Engendering Men: A Collaborative Review of Evidence on Men and Boys in Social Change and Gender Equality
A look at how men’s education is portrayed in the World Development Report 2012 on Gender and Equality, and where it fails
The World Development Report (WDR) 2012 has recently been released, documenting the state of Gender Equality and Development around the world. The WDR is a yearly report documenting the state of development around the world, and it put out by the World Bank (WB). The report attempts to tackle a vast array of topics and attempts to address the state of gender equality around the globe.
In 2006, the Rogers Park Young Womens Action Team (YWAT) launched a campaign to engage young men as allies in addressing violence against girls. The YWAT, a youth-led and adult-supported social change project, conducted a participatory action research project that included the creation of a film called Real Talk (in collaboration with Beyondmedia Education), survey research, and a set of popular education workshops. In addition, the YWAT organized and implemented a two-day train the trainer workshop for fifteen young men ages 14-22 in November 2007.
'Because I am a Girl: The State of the World’s Girls 2011 - So, what about boys?' is the fifth in a series of annual reports published by Plan examining the rights of girls throughout their childhood, adolescence and as young women.
The report shows that far from being an issue just for women and girls, gender is also about boys and men, and that this needs to be better understood if we are going to have a positive impact on societies and economies.
[This is a modified version of a blog post, which I welcome you to comment at *here*. I hope it works fine here as a story.]
Exposure to pornography is routine among children and young people, with a range of notable and often troubling effects. Particularly among younger children, exposure to pornography may be disturbing or upsetting. Exposure to pornography helps to sustain young people’s adherence to sexist and unhealthy notions of sex and relationships. And, especially among boys and young men who are frequent consumers of pornography, including of more violent materials, consumption intensifies attitudes supportive of sexual coercion and increases their likelihood of perpetrating assault. While children and young people are sexual beings and deserve age-appropriate materials on sex and sexuality, pornography is a poor, and indeed dangerous, sex educator.
There is considerable debate over whether boys' education is shaped in significant ways by the sex of their teachers, and in particular, whether boys need male teachers. Here, XY presents a selection of key journal articles on this issue.
Steve Biddulph’s bestseller on bringing up boys takes us on a trip back to the 19th century.
Within the fields of sexual and reproductive health, HIV/AIDS prevention and gender equity, there has been a growing consensus of the need to engage young men. Many of the major UN agencies working in health, gender and HIV/AIDS -- including UNFPA, WHO, PAHO, the World Bank, and UNAIDS -- have all confirmed the importance of engaging boys and young men in the promotion of health and gender equity.
A growing body of research on young men (15-24) affirms numerous reasons for focusing attention on their socialization.
Boys in the Picture (2000) is an advocacy document that stresses the importance of including boys in programming for adolescent sexual and reproductive health. This 32-page overview is in four languages. As it concludes, "Making a case for increasing attention to the health, development and wellbeing of adolescent boys and young men is necessary and timely. Increasing the attention to boys is a matter of gender equity and benefits accrue not only to adolescent boys and young men, but also to adolescent girls, women, children, men and communities."