"Fashioning the Feminine" is a critical consideration of the roles played by popular culture and schooling in the construction of teenage female identity, and the possibilities that exist for challenges and change to that identity. Much has been written in the past decade about the ways in which popular cultural texts construct and legitimize particular images of femininity and masculinity. At the same time, there has been a recognition of the need for schools to provide classroom space and time for the real lived experiences of students. This book explores a field that is now of major concern to a number of different disciplines - sociology, gender studies, literary theory, socio-linguistics, cultural studies and education studies - and to anyone interested in the relationships between gender, culture and education. "Pam Gilbert is a Senior Lecturer in Education at James Cook University, Townsville. She is particularly interested in issues linking literature, language, gender and schooling practices, and is the author of "Coming out from under, Contemporary Australian women writers, Gender, literacy and the classroom" and "Writing, schooling and deconstruction".
Sandra Taylor is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology of Education at Queensland Institute of Technology. She has a special interest in gender and schooling, and in policy issues relating to the education of girls. She is co-author of "Undersanding schooling: an introductory sociology of Australian education" and "Battlers and bluestockings: women's place in Australian education. This book is intended for students and researchers in gender studies.