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Endangered Girls and Incendiary Objects: Unpacking the Discourse on Sexualization

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An Erratum to this article was published on 23 October 2008

Abstract

In this article, we deconstruct the epistemological framework underlying recent discussions on the sexualization of girls. Conducting a close textual analysis of scholarly and activist writings and their media coverage in Australia, Britain and the United States we examine the foundational assumptions of the argument against sexualization and explore its potential social and political implications. It is our contention that the conceptualization of sexualization as both a process and outcome relies on an ambivalent and overly deterministic model which makes the danger of sexualizing materials uniform, but their outcome gender specific. The unintended consequence of this discourse is that girls are framed as passive recipients and their sexuality becomes the result of and reduced to sexualization.

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Notes

  1. It is important to note that most of the historical materials we have studied have implied (this is not always noted directly) that their concern is to do primarily with white children.

  2. Diane Levin and Jean Kilbourne have written the forthcoming So Sexy So Soon: The New Sexualized Childhood and What Parents Can Do To Protect their Kids. Due to our lack of access to the text (it will be published in August 2008), we have relied on media interviews to gain an understanding of their perspective on this issue.

  3. Although authors ascribe sexualization as a process affecting all women, given the scope of our article we will focus our discussion on the effects of sexualizing girls within the literature.

  4. It is beyond the scope of this article to discuss every study cited within the literature. Moreover, it would be irresponsible for us to claim expertise in the area of psychological research. We want to be clear that we are not arguing that the empirical materials presented are invalid, rather our concern is that much of the literature was conceptualized and operationalized using other rubrics and then retrospectively having their findings cited as evidence of sexualization.

  5. It is important to note that many sexualization authors view Barbie as tame in comparison to Bratz dolls which they describe as looking like a prostitute (Kilbourne in Cabrera 2007; Kilbourne in Tatsee also Durham 2008 and American Psychological Association Task Force 2007b). Prior to Bratz, Barbie was considered equally problematic role model for many parents and feminists, including Kilbourne herself.

  6. According to Foucault, the modern construction of the sexual child within medical, sexological and educational discourses, “rested on the requirement of regulation, on a whole thematic of the species, descent, and collective welfare, in order to obtain results at the level of discipline” (Foucault 1980, p. 146).

  7. The risk to safety and the type of infection that could occur were left unspecified in the article.

  8. A recent exception to this silence about the sexualization of boys is a January 2008 episode of Law and Order SVU (Season 9, Episode 3 Unorthodox). The protagonist is a fourteen year old boy who has been ‘sexualized’ by both popular culture and pornography (little distinction made between the two) and has violent and non-consensual sex with younger girls and boys. A key gender distinction here is that the sexualized boy is a predator not a victim.

  9. Childhood as a sacred space free of adult pollution is a relatively recent bourgeois conception, one that began in the late 18th century first with bourgeois children and later expanded to encompass all children (Walkerdine 1998; Cunningham 1991; Zelizer 1985). Dominant discourses crafted the child as “special” and in need of increased affection and attention from parents, the government and social welfare associations. Framing the child as an idealized creature deserving of play and freedom transformed the value of children from utilitarian actors in the familial economy into affective symbols (Zelizer 1985). However this discourse also rendered any variation from this ideal suspect and justified state and social intervention into the lives of poor families through a discourse of child protection (Egan and Hawkes under review; Gerodetti 2006; Luker 1998).

  10. One might expect that the defense would counter with the issue of context and intention in the display of the bodies of girls (here, again, boys are not included). However a recent photography exhibition by Bill Henson in Sydney, Australia was closed down by police, the images confiscated and subjected to legal scrutiny Tovey et al. 2008). The consideration was whether these naked photos (of girls and boys) were pornographic images of children. The charge was not upheld but this and other cases in the UK demonstrate another (perhaps unintended) consequence of the sexualization of children argument. Artistic representations of the naked child were not argued to actively engender age inappropriate sexuality. But they were argued to threaten the innocence of the child—by proxy. For there was a sense that the public display of the body of the child was sufficient to taint not just the individual but the cultural ‘fiction’ that insists upon only two possibilities: innocence or corruption.

  11. Calls for the protection of innocence have also validated interventions into the lives of adults in general, particular in discussions of censorship.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. St. Lawrence University, Canton, NY, USA

    R. Danielle Egan

  2. University of New England, Armidale, NSW, Australia

    Gail L. Hawkes

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  1. R. Danielle Egan
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  2. Gail L. Hawkes
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Correspondence to R. Danielle Egan.

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An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12119-008-9040-z

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Egan, R.D., Hawkes, G.L. Endangered Girls and Incendiary Objects: Unpacking the Discourse on Sexualization. Sexuality & Culture 12, 291–311 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-008-9036-8

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