|
|
 |
Resources for promoting gender equality through education in the context of HIV/AIDS
DrRobert Pattman. Department of Sociology, University of KwaZulu-Natal. May 2005. Republished courtesy of Dr Robert Pattman.
|
Dr Robert Pattman recently spoke at a University of KwaZulu-Natal Gender Studies Seminar, held on 17 May 2005. Dr Pattman is a senior lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
A copy of the paper on which his presentation was based can be found on the righthand side of this page, alongwith two sex education and HIV/AIDS education handbooks, based on UNICEF-funded research which he coordinated, interviewing young people in seven countries. These handbooks are currently being piloted by UNICEF in schools in African Countries.
Abstract:
I argue for learner centred approaches to HIV/AIDS and sex education which make the gendered lives and identities of the learners the key resources. This requires teachers to develop strategies which tap into the rich potential of their pupils. I draw on an interview based, UNICEF funded study with young people in Southern and Eastern Africa to suggest such strategies. In this study, the researchers established friendly and non judgmental relations with their interviewees, and encouraged them to set the agenda. I argue for gender sensitive approaches which encourage voices for girls without alienating boys, promote self reflexivity and less investment in gender polarised identities.
Introduction: resources as things with monetary values, and as the lives and identities of pupils
Education has been described in Southern Africa as a ?‘vaccine?’ against AIDS (Coombe and Kelly, 2000) because of the coincidence between lower rates of HIV infection and higher levels of education attainment. This vaccine is less available to girls than boys, with girls, in sub Saharan Africa, tending to drop out of school earlier than boys. The ratio of girls?’ to boys?’ enrolment in primary and secondary school, in sub Saharan Africa, in 1999, was 82%, (quoted in UNICEF, 2004). Girls drop out of school for a number of reasons, such as domestic and caring obligations at home (made more pressing in the light of AIDS), sexual harassment at school and parental concerns about mixing with boys, pregnancy and parents prioritising their sons?’ over their daughters?’ education when negotiating school fees. Girls are more likely to contract HIV than boys (more than 2 out of 3 newly infected 15-24 year olds, in sub Saharan Africa are female, UNICEF, 2003) and ?‘out of school girls?’ are especially vulnerable. For example, in Manicaland, Zimbabwe, infection rates in 1999-2000, among 15-16 year olds were, 4.8% for ?‘out of school?’ girls and 1.3% for ?‘school going?’ girls, and among 17-18 year olds, were 8.4% for ?‘out of school?’ girls and 1.4% for school going girls.(Gregson et al, 2001).
Girls who pursue schooling for longer, according to the UNESCO EFA monitoring report (2003), develop life skills, confidence and enhance their employment prospects, and, consequently, are more likely to delay heterosexual relations and to enter these on a relatively equal footing. As the report states, ?‘more educated women have better job prospects and have greater value outside the home?….and are better able to influence family decisions.?’ This is contrasted with the situation of girls who drop out of school early, who are much more dependent on men, and more likely to engage in early and risky heterosexual behaviour.
The EFA monitoring report advocates investing resources to make the schooling of girls a more viable and attractive option. It proposes, for example, replacing school fees for primary education with state funds. This is because in countries like South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Rwanda where primary school fees are charged, poorer families have difficulties raising these and often prioritise education for their sons over their daughters. The removal of primary fees would be the ?‘single most effective means of raising primary enrolments and reducing gender disparities in the short term,?’ according to the EFA report. (With the removal of primary school fees, governments, of course, would need to channel resources to meet the demand for more classroom space, teachers, books etc. brought about by increasing enrolment.) The report also argues for investment to make schools, especially secondary ones, more girl friendly, for example by improving toilet facilities or constructing more schools closer to people?’s homes, thereby cutting travelling distances, and minimising the dangers schoolgirls might experience going to and from school.
Creating equal opportunities for primary and secondary education for boys and girls is essential for establishing equal and non exploitative gender relations - particularly pertinent in the light of HIV/AIDS. However, as I shall argue in this paper, schools are not gender neutral institutions which simply develop the social and intellectual skills of all its pupils, but may be experienced by boys and girls quite differently and may carry particular risks for girls. I shall be focusing on what happens inside schools, addressing schools as important sites in which gender identities and relations (and inequalities) are constantly negotiated, contested and produced. This means thinking about resources not just as things with monetary values, (though, in pursuing gender equality, it is important to argue, as above, for more state provision for primary and secondary education, and, for setting up sustained workshops and training programmes with parents and teachers ?– as I do later in this paper), but also as the lives and identities of pupils in and outside school.
The lives and identities of pupils are not usually constructed as resources either by researchers or teachers, and, in this paper, I shall address how teachers can tap into the rich potential of pupils, by making them the key resources. In this sense, then, the paper is partly about pedagogies, and ones which encourage boys and girls to reflect upon and talk about themselves and their relations with others. My focus is on HIV/AIDS, sex education, which, in response to the crisis precipitated by HIV/AIDS, has been or is being introduced in many schools and colleges in Southern and Eastern Africa. Clearly young people need to be taught about AIDS and its modes of transmission, but this does not mean that they should become the passive recipients of sex education. I argue for pedagogies which engage with the cultures and identities of pupils, and the significance they attach to gender and sexuality, and I suggest that by addressing pupils as resources in this way and encouraging self reflective talk among and between boys and girls, the kind of polarised gender identities which many young people routinely develop and inhabit in and outside school may be broken down.
The full paper and handbooks can be downloaded on the righthand side of this page |
| Was this article helpful to you? |
 ?88%???? ?13%
|
|
Back
|
|
|
|
