Because looks can be deceiving

Media Alarm and the Sexualisation of Childhood - Do We Know What We Mean

Bibliographic Data

ID3611023
AuthorsKirrilly Thompson (0000-0002-2758-6537, University of South Australia, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume19
Issue4
Pages395-400
Publication date2010-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Gender Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0958-9236 • E-ISSN: 1465-3869
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/09589236.2010.533492
OpenAlexW2010121880
LanguageEN
Citations received14
References cited17

This article considers ongoing moral outrage over the assumed sexualisation of young girls by the media. It questions this taken-for-granted association between the media and the sexualisation of children. It suggests that this visceral anxiety reflects a particularly adult-centric view of children's behaviour and considers how this may serve to discipline girls’ sexuality in particular. Whilst child welfare and wellbeing are paramount, this article suggests the need for a more nuanced and ethnographically informed debate around the relationship between childhood, the media, and sexualisation. It calls for ethnographic research with children, to understand their perspectives of what adults view as sexualised behaviour. A number of questions are raised throughout the article to stimulate further research within anthropology and the social sciences more broadly. The article considers the extent to which attention could more usefully be shifted from the control of extrinsic factors such as the media to teaching critical thinking skills in primary and secondary schooling. It thus argues for a critical anthropological engagement with a debate currently dominated by adult-centric understandings and framed against a demonisation of sexuality and the media

Ethnography · Human sexuality · Outrage · Political science · Sociology · Anthropology · Children's Rights and Participation · Gender Roles and Identity Studies · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media

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