in the pool. Toward the end of a swim meet, several boys filled their swim caps with water and tried splashing Lesley and Grace. After wrestling the swim caps out of the boys’ hands, Grace came over to me and told me that Elijah gave her “cooties.”
Although the swimmers tended to interact in antagonistic ways during their free time, borderwork at the pool did not seem to be based on beliefs in male supremacy. Unlike existing research has suggested (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000; Thorne 1993), boys did not provoke antagonistic relations more frequently than girls, nor did the boys control more space on the pool deck. Furthermore, the girls never tried to avoid confrontations with the boys, and instead seemed confident in their ability to interact as equals. Once, for example, I was talking with Katie when Amy, an 11-year-old Asian girl, walked over to us. Elijah and Jon were standing several feet away, wearing swimming flippers on their hands. Katie warned Amy that the boys would “smack you with that fin” if Amy got too close. Amy, however, rolled her eyes and told Katie, “I’m not scared.” She then punched Katie’s arm a couple of times, demonstrating how she would fight if provoked. If the swimmers had believed that boys on the pool deck were stronger than the girls, Amy may have been more cautious about fighting Jon and Elijah. Instead, she confidently proclaimed that she was “not scared” and demonstrated how she would punch them.
Other girls in the Sharks group also seemed confident in their ability to engage in borderwork as equals with the boys. Once, much to the girls’ excitement, Katie “pantsed” Elijah at a swim meet. 5 Another time, after Nick dumped what he described as “ice cold” water on Sophia’s head, she got “revenge” by pouring red Gatorade on him. If Katie or Sophia had believed the boys were stronger or more powerful than the girls, they may have been afraid to instigate such interactions. Fear of the boys’ reactions, however, did not stop Katie from “pantsing” Elijah, or Sophia from dumping a red, sticky drink on Nick’s head. Although hegemonic cultural beliefs about gender often become activated when gender is a salient aspect of social interactions (Ridgeway 2011), the swimmers’ antagonistic interactions in this context did not appear to be based upon a sense of male supremacy. Instead, they were transformative in the sense that they allowed the girls to occupy space and express agency when interacting as equals with the boys. However, because these interactions continued to affirm categorical and essentialist differences between the genders, they simultaneously undermined and reproduced aspects of hegemonic gender relations.
Furthermore, all the swimmers talked about sharing close physical space with kids of the other gender in ways that were markedly different from how they talked about racing one another. When talking about racing “for times,” the swimmers willingly recognized and discussed the overlap between girls’ and boys’ abilities. However, on a social level, the meanings kids associated with gender were firmly grounded in categorical differences. Perhaps because of the risk of heterosexual teasing (Thorne 1993), boys and girls told me that spending time with athletes of the other gender was “not fun,” “awkward,” “annoying,” “awful,” “super uncomfortable,” “gross,” “kinda weird,” and “really bad and really messed up.” Furthermore, many of the kids articulated essentialist understandings of gender within these narratives, explaining that “boys are always wild,” “girls are very nice and sweet,” “girls are more limber,” and “boys are more competitive.” Notably, however, the swimmers did not include assumptions about male supremacy within these explanations. Instead, as suggested by their patterns of borderwork, the swimmers associated categorical and essentialist—but nonhierarchical—meanings with gender.
As an observer who spent an equal amount of time with the girls and boys, it was puzzling to hear girls and boys make categorical and essentialist distinctions between the genders. If girls were always “more limber” than boys, then how could the swimmers account for the boy from the Sharks group who frequently did the splits before swim practice? If “girls are very nice and sweet,” then how could they explain the times when the girls screamed at and hit one another? Although it was easy for me to think of exceptions to the kids’ generalizations, whenever I asked kids about these exceptions, my questions were met with shrugs and surprise.
Despite being quite knowledgeable about one another’s swimming abilities, the girls and boys were relatively unaware of the other group’s social experiences. Because the swimmers tended to provoke antagonistic interactions with one another, similarities between the genders were obscured. Unlike focused aspects of practice, structural mechanisms did not illuminate the similarities between the girls and boys (Kane 1995). In this less scripted context, the kids instead drew upon and enacted aspects of hegemonic patterns of gender relations (Morgan and Martin 2006; Ridgeway 2009, 2011). The swimmers, however, did not default to enacting all aspects of hegemonic gender relations. The swimmers’ group-based interactions led the swimmers to associate gender with categorical and essentialist meanings, but the assumption that boys are superior to girls was notably absent from swimmers’ interactions during unsupervised free time.
Discussion and Conclusion
Gender is a social structure embedded within individual, interactional, and institutional relations (Connell 2009; Lorber 1994; Martin 2004; Messner 2000; Risman 2004). At the institutional level, femininities and masculinities are ranked in societal-wide, historically based hierarchies that are created and re-created through laws, policies, practices, collective representations, symbols, and hegemonic meanings of gender (Connell 1987; Lorber 1994), but the impact of structural mechanisms and hegemonic cultural beliefs within interactions varies based on the context (Britton 2000; Connell 1987; Deutsch 2007; Messner 2000; Morgan and Martin 2006; Ridgeway 2009, 2011; Ridgeway and Correll 2004; Thorne 1993).
My research contributes to existing literature by exploring how gender meanings and relations change across contexts. By following the same group of individuals across different contexts, I found that the meanings kids associated with a social category such as “gender” did not always align with hegemonic beliefs. Instead, the swimmers’ understandings of gender were filtered through group-based interactions and thus varied dramatically depending on the context (Fine 1979; Eliasoph and Lichterman 2003; Swidler 1986). During focused aspects of practice, when swimmers followed their coach’s instructions to compare times and race one another, gender was less salient and athletes interacted in nonantagonistic ways. As a result of their group-based interactions in this context, swimmers regularly witnessed athletic parity between the genders, making it difficult to sustain beliefs in categorical gender difference and male superiority (Kane 1995). Because structural mechanisms enabled a different pattern of group-based relations during the swimmers’ unsupervised free time, the meanings associated with gender changed across contexts at SVST. During the swimmers’ unsupervised free time, gender was highly salient and swimmers interacted in antagonistic ways. As a result, their interactions obscured the similarities between the genders, encouraging the swimmers to associate gender with categorical and essentialist—yet nonhierarchical—meanings.
The fact that swimmers’ understandings of gender did not uniformly align with hegemonic cultural beliefs has broader theoretical implications for gender theory. When the salience of gender is low and structural mechanisms allow individuals to interact in ways that illuminate similarities between the genders, it is possible for individuals to associate gender with nonhegemonic beliefs. This study thus provides a glimpse into the types of practices that can potentially enable interactional gender expectations to become less oppressive (Connell 1987; Martin 2004; Ridgeway 2009; Risman 2004). Furthermore, unlike existing research (McGuffey and Rich 1999; Messner 2000; Morgan and Martin 2006; Ridgeway and Correll 2000; Ridgeway 2009; Thorne 1993), the swimmers did not default to enacting all aspects of hegemonic gender relations when interacting within a relatively unscripted setting. Beliefs in male supremacy were notably missing from both contexts, highlighting the need to explain the lack of gender hierarchy at the pool.
If individuals enact more equitable gender relations in one context, aspects of these gender relations may “spill over” into other settings within daily life. At SVST, structural mechanisms illuminated the similarities between the genders during focused aspects of practice. While sharing lanes and racing one another, time-based comparisons made it clear that girls and boys were equally strong and talented swimmers. Perhaps the embodied strength and confidence girls developed while racing “for times” allowed them to be more expansive in their appropriation of space and more confident in their antagonisms with the boys (Hollander 2013; Messner 2011; Travers 2008). The boys’ in-pool experiences of losing to the girls may have helped create a baseline of respect for the girls outside of the pool (Anderson 2008; Messner 2011), making the boys less inclined to invade the girls’ space and provoke antagonistic relations. As a result, although structural mechanisms encouraged the swimmers to deploy categorical and essentialist meanings of gender in their unsupervised free time, the nonhierarchical aspects of the swimmers’ gender relations may have transferred across contexts. The spillover effect likely weakened as the swimmers entered situations further removed from SVST (Ridgeway and Correll 2000), but the swimmers’ in-pool experiences appeared to reduce the overall degree of gender inequality at the pool.
The fact that the swimmers compared times—a relatively quantifiable measure of ability—likely facilitated the enactment of alternative gender relations during focused aspects of practice and the potential spillover of these relations into other contexts. In other institutions, such as workplaces and schools, measures of performance may be less transparent than in a timed sprint, perhaps making it more difficult to enact alternative patterns of gender relations. Additionally, the spillover effect I observed occurred within youth swimming. When compared to sports like basketball, swimming has historically been considered a more gender-“appropriate” sport for girls (Bier 2011; Cahn 1994). Activities that are considered to be feminine likely create more space for the development of egalitarian attitudes and patterns of gender relations when compared to activities that are considered more masculine (Finley 2010; Prokos and Padavic 2002; Ridgeway 2009; Schippers 2002; Wilkins 2008).
Race and class also may operate as hidden resources within contexts where kids enact alternative patterns of gender relations. At SVST, most of the Sharks swimmers were from upper-middle-class families, and drew upon class-based resources while regularly attending swim practices with high-quality coaches, equipment, and facilities. However, not all children have equal access to sport (Sabo and Veliz 2008), nor do all parents have the resources to foster their children’s talent and interest in extracurricular activities (Lareau 2003). The overlap between girls’ and boys’ athletic abilities may not be illuminated as easily among kids who lack the resources to become committed and talented athletes.
Furthermore, the kids might have enacted alternative patterns of gender relations primarily because they conformed to other aspects of white, middle-class social relations. In order to be successful athletes, the Sharks swimmers participated in activities that reinforced neoliberal individualism and white, middle-class values, such as defering to authority figures, valuing hard work, and believing in meritocracy (Bettie 2003; Cooky and McDonald 2005; DeLuca 2013; Perry 2002). The fact that Sharks swimmers reinforced key aspects of white, upper-middle-class values might have afforded them some leeway for enacting nonhegemonic patterns of gender relations (Wilkins 2008). At least within competitive youth sports, the enactment of alternative patterns of gender relations may create tensions within hegemonic gender relations, while simultaneously leaving existing class- and race-based systems of inequality in place (Bettie 2003; Cooky and McDonald 2005), ultimately prefiguring the public world the kids may enter as professional class adults (Messner 2009; Levey 2013). It remains to be seen by future research whether spillover can occur in contexts that not only undermine hegemonic gender relations, but also hegemonic patterns of race and class relations.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to Michael Messner, Sarah Banet-Weiser, Sharon Hays, Paul Lichterman, Jess Butler, Hyeyoung Kwon, Sean McCarron, and the three anonymous Gender & Society reviewers for their feedback and invaluable insights on previous versions of this article.
Author’s Note:
An earlier version of this article received the 2013 Sally Hacker Graduate Student Paper Award, from the Sex and Gender Section of the American Sociological Association.
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Notes
Michela Musto is a PhD candidate in sociology and gender studies at the University of Southern California. Her research interests include gender and sexualities, children and youth, families, and sport. She may be contacted at