The Gendered Socialization of Girls and Boys in Tunisian Schools ()
1. Introduction
The place given to the child in our society has evolved considerably in recent decades. On the one hand, the child is considered as autonomous, capable of thinking and creating by himself, as an individual with his own characteristics and, on the other hand, as a being to be educated, protected, accompanied and whose we must develop sociability. In the current context, concern for the child, concerns about his well-being, education, academic success, integration and socialization, are of primary importance and govern institutional and parental educational actions (Neyrand, 2014) [1] . One of the challenges is to promote children’s access to sports and cultural activities while working to reduce social inequalities in access to these opportunities (Martin, 1998) [2] .
The supervised activities, even more numerous and diversified than before, generally remain consistent with the sex of the child. Thus, if children’s hobbies are at the center of educational injunctions promoting the development of children’s skills, practices also disseminate different social representations contributing to the reproduction of gender inequalities. Undeniably, the body, as an object and product of socialization (Darmon & Détrez, 2004) [3] , is transformed and modeled in contact with different spaces and more or less influential actors (Détrez, 2002) [4] . This study of the process of bodily socialization of children is crossed by several questions. First of all, it is important to consider the effects of vertical socialization from adult to child.
Parents transmit to their children a basic knowledge oriented by their own position in the social space: social belonging, cultural and economic capital, by the representations of social and gender roles that they themselves have internalized (Darmon, 2006) [5] . On the side of the parental transmission modes, Lahire identifies three forms of family socialization favoring the transmission of parental norms: socialization by direct practice, socialization by ideological inculcation perceptible in the words of the parents and silent socialization (1998) [6] . These different modes of transmission can be combined and depend in particular on the involvement and knowledge of the parents in the activity in question (Court, 2007) [7] .
The forms taken by the body, the gestures, the attitudes, and the ways the child maintains his body, considers it and talks about it will be at the center of the analysis. Height, body shape, gait, and dress style, are indeed partly the result of socialization. To conclude, if the teacher is particularly influential, other staff (physical education teachers, catering staff, educational staff, school life assistants), can have a determining role in the socialization of the child. The modes of intervention and regulation of interactions by sports educators have thus been studied. Several questions arise: What are the influences exerted by the different socializing authorities allowing the acquisition of gendered and socially situated bodily dispositions? In what ways are models of masculinity and femininity shaped by socialization actors and how are gender norms internalized by children?
2. The Analytical Framework
From a Bourdieusian and Lahirian perspective, we consider the weight of context on the creation, disappearance, activation or inhibition of dispositions. The uses of the body are formed and transformed by contextual constraints. Socialization, with its objective of producing the humans of tomorrow, turns out to be plural and complex, leaving room for multiple tensions between discourses that family and social actors will be responsible for regulating (Hugues, 1996) [8] . In this perspective, the work of Bourdieu and the theory of habitus (1980) [9] make it possible to take into account the weight of the first experiences of life, by considering that past experiences partly guide future experiences. A system of durable and transferable dispositions, the habitus determines the categories of judgment and tastes, and thus directs bodily practices. However, contextual constraints play a role in mobilizing the embodied past. Bernard Lahire highlights the weight of context on the creation, disappearance, activation or inhibition of dispositions (1999) [10] . His work thus makes it possible to better understand the heterogeneity of the forms of practice in the same sexual class (Lahire, 2002) [11] .
His approach makes it possible to apprehend the question of social reproduction and in particular class and gender inequalities (Bourdieu, 1979) [12] . It grants the dispositions incorporated during childhood, to the class habitus, a completely determining role in the appearance of the present modes of practices and interactions (Bourdieu & Passeron, 1970) [13] . It starts from the postulate that the incorporated provisions are transferable and generalizable to several areas of practice, and that family socialization, which is particularly effective, participates in the internalization of differentiated social roles but also in the process of reproduction of male domination and social inequalities.
This study of the bodily practices of girls and boys of primary age and of the socialization processes at work in different socializing contexts is at the crossroads of an interactionist approach, sociology of childhood and sociology of socialization. In this perspective, the favored analysis is qualitative and attaches to a study of the effects of the instances of socialization, which are the school, the family and the practice of associative sports. As advocated by supporters of the interactionist (Becker, 1985) [14] and structuralist (Lahire, 1995 [15] ; Elias, 1997 [16] ) approaches, we have combined different spatial and temporal scales of analysis.
3. Methodology
As part of our study and in order to respond to the hypotheses formulated above, we opted for a qualitative approach. Thus, in order to obtain detailed information on the influence of socialization on teaching practice and on the behavior of teachers, two methods of data collection were employed. Initially, we carried out a year of observation of the bodily practices of children (16 pupils); in several spaces of socialization by identifying in particular the different models of interiorized masculinities and femininities and the socializing contexts, which are sometimes difficult to understand. Access, the survey required a combination of several methods. To study practices and interactions, we conducted an ethnographic type survey in schools and then observations in sports clubs. The observation of self-organized practices and inter- and intra-class sex interactions in the school context and more particularly in the playground was favored to identify the diversity of body uses and bodily practices of girls and boys.
In a second step, we carried out a survey by interviews with the children (7 girls and 9 boys), the parents (16 parents) and the supervisors (2 Football supervisors, 2 mountain bike supervisors, 2 Rugby supervisors, 2 Dance supervisors and 2 swimming supervisors). The investigation consists of identifying bodily practices, affinity groups and models of femininity and masculinity, as well as their diversity, variability and hierarchy. These questionnaires nevertheless made it possible to specify non-observable but essential data for the analysis, such as the social characteristics of the students, in order to relate them to their bodily practices. The questionnaires related in particular to the social background of belonging, family composition and tastes in terms of preferred sports practices and school disciplines. They made it possible to establish a social morphology of the pupils of this class and to collect initial information on the tastes of the girls and the boys in terms of ludic and sporting practices. These two methods provide access to different data, the combined analysis of which makes it possible to better understand the modes of child body socialization.
The ethnographic survey in the school environment was supplemented by observations in four associative sports contexts frequented by some of the students surveyed: a rugby club, a mountain bike club, a dance club and finally a football club. It seemed important to me to take a look at these sporting activities, which contribute to the acquisition of gendered uses of the body and socially situated bodily knowledge.
4. Results
4.1. Weight of Female Social Class, Capital and Instructor Seniority
Table 1 presents the socio-cultural and professional characteristics of the population studied. In the school, surveyed, female relational networks are more restricted and less flexible than those of boys. Four students arrived in the class, almost half of the girls. At the same class, the girls were only five. The numerical superiority of the boys should be taken into consideration in the analysis of the identified groupings. The girls are few. A group of girls stands out from the others by its notoriety. It brings together students with seniority and “popularity” recognized by the whole class.
Two other smaller groups are also identifiable. The first consists of girls “new” in the school who occupy a favorable position in the hierarchy of the class group and who compete with those of the first group. The second brings together two rather marginalized girls, with little legitimacy among their peers. Finally, two other girls are considered “satellites” and seem to want to get closer to the most popular girls without establishing a privileged relationship with them.
We can see the effects of anticipatory socialization and an interest in the “culture of the grown-ups” which they already want to resemble, which earns them the status of “fashionable” girls. However, mastering certain cultural codes is not enough to be integrated into this group. Girls must also meet school standards and expectations. Indeed, they often talk about school results, revise together the next test or prepare their presentation.
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Table 1. The socio-cultural and professional characteristics of the population studied.
The boys, on the other hand, are not interested in it and only repeat when asked, unlike the girls, who obviously want to improve. Their skills, recognized by the other girls and boys in the class, allow them to practice singing or dancing without apprehension in this space where the different classes live together. Other girls, even interested in these activities, avoid practicing in front of others, fearing their criticism. The girls in this group thus appreciate certain physical games shared with athletic boys, but clearly avoid those who adopt practices and behaviors deemed to be inconsistent with school requirements.
These girls do not accept it when the boys in the class who are less appreciated and considered bad students try to involve them in physical games. One boy, who comes from a working-class background and performs poorly academically, expressed his rejection in a virulent way. The latter, by inviting himself into the game, signifies his interest in the girls, but his behavior ultimately reinforces his exclusion from the group. On the other hand, they willingly accept contact and physical games with other boys. This observation qualifies the idea that these girls do not appreciate physical contact with boys. Indeed, this game shared with sporty and valued boys in the class becomes interesting for them. They follow the rules of the game initiated by the boys and use them to impose themselves in turn.
However, even with the most popular boys, the girls do not participate in just any game. They thus remain distant from football games, an exclusively male territory, and do not participate in the most physical or violent games either. In terms of physical appearance, the girls are considered pretty by the students and the teacher. All three wear either sneakers or ankle boots without heels. The parents of these girls, belonging to the middle and working classes, not very athletic, value cultural or artistic activities, which they associate with personal fulfillment, but also with maintaining their social position. Academically profitable practices are little negotiated, educational styles taking a relatively authoritarian form (Kellerhals & Montandon, 1991) [17] . The bodily socialization of girls in this group is characterized by the transmission of a taste for feminine cultural, artistic and school practices by the parents. They are more oriented towards artistic physical activities or towards cultural activities. The importance of these activities and the awareness of their benefits have been transmitted by parents who are themselves sportsmen or appreciate cultural activities. Like the families of the girls in the first group, they attach importance to the education and academic success of their children. Unlike the girls in the first group, they are distant from association activities. Since the children were free to choose, it would seem that the move to a new town and the absence of an extensive relational network constrained the choice of practice.
Indeed, the judgment of boys seems to participate more in the hierarchization of female relational networks than is the case in contexts numerically dominated by girls. The composition of the class thus has an impact on the diversity of observable practices. It is nevertheless necessary to put its impact into perspective since other factors also act on this phenomenon: on the one hand, the spatial organization of the playground, the space of which is quite limited in the school surveyed, on the other hand, the absence of facilitators and materials made available to students, which limits the diversification of activities. If the incorporation of a common play heritage (Delalande, 2003) [18] undeniably contributes to differentiating groups of girls, other factors must be taken into consideration.
Our observations show a gradual shift from child culture to pre-adolescent culture, which occurs more or less precociously. In the context surveyed, girls who initiate the incorporation of body uses and preadolescent practices are also the best positioned in the hierarchy. Thus, the mastery of childhood and adolescent codes, but also the composition of other resources imported by girls in the school context induces power relations between the different groups of girls, endowed with greater or lesser legitimacy. We note in particular a relative correspondence between social legitimacy and academic legitimacy, which we must all the same put into perspective. Two groups of girls are among the most attractive, the old ones and the new ones. These girls come from the middle classes and the upper fraction of working class backgrounds. They have an attractiveness spotted by satellite girls, often from less stable working-class backgrounds, who seek their closeness and see a way to widen their relational network. The presence of newcomer girls makes it possible to understand the question of the construction of relational networks and the gradual integration into more or less extended affinity groups.
The composition of this symbolic capital, associated with the other capital held (social, cultural, symbolic), makes it possible to position oneself more or less advantageously in this context, thus ranking the girls among themselves. Girls’ groups have high academic and social legitimacy. The new group presents social characteristics, practices and a relationship to school standards similar to the old ones, but the latter feel competition. Attempts to integrate the group are observable, but we also notice the reluctance of the old ones who wish to preserve their advantageous status and their symbolic domination in this context.
Indeed, girls generally tend to get closer to friends with whom they share an associative activity. Those who do not have any associative activity have more restricted relational networks in the school context. Thus, for girls, women’s associative activities make it possible to broaden their relational networks at the same time as they incorporate feminine dispositions. Finally, the portraits shed light on the ways in which the different modes of socialization can be articulated. Families present specificities from the point of view of parental educational styles and modes of parental transmission. Parents more or less encourage sports practice, depending on financial means and their position on cultural and sports practices.
4.2. Weight of Sports Practice and the Relationship to School and Gender Norms
Thanks to the production of portraits, we also put into perspective the differences in relationships to the body, to sports, to the school institution with the modes of socialization (family, sports, between peers). By reconstructing the conditions of socialization (vertical and horizontal), we have attempted to specify the conditions for the construction of bodily dispositions and of a plurality of relationships to the body, to sport and to the work of beautifying the body. The relationship to work, appearance and adolescent culture appeared to be absolutely decisive in groupings (and in the choice of associative activities) and more broadly in the bodily socialization of girls. In this part, we analyze more precisely the groups of affinities, the practices and the modes of male sociability. The relationship to sports practice and the methods of practice and interaction favored in this context appear to be determining elements in the construction of male relational networks. Most of them have a common interest in sports and physical activities, as male territories. Like the work already carried out on recreational practices, they particularly appreciate football and physical games, privileged places for the expression of the dominant libido. These activities play a central role in the bodily socialization of boys (Connell, 1995) [19] and participate in their hierarchy, the most athletically competent being very often endowed with greater popularity (Adler, Kless & Adler, 1992) [20] . The relationship boys have to these activities, the modes of practice and interactions that they privilege, participate in the distinction of different groups of boys referring to models of masculinities, hegemonic or subordinate, more or less legitimate in the school context. Hegemonic masculinity involves constraints in three registers of practices: affective and emotional retention (not showing feelings, not crying). On the other hand, all the boys do not build the same dispositions and do not have an identical relationship to the practice of sport. If, for most boys, sport is a way to promote themselves to their peers, for others it can be a source of frustration and disappointment (Klein, 1993) [21] . Different groups of boys, which refer to relationships with the practice of sport, with varying school and gender standards, were identified. If most of the boys, invested in male relational networks, favor outdoor games, sports, challenges or mock confrontations, others, distant from these practices, are rather marginalized. Masculinity models, more or less dominant and attractive, make it possible to account for the dynamics of gender models (Thorpe, 2010) [22] since there are indeed several ways of being a boy. They also make it possible to understand how the groups rank among themselves and to appreciate the role of sports socialization (Darmon, 2003) [23] . Four groups of boys were identified in the school context. Two refer to models of hegemonic and legitimate masculinity in the school context. Two others bring together boys whose behavior does not conform to school standards. The first two groups are particularly attractive and bring together the majority of boys.
Cooperative and competitive boys dominate the schoolyard space and often come together for common activities. Among the subordinate male groups in the school context, the combatant group also refers to a model of hegemonic masculinity, but these boys value registers of interaction based on the expression of physical violence, which makes it not very legitimate in the school context. Finally, two boys who are more distant from gender norms are also dominated in the school space. For these two groups of boys, the least conforming to male school standards, the school experience is often difficult. This group brings together boys from working-class and middle-class backgrounds, endowed with cultural capital. The first boy belongs to privileged backgrounds: his parents are divorced; his father is responsible for manufacturing in a company; his mother is responsible for communication. The second boy belongs to the middle classes; his father is a works inspector and his mother a nurse. The third boy belongs to working-class backgrounds, his father is a railway worker and his mother is a school life assistant. Finally, the last boy also comes from working-class backgrounds. Her father is a dress-maker and her mother a cook, and the family context is characterized by certain stability.
Thus, if this network brings together boys of different social origins, none however belongs to precarious popular circles. The boys in this group are those whose extracurricular sports activities are the most diversified (football, mountain biking, rugby and swimming). All of them have at least two sports activities and several also practice artistic or cultural activities, which helps to distinguish them from other groups of boys. At school level, the boys (13, 14, 15 and 16) have no particular difficulties and respect school standards. Involved in their learning, they regularly get encouragement. They thus benefit from a positive labeling of the educational institution. The parents of these families pay particular attention to the education of their children.
However, all the boys in this group adapt their clothing to the program of the day. They do not exclusively wear sports outfits and also appreciate city outfits but always. They are therefore distinguished from some boys who wear almost exclusively sports tracksuits, such as fighters and some competitive boys.
Not all boys play football the same way. They also adapt the rules to develop masculine qualities. These boys, competitors and connoisseurs of football and positions (attackers, defenders), have perfectly integrated the internal hierarchy of the football team. The position of striker, and especially scorer, is the most interesting. To practice goals and stage their individual performances, the boys invented a football game, the aim of which is to score the best goal. Finally, this group operates on a competitive register and expresses more of its desire to distinguish itself from low-status models than the previous group. These boys refer to the model of hegemonic masculinity and engage in all forms of school and sports competition. The physical and sporting practices invested by boys in the playground vary according to their social background, their relationship to school standards and their associative activities. Football and rugby, and more broadly men’s sports, occupy a privileged place in the body socialization of boys. The majority of boys thus mobilize their sporting skills to position themselves favorably in the hierarchy of the group. However, these skills, if they are essential, are not enough to occupy a valued position in the school context. The majority of boys thus mobilize their sporting skills to position themselves favorably in the hierarchy of the group. However, these skills, if they are essential, are not enough to occupy a valued position in the school context.
Four groups of boys have been identified in this context. They are characterized by a particular relationship to sport and school standards. Each thus occupies a different place within the hierarchy of the class group. Compliance with school and gender norms appears essential to integrate the most legitimate relational networks in this context. Among the groups identified, two occupy a rather dominant position, and two others are rather dominated. Cooperatives come from the small middle classes to the privileged classes, endowed with cultural capital. The boys in this group maintain rather egalitarian relationships and place more importance on collective victory than on individual performance. Their leisure activities are diversified, and in some cases they combine sports practice and artistic activity. At school, they conform to academic requirements and have dispositions favorable to their success, transmitted in a fairly privileged family context. Competitive boys come from the middle classes and working class backgrounds. They are distinguished from the first group by their relationship to sport. They attach more importance to individual performance than to collective victory and challenge each other to assess each person’s potential. Invested in associative football or rugby clubs, their extracurricular activities are less diversified than those of the boys in the first group. The popular activities in the school context, and in particular in the playground, sometimes deviant, sometimes childish, as well as their behavior contribute to their segregation.
The fighters belong to the precarious popular classes. Like the first two groups, they value physical skills, with a more pronounced taste for agonistic use of the body, but they are dominated in the classroom space, discredited by their distance from school standards and their low results. In the yard space, they attempt to physically dominate their classmates. In school difficulties, their agonistic skills constitute for them the only means of valuing themselves (Bourdieu, 1998) [24] . However, this behavior excludes them from the relational networks of their classmates, and they ultimately participate little in the activities initiated by the latter.
With a more pronounced taste for an agonistic use of the body, but they are dominated in the classroom space, discredited by their distance from school standards and their low results.
5. Interpretations
Transmissions within families are differentiated based on family configurations and parental educational styles. Additionally, the sports institutions attended by children also build different relationships with the body and with sport. In these contexts, gender regimes (Mennesson, 2007) [25] , modes of intervention, regulation of interactions, and differentiated expectations regarding children, all account for different modes of gendered socialization.
In rugby and football, the modes of regulation of interactions by the coach and sports educators contribute to the dissemination of models of masculinity and the internalization of the principle of male domination. In mountain biking as in rugby, the coaches encourage the boys to toughen up and go beyond their limits and do not consider the girls in a strictly identical way. However, several models of masculinity and different forms of bodily excellence have been identified, which reminds us that sharing an activity does not mean that its effects will be identical for all children.
Differences between experts and novices are also identifiable, which testifies, as for rugby, to the effects of progressive socialization and the different degrees of appropriation of norms. The context of the modern dance class also shows different ways in which girls can appropriate the activity according to their social position and their conception of dance. Associative sports contexts thus have effects on the acquisition of specific uses of the body. The observations also highlight the weight of the injunction to sexual conformity, for girls and for boys. Indeed, some boys, distant from the practice of competitive sport, choose to practice a male sport.
However, the injunction to invest in masculine practices seems stronger for boys. Investing in feminine practices is in fact more devaluing for boys than the investment in masculine activities by girls (Brougère, 1999) [26] . If the choices of girls in terms of associative sports practices are largely in line with the sex of the child, in the school context, the investment in more physical recreational practices and the abandonment of calm activities by some of the girls, account for the less penalizing nature of this choice for them.
Similarly, the presence of a few girls in men’s associative sports and the absence of boys in dance testify to the less rewarding nature of women’s activities for the latter. Observations made during physical education classes confirm the internalization of different dispositions by girls and boys but also within sex groups, both of which do not value the same methods of practice, nor the same activities. We also found that the modes of authority and supervision of activities differ between the sports educator and the teachers. Depending on these and on the dispositions built up in other contexts (family, associative sport, etc.), the children have a different relationship to this school education. The effectiveness of the transmission process in this context depends in particular on the relationship that the children have with it. Overall, the survey shows the effectiveness of the process of vertical transmission in families, which nevertheless takes place more or less efficiently and quickly depending on parental educational styles. The dispositions constructed by vertical socialization in the family and in associative sporting practices, which are different for girls and boys, as well as within gender groups, guide the practices and relational networks invested in the school context (Zaidman, 1996) [27] . Depending on their compliance with legitimate gender, school and social norms, the groups identified are ranked among themselves. This one being carried out all the same in a more or less efficient and rapid way according to the parental educational styles.
In the school context studied, the girls, although few in number and numerically dominated by the boys, invest different groups that value specific bodily practices and modes of interaction. These groups have a variety of relationships with child and adolescent cultures. From the point of view of recreational practices by girls, it is interesting to note that they are not very diversified. Moreover, the massive presence of boys seems to influence the early abandonment of certain practices or their confinement to certain spaces.
The physical and sporting practices invested by boys in the playground vary according to their social background and their relationship to school standards. Football and rugby, and more broadly “male” sports, occupy a privileged place in the bodily socialization of boys. Football and agonistic skills participate in the construction of the hierarchy between peers. The majority of boys thus mobilize their sporting skills to position themselves favorably in the hierarchy of the group. However, these skills, if they are essential, are not enough to occupy a valued position in the school context. Adherence to school standards also helps distinguish different groups among athletic boys. Compliance with school and gender norms appears essential to integrate the most legitimate relational networks in this context. Among the groups identified, two occupy a rather dominant position, and two others are rather “dominated”.
6. Closing
This article analyzes the body socialization process of children. It extends work in the sociology of gender, childhood and socialization. The aim was to understand how individuals belonging to the same sex group can construct different bodily dispositions. The survey methodology is part of dispositionalist sociology (Lahire, 2001) [28] of childhood, which studies the modes of socialization and the construction of dispositions. It is inspired, in fact, by the proposals of Lahire who recommends observing respondents in several contexts in order to study the articulation of modes of socialization. The initial ambition to carry out both a cross-sectional and a longitudinal analysis of socialization was not completed. Overall, the interviews show a certain permanence of bodily and sporting practices. We therefore favored a cross-sectional analysis of the socialization of children, while exploiting certain observations and data collected. The study of differential socialization within sex groups questions, as do gender studies, the naturalization of differences by highlighting the complexity of the process of construction of gender. Initially, the aim was to understand how children acquire uses of the body characteristic of their sex group. The survey reveals that children do not incorporate all of the gendered dispositions, but only some of them, depending on the social environment to which they belong, family configurations and parenting styles and other social spaces frequented. The variety of children’s social, academic and sporting trajectories also makes it possible to deconstruct the idea that girls and boys share a majority of common tastes with the members of their sexual class.
This research analyzes the ways in which the vertical and horizontal processes of socialization combine, thus allowing the acquisition of particular uses of the body. The results confirm the role of the family and other instances of vertical socialization in the process of gender construction. The portraits also make it possible to grasp, on a case-by-case basis, the ways in which horizontal and vertical socializations can be articulated, taking into account the concomitant and successive effects of the different instances. Moreover, the affinity groups identified in the school environment and the analysis of the social relationships that structure them, reveal the weight of sports practice and work on appearance in this process.
7. Outlook
For both girls and boys, the body, its shape, and its adornments serve as symbols of either a dominant status or, conversely, a subordinate social position. These attributes also express a gender identity that may conform more or less to gender norms. Additionally, by observing their classmates, students become aware of their status within the group. The variation in styles and preferences observed within gender groups confirms the existence of hierarchical masculinities and femininities that are based on distinct social codes, as seen in physical and athletic practices, as well as patterns of interaction.