Young women, feminist identities and neo-liberalism

Women’s Studies International Forum 28 (2005) 495 – 508 www.elsevier.com/locate/wsif

Young women, feminist identities and neo-liberalism Emma Rich School of Sport and Exercise Sciences, Loughborough University, Loughborough, Leicestershire, LE11 3TU, United Kingdom

Synopsis This article draws on a life history study to illustrate the ways in which young women currently occupy more than one subject position in relation to gender, equality and feminism. In particular, efforts are made to explore the tendency for young women to support an equal opportunities framework yet also distance themselves from feminism, and in particular the subjectivity of dfeministT. It is suggested that the women in the study were juggling different subject positions simultaneously. Whilst the data reveals that the young women were negotiating their lives around gendered dynamics, they were also constructing a narrative wherein they described gender inequality as a thing of the past. This narrative was heavily informed by a position of individualism which ostensibly opened up dnew choicesT to their life paths, but simultaneously influenced the ways in which they could recognise and resist gendered inequalities in their lives. The article concludes by considering the implications this has for the ways in which these young women identified with the wider collective movement of feminism. D 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Introduction Over the past couple of decades it seems that feminism, in all its various forms, has been facing increasing conflict and tension (see Hirsch & Keller, 1990). As Budgeon (2001) notes, much of this debate has been centered on generational differences between feminisms. The current place of feminism in the lives of young women has prompted questions about the dintergenerational currency that feminism has come to lackT (Budgeon, 2001, p. 7). For some, the generation debate is seen to be dthe most pressing task for the feminisms of our time, both inside and outside academeT (Zita, 1997: 1). Moreover, in recent years, a developing body of literature has begun to explore the ways in which young women are taking up or resisting various feminist discourses, particularly in relation to their lived experience of gender. Feminist texts such as Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards’ (2000) Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism, and the Future, Trioli’s (1996) Generation f, Bail’s 0277-5395/$ - see front matter D 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.wsif.2005.09.006

(1996) edited collection DIY Feminism and ElseMitchell and Flutter’s (1998) edited collection Talking Up are just some of the many new feminist voices that have contributed to these debates. This literature has begun to explore the relevance of feminism in young women’s lives, and indeed the ways in which dthe lived experiences and cultural products of youth articulate, reflect and transform feminismsT (Bhavani, Kent, & Twine, 1998, p. 575). Research by Budgeon (2001) has begun to reveal the complex ways in which young women in late modernity take up feminism, suggesting that whilst the women in her own study were alienated from second wave feminism, their identities were indeed informed by intrinsically feminist ideals. This paper attempts to build upon this burgeoning body of literature in exploring the various ways in which a group of high achieving young women produced identities in relation to feminism and gender. To do so, the life stories of 10 women all aged in their early 20s are drawn upon. This particular group of women in many ways embodied the characteristics that one might as-

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sociate with young feminists; they were confident, ambitious, determined to challenge inequality, and prepared and experienced in entering traditionally dmaleT contexts. Many of them were competent all-rounders who had excelled at sport (some were international athletes) and academic studies, and all of them were post-graduate students who had enrolled onto a course to train to become Physical Education teachers. Whilst collecting the life stories of these young women, I was struck by the ways in which despite all of the above, all of these women, although in varying degrees, employed narrative strategies which served to actively distanced themselves from the subject position of feminist. This prompted an exploration of the complex ways in which young women actively manage such ambiguity. As Budgeon (2001, p. 7) has noted, this dpropensity for young women to espouse opinions compatible with a feminist viewpoint yet at the same time lack any identification with feminism is not newT. However, it seems we need a clearer understanding of the various ways in which young women are positioning themselves in often complex ways, against and within the discourses of feminism and gender. Doing so invites an exploration of how young women in contemporary society may be negotiating discourses of gender, the self and discourses of equality in often multiple and contradictory ways. It raises a number of questions such as; what spaces did these young women feel comfortable occupying in relation to feminism? What other discourses of gender might intersect with feminism to influence how young women currently identify with feminism? The article draws on data from a study exploring gender identity and teacher training in Physical Education at a University in Central England. Within this

study, 10 student teachers took part in a series of life history interviews in an attempt to explore the gender identities they constructed before, during and after their teacher training. In analysing these life stories, it became apparent that many of these women embodied the ideals of feminism, yet also actively tried to manage their identities so as to distance themselves from feminist identities. It was apparent that the many of the women were juggling different subject positions simultaneously. They were negotiating gender in similar ways to that identified in the work of Volman and Ten Dam (1998) where gender was a structuring and influential dynamic in their lives, whilst at the same time constructing a narrative wherein gender inequality was seen as undesirable and a thing of the past. This narrative was heavily informed by a position of individualism which ostensibly opened up dnew choicesT in their life paths, but simultaneously influenced the ways in which they could recognise and resist gendered inequalities in their lives. Whilst not all of the discourses influencing this process can be represented in this article, some of the key dimensions are represented in Fig. 1. This process is explored in further detail throughout the paper. Methodology The empirical data for this work is drawn from a life history study focusing on a cohort of 10 female student teachers as they progressed towards becoming teachers of physical education on a Post Graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) course in an English University. The aim of this larger study was to explore the ways in which female student teachers of

Second Wave Feminism Equality of access

Popular/Post feminism

Women as a universal category

the way s in

Gendered Subjectivities Discourses of Gender binaries femininity, Biological heterosexuality assumptions

Traditional Gendered Discourses

Solution to inequality lies with individual

Women as emancipated

Individuality, freedom of choice,rationality

Negative caricatures of feminists

Individualism

Fig. 1. Key dimensions and discourses in the construction of participants’ femininities.

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Physical Education developed gendered identities, and the implications this had for their teaching. However, the analysis which informs this article focuses only on the relationship between their gendered subjectivities and feminism. All of the women who volunteered to take part in the study took part in at least three life history interviews lasting between 45 min and 2 h. These took place before, during and after their teacher training course. The interviews were thematic and open ended and largely conversational in style, with the respondents identifying key moments of importance in their life stories. The format and order of questions, delivery, pace, detail and variance in topics were structured by the nature of the interaction between the author and each participant, thereby generating very different interviews. All of the 10 women were white, and aged in their early 20s. In terms of social class, the women identified themselves in the following ways; Louise, Jill, Emma, Claire and Fiona saw themselves as coming from a middle class background. Christie, Julia and Robin described their family background as dworking classT. Sam and Anne described their backgrounds as working to middle class. Sam for example, claimed that her mother was working class and her father was middle class. All of the women in the study were sports performers who might be described as members of an elite group, having excelled in at least one sports activity. Many of the women had transgressed traditional gender boundaries by entering sports or social contexts that were traditionally seen as dmale domainsT. Furthermore, they all appear to be competent all-rounders demonstrating a higher than average skill in a wide range of physical activities, and academic studies. Whilst there was only a sample of 10 women involved in the research, the intention here is not to make generalisations about the ways in which all young women experience discourses of gender, but to illustrate in detail the sort of complex processes which various women may have to negotiate in different ways. In this sense, it seems important to add a cautionary note that this is a particular group of young, white women, who in many ways shared similar life experiences related to sport and their chosen career paths. There is of course a case to be made for further research which explores these issues with women of different ethnicities, socio-cultural background, sexualities, etc. The narratives are in no way intended to be representative of all young women. These life stories are analysed by placing them into social, historical and cultural context, fo-

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cusing in particular, as Sparkes (1995, p. 116) suggests on the dcentral moments or critical incidentsT around dindecisionT and dcontradictionT to give a dmore complex view of realityT. Analysis was carried out at both the micro-level of the narrative constructed, and the social level in terms of how these women socially positioned themselves and others through these discursive resources. In this sense, the article draws very loosely on post-structural tools of analysis, informed by a discursive approach to gender and identity. A feminist discursive approach considers gender identity as a relational social process (BjerrumNielsen & Rudberg, 1994; Davies, 1989a, 1989b, 1989c; Walkerdine, 1989), but also, as Volman and Ten Dam (1998, p. 531) suggest dperceives the concept of gender itself as socialT. The analysis therefore involved identifying key gendered discourses, and exploring how the participants came to position themselves and others within and against these key discourses. This entailed identifying the particular ways in which, for example, gender was spoken of. The analysis also involved an exploration of the inter-relationships between these discourses, for example by exploring the ways in which ideas about equality related to discourses of feminism. In this sense, the concept of dpositioningT was utilized as a way of understanding the ways in which participants were constituted in and through existing discourses (Davies & Harre, 1990). As Davies and Banks (1992, p. 3) suggest dfrom a post-structuralist perspective, subjectivity is formulated through discourses, given substance and pattern through storyline and deployed in social interactionT. In this sense, people move through multiple positioning during various interactions. Positions are discursively and interactively constituted and so are open to shifts and changes as the discourse shifts or as one’s positioning within, or in relation to, that discourse, shifts. Davies (1982) further argues that through taking up these discourses as one’s own, each woman is a speaking subject and also one who is subjected or determined by those discourses. This it seemed, was a useful way through which to examine the ambiguities present in the life stories of these young women. Narratives of entitlement: drawing on second wave feminism and liberal individualism Young feminists no longer want to change the world; they want to be independent (Bulbeck, 2001, p. 147). All of the women spent a large part of the interviews talking about the negotiations that they had made

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around a number of rites of passage; moving out from a parental home, becoming economically independent, beginning university, entering into new relationships, and entering social contexts that were considered dmale domainsT, etc. Such events appeared to feature as dcritical incidentsT (Sparkes, 1995) in their lives. As mentioned above, these women were what might be described as high achievers; successful students at school, higher education and sport. All of the women constructed narratives that emphasized the perceived increase in the importance of individual choice. They talked at length about having to try to decide between the many choices they had available to them as they were growing up, such as where to go to University, what sports to participate in, and even what careers to pursue. These narratives tended to draw on the language of what Giddens (1991) refers to as individualisation whereby through the recent changes in the organization of economic and social life, there has been a perceived increase in the importance of the individual, and particularly of individual choice. In this first section therefore, I wish to explore the ways in which these narratives reflected the ambiguities of being dfemaleT under neo-liberalism, particularly the ways in which the women in the study came to understand opportunity and failure as something of their own making or fault (Walkerdine, 2003). The women in the study articulated this choice narrative in different ways. Those women who felt some affiliation with a working class family background, drew upon a discursive feature whereby individualisation was strongly connected to achieving upward mobility through education and work. This was achieved through the fixing and distancing (Skeggs, 2004) of their mothers’ lives with their own. In other words, their life choices and opportunities were compared with those of their mothers’ (or indeed other relations). On occasions when they talked about being able to go to University, having good careers, or of competing in sport, this was seen as a feature of dfreedom from oppressionT. A narrative tended to be constructed where their lives were compared more favourably than with those their older female relatives had at their age: She [mother] didn’t go to university, she left at fifteen. I think she is very proud of me, the fact that I have gone on further than she had, but she doesn’t really know that much about it. (Robin) The participants alluded to the increasing social opportunities that have arisen across generations, with most of the participants making reference to the

lack of opportunity for previous female generations in their family. I think that when I was little I sort of asked my Mum dMum what did you want to be when you were little?T She wanted to be a primary school teacher, but she didn’t. (Anne) I think my Mum is just glad that I am going into something that I want to do. I think that she didn’t have the same opportunities that I have. I think that she respects me . . . or thinks that it is a good decision to find something for me that is secure because in theory it’s a secure occupation. (Christie) Yes, My Mum didn’t have much chance of an education, she left school at fifteen, due to family circumstances, she’s very proud that both my sister and I have gone through. (Sam) Some of these women describe situations where they were the first of their family to enter into higher education: But in my family no one had ever gone to university. . . oh my cousin did but he was a few years older than me. (Anne) My Mum’s got six brothers and sisters, and my sister and I are the first to go to University. (Sam) These women therefore perceive an immense difference between their lives as younger women, compared with those of older women, particularly in terms of having more access to education, employment and doing things that might traditionally be perceived as dmaleT. In recent years, evidence has emerged that young women are indeed enjoying more opportunity to education and employment, particularly since the 1990s (see for example Walby, 1997). Similarly, Brannen and Nilsen (2002, pp. 514–515) suggest that dfor many young women employment and occupational careers which promise economic independence are novel possibilities which were not available to many of their own mothersT. Budgeon (2001, p. 11) argues that din view of these kinds of shifts in gender relations and social structures age will continue to provide a source of difference and the implications of this conflict will continue to provide sources of fragmentation for feminismT. By comparing opportunities with previous generations, these young women were not only describing individual family stories, but also constructing a narrative about change in wider social contexts. Their own educational and sporting success

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emerges here as a reflection of social mobility. As Angela McRobbie has suggested, young women have replaced youth as a metaphor for social change (2000, p. 201, cited in Gonick, 2004). The women in the study were not only alluding to social change, but constructing a particular subject position of women as dfree to chooseT from the many opportunities now available to them: To a certain extent, but I think because my sport is football. . . Nobody’s ever said. . . Mum and Dad have never said you shouldn’t play football because you’re a girl. That’s never been a point that’s come across. They’ve always been sort of, if you like it then go ahead. They’re quite supportive of whatever sport I do. (Julia) I think they [women] are [oppressed] actually in some aspects, I don’t think you see it in England but when you go abroad you see it. (Sam) I would say that in some situations that being female is a disadvantage but in others it can be a sort of, well get on better, find it easier. (Julia) Those women in the study who saw themselves as having a middle class family background, tended not to compare their social location with previous generations. Moreover, they tended to have a stronger belief that being a woman has not made, nor should it make, any difference to either who they are or to their life choices, particularly in a society that ostensibly now provides them with more opportunities, as Louise stresses dI would like to think that in my life the people that I socialise with, or work with, I want them to treat me equally the same as a male counterpartT. Claire suggests that throughout her schooling, dI think whether you were male or female I think it was just to achieve the best you can. I didn’t see any real distinction about how far you can goT. dI don’t think that they [women] are oppressed. I think people can take this too far sometimesT (Fiona). However, both sets of women were drawing upon the ideals of neo-liberalism alluding to the idea that in planning their lives they were not bound to the traditional controls of external dauthoritiesT but were critically engaged in reflexively constructing their identities from other kinds of knowledge and resources (Ferguson, 2001, p. 47). The language of a liberal individualist philosophy is weaved throughout the narratives of these young women emphasizing the autonomous and detached political subject (see Weir, 1997) in constructing a sense of self

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that was dfreeTof gender constraint, and elicits self control and self determination: But I think that [sport] was just something that I got involved in for myself rather than because I was influenced. (Claire) I think I probably behaved [like that] to rebel against what my stepfather is like. (Robin) Mum will sort of put in the odd joke about, you know, where’s your boyfriend kind of thing, but it’s all taken with a pinch of salt because if I turn around to them and say Mum I don’t want to get married, I won’t do it because you want me to. . . (Sam) Well it [sports participation] started a lot earlier than that I guess, right back to primary school when I started going against the grain. (Claire) My parents have always instilled into me make your own choices and stick to them. (Sam) The way I react best to people is if you tell me I can’t do something, I’ll do it to prove. . . not to say that you know, I am not allowed to do that, but. . . (Sam) These are in many ways compelling stories positioning these women as strong, independent, almost female rebel-heroines (dI rebelled against itT) who resist dominant gender expectations by dnot following the normsT. Budgeon (2001, p. 18) suggests that whilst dindividualism privileges the worth of the individual at the expense of the collectivity it can also be a source of agency at the micro-level of everyday practicesT. In her own research on the feminist identities of young women in late modern social conditions, she suggests that dwhilst the young interviewed had no sense of a collective political traditionT they dexercised a politicised agency at the micro-level of everyday social relationsT (Budgeon’s, 2001). Similar to Burdgeon’s participants, there are indeed occasions where individualism was translated by the young women into a belief of having fundamental rights. Indeed education, sport and career options were very important to them, all areas within which significant gains have been made via the second wave feminist movement. In other words, the choices they were making about their lives, were heavily centred on the social conditions that had been challenged and restructured by second wave feminist principles of equal opportunities. They all shared a common belief that women were free and equal with men to explore the

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opportunities of dequal opportunitiesT in practice. The young women were all successful participants of Physical Education and Sport; prime arenas in which they construct identities which resist the dnormT. Indeed, some find pleasure and empowerment through challenging traditionally male orthodoxies. dWomen’s rugbyT. I don’t play women’s rugby I am just a woman that happens to play rugby. Yet people will see it. . . like people will never say oh you play men’s rugby? That’s not an issue. Yeah I mean the amount of people that don’t think that women should do it. . . never mind all the stereotype gay images that it gets. Which yeah you do get in other women’s sports like hockey and netball, sports like that. . . it’s made it more exciting I think. . . It was something different . . . something that not many people have the chance to do. . . It was a male sport so it was . . . just to be able to say to people that you play rugby just waiting for the reaction it’s like nothing else. . . you say to people you play hockey and it’s like oh right and you say that you play rugby and you just wait for some sort of reaction. But I play it because I enjoy it not because I am trying to get a reaction. . . Yeah I mean people have been . . . I mean when you tell them that you play rugby you automatically think oh what must they be thinking of me? Which makes it a lot more interesting. . . I actually find it quite interesting to find out what people think of me and it doesn’t matter what they say . . . I can just . . . they’ve got their right to an opinion. I’ve heard lots of ignorant opinions about women playing rugby and you just laugh at them because there is no point in trying to educate . . . well I wouldn’t want to waste my energy trying to educate them. They’ve got their opinion and it’s hard to change people’s opinions. (Anne) Yeah, if I went into teaching and if I had influence I’d definitely try and make it so that girls sport has the same status as boys sport, I think it’s coming about more anyway now, it just takes time. . . so that. I think it’s important to get the kids out there doing it. . . (Fiona) Whilst therefore, there are parallels with Budgeon’s (2001) position that there may well be merits to exercising a form of agency associated with individualism, the stories of the ten women interviewed suggested that there are a whole range of more negative implications when doing so. It not only tended to obscure structured and socio-cultural gendered inequalities, but did so in

differing ways according to social location, and had an effect on the ways in which these young women themselves reified gender binaries and distanced themselves from feminism. Consider for example, the ways in which Robin and Christie, in living out the ideals of neo-liberalism actively fix and distance (Skeggs, 2004) themselves from their own family: The relationship that went on between my Mum and my stepfather, very. . . very . . . I mean like I say they have broken up now, divorced last April whenever it was before I went away and the main breakdown of that was because of my step fathers perceptions of what he thought that Mum should do . . . and even though he and Mum were earning about the same amount of money he thought no he’s the male, he dominates the house and rules and if you don’t like it you can get out and find somewhere else to live and I think that has really effect me and it has made me a lot more independent. . .. My stepfather, he was very . . . he was my stepfather. . .at the time he was a panel beater in a factory, cars. He was the same, he left school at fourteen I think, and went into the navy so he was completely against me going up the education system, he thought I should leave and just get an ordinary job. . .my stepfather and the way he was I was actually not, I was never allowed to go out when. . . I was at home I was kept in. As soon as school finished I was kept in and that was it. I wasn’t allowed to go out at the weekends and I didn’t have social groups . . . Mum is very feminine, very. . . this is how females behave and this is how they react and my step father has definitely got a very,. . . a very definite picture as well. He is actually quite sexist I would say. (Robin) Definitely independent, it forces you to be independent. . . um . . . I don’t know if that is particularly because I am female or not. . . In the way that my Dad treated my Mum. Not necessarily the way that they treated me, because they did just let me get on with my own life in the way that I want and there was no real. . . I didn’t feel that I was ever letting them down, or not living up to their expectations. . . but probably in the way in which he treated my Mum I perhaps did [find it problematic] [. . .] I think because Mum was kind of so reliant on him that will make me the opposite. . . yeah I don’t want to be in the situation where I am reliant. I supported myself the whole way through University, they gave me nothing. I don’t get very

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much grant so it’s literally . . . I’ve done everything. I mean when I came to University I had a partner, but I wouldn’t rely on him. Even though he started to work and that, I refused to rely on him which was . . . I mean it probably causes a bit of friction so I would rather avoid it. I don’t want to be the sort of . . . how would you describe it . . . the pathetic female? (laughter) You know, whatever the stereotypes are. (Christie) Some might argue that this is merely a positive reflection of the changing structural transformation in the social organization of intimacy, and of the ways in which, as Giddens (1998) notes, the dtraditional familyT may no longer come to reflect the actual lived experience of many people. The increasing divorce rate and the number of single parent families seem to have an impact upon some young women and girls (Francis, 1998) whereby one no longer has to drely on a manT. In all of the women’s narratives, there is the core theme of dindependenceT, but what Christie and Robins stories reveal is that for the working class women, this dselfidentification is closely linked to their parents circumstances and their own struggle to descapeT (Lucey, Melody, & Walkerdine, 2003, p. 289). Skeggs (2004) suggests that the discursive fixing of dothersT to different locations, enables dpositional agencyT and free will, the sort of individualisation so heavily featured with discourses of neo-liberalism. Lucey et al. (2003) argue that these sort of narratives, where there is an unwillingness to dmake a fuss about anythingT in terms of relying on others for financial help, may well speak of massive dpsychic defence . . . to deal with difficult and contradictory feelings that educational success and failure so acutely, though often unconsciously, provoke for working-class peopleT (Lucey et al., 2003, p. 287). One of the key points here that Lucey et al. (2003) argue is that for working class daughters the drive to higher education and good careers may present deep ambivalence because it is about not becoming like their parents. Conversely, there is also a sense of empowerment that is gained through this belief of entitlement and social mobility; they do not want to see themselves as victims of discrimination, since to do so, in Christie’s words would be dto feel like a pathetic femaleT. However, both Robin and Christie resolve the gendered tensions they experience by suggesting that these conditions only led them to become more independent; it becomes a personal challenge. In this sense, this is a very ambiguous position for these women; they are drawing on a discourse which suggests endless options for their life paths, but at the same time this is dtampered and regu-

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lated by the kind of meritocratic principles that can explain any failure to dachieveT and to dhaveT as a kind of personal one (Lucey et al., 2003, p. 285). To fail, becomes a personal lack, and is to embody what Christie describes as dthe pathetic femaleT. Whilst experienced differently, all of the women tended to draw upon the ideals of the neo-liberal subject that was dtaken to be freed from traditional ties of location, class and gender and to be completely selfproducedT (Walkerdine, 2003, p. 240). Existentially, the narratives above tended to assume a separation of self from gendered contexts, and a belief that ones individual determination to become or achieve something, (the rebellious selves described above) is enough to overcome social constraint. It assumes that to dgo against the grainT as Claire suggests, is a choice that one can make to re-position themselves outside of gender inequality. This type of feminist affiliation has been referred to as popular feminism (Skeggs, 1997) or ddo-it yourselfT feminism (Bail, 1996, pp. 3–4), whereby women do not define themselves by some collective gender affiliation, but by individual or dpersonal challengesT. Skeggs (1997, p. 144) argues that dwhile it does this it detaches feminism from the social and the systematic. It reduces feminism to the solitary individualT. Clearly, as Budgeon (2001) argues there are merits to this position in terms of how these young women have utilized it in the context of negotiating access to whatever it is they want to do. However it also emerges in some ways as what Furlong and Cartmel (1997, p. 109) refer to as an depistemological fallacyT around which late modernity resolves. They assert that individualism rather problematically obscures underlying social structures. It assumes that as a detached self one is in a position of independence (no longer intrinsic needs for others). Weir (1997, cited in Dillabough, 1999) suggests this sort of liberal position is an unrealistic abstraction. It further assumes that women can dacquire the necessary freedom to act politically in their own name if they can detach themselves from their social experienceT (Dillabough, 1999, p. 378); much like the liberal individualism that permeated the key storylines of their biographies. Such complexities reveal dthe delusionary character of selfdetermining, individualistic and autonomous ideas of subjectivityT (Gonick, 2004, p. 204). In drawing on the language of individualisation, these women become disinclined to associate with a group that would be seen to be dvictimsT since it ultimately undermines the carefully constructed sense of agency that is integral to their identity narratives. Moreover, this form of feminism also assumes some level of emancipation from traditions and conditions of

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domination as already achieved enabling these women to distance themselves from the position of dvictimT or ddisadvantagedT and thereby continue to construct the type of narratives as outlined above. It is a narrative which draws on notions of rational actors who can free themselves from constraint if they dmake the effort to do soT, and in this sense may depoliticise the inequitable social structures which have an impact on their lives. Indeed, participants felt that they were accountable for their choices, for everything they do, or fail to do/achieve. This, it seems, has a negative implication for the way in which these young women assigned particular subjectivities to other girls/women who were not like them. This last point was most clearly seen in the life stories when some of the women showed an obvious disdain for other women or girls who might be perceived as weak, or who dfailed to exercise individual choiceT. Consider the comments below: It’s difficult to play games when there are only two out of a class of twenty-four, and ten are not doing it because they don’t want to break their nails. (Christie) The groups really started to form by the GCSE year where the divides really started to form between those that were sporting and those who were dslappersT and there was a distinct divide. . . I suppose my best friend Mary, was the most feminine, good looking and yet was a very good tennis player and quite a good hockey player. . . I mean the girlygirls wouldn’t turn up if it was raining or anything like that. . . Whereas those that really were achieving were there getting stuck in, getting dirty, whatever the weather getting really passionate about it. (Claire) I’ve never. . . well I remember Lacrosse at school there was never once where I didn’t want to go out and play, it didn’t matter what the weather was like I always enjoyed PE. (Fiona) These comments were typical of the ways in these women who identified themselves as strong and independent, felt frustrated and disappointed by other girls or women who failed to make the most of opportunities (for a fuller exploration of this, see Rich, 2004). Ultimately, the story goes that the dgirly-girlsT only have themselves to blame for not seizing their opportunity. Of course when the social structures which may prevent other girls from participating in sport become

dobscuredT, it becomes all to easy to position these girls as dfailing to exercise choiceT (Furlong & Cartmel, 1997). It must be noted that there are other occasions when these young women are clearly very sensitive to gender inequalities. The point here however, is that when drawing upon the particular discourse of individualism, there is little scope for acknowledging the mediating gendered dynamics that may have socialised their non-participating peers out of taking part in sport (or indeed in other cases education, careers, etc). Dilemmas of difference An interesting dynamic emerges in the above extracts. On the one hand, these women do not account for the gendered structures that might prevent dgirliegirlsT from taking part in sport, and rest the blame for their lack of participation on the individual. However, by drawing on language like dgirlie-girlsT, dslappersT and ideas about femininity and passivity (breaking their nails) they implicitly invoke gendered binaries. They come to interpret these girls and their relative sense of self along familiar gendered storylines. However, it becomes very difficult to talk explicitly about these structures when drawing upon the language of individualism. Such dilemmas emerged in other ways too. Whilst the participants went some way towards constituting themselves as unitary, autonomous selves within a discourse of individualism, many of them reported experiences that alluded to negotiating a variety of subjectivities within deeply gendered social contexts. Indeed, there is a subtle but noxious double bind here in that the young women want to live out the ideals of individualism—to challenge, make choices, shape their own lives. However, if they are to express (or be allowed to express) these qualities, they (that is to say the dtraitsT) are invariably stereotyped and positioned by gender. Whilst this does not appear to dissolve the participants’ agency for exhibiting alternative forms of identity, it does narrow its scope and likelihood, largely because it is not awarded the same legitimacy as others. Many of them described experiences of dgender role maintenanceT whereby others around them policed their femininity through peer acceptance or rejection (Davies, 1989c). They alluded to the danger and consequences of being relegated to dgender marginsT and ridiculed or ostracised by peers when taking up non-traditional positions (see Davies, 1989b, 1993; Francis, 1998). My Mother especially, would discourage me from . . . well if I said I was going to aerobics that would be fine but if I said I was going to the multi gym and

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said hey Mum guess how much weight I’m lifting then she was never very impressed and would always say be careful or say don’t start to look all butch and masculine. (Claire)

these women feel such a strong connection with maintaining femininity (albeit this is many ways a contradictory position for them). Walkerdine (2003, p. 242) argues that it is the

In these cases, certain subjectivities became dunavailableT to them (Walkerdine, 1988), and is illustrative of the way in which particular gendered discursive practices clash sharply with the notion of rational autonomous self. Their involvement in sport and physical education brought with it a concern over their embodied femininity. For some time, it has been recognised that PE and sport have a history celebrating hegemonic competitive masculinity, featuring white, middle class practices and values (see, for example Hargreaves, 1986; Kirk, 1993). The dcult of masculinityT (Clarke, 1998) manifested in these contexts is seen to contribute to the social (re)production of gender difference (Griffin, 1989; Talbot, 1993; Wright, 1997). Moreover, the professional body of the female physical educator has long been inscribed as dlesbianT and is perhaps indicative of the types of control over women’s physicality which serve as da constant reminder to women that they are bodies first and people secondT (Bloom & Munro, 1995, p. 109). As a consequence, they were active in holding onto certain aspects or dsignifiersT of their femininity, concerned that outside of a sports context they might loose legitimacy to feminine identity. They draw upon a number of rules (or narratives) learnt through bodily discourse; images of appropriate clothing, body shapes, facial expressions, movements, behaviour:

qualities ascribed to femininity which are understood as the central carriers of the new middle class-individuality, building upon the long established incitement to women to become producers of themselves as objects of the gaze.

Yeah, and I like big groups, I like the team situation, I like that sort of thing, and I suppose partly I wouldn’t say I was stubborn but I wasn’t going to let that stop me. There’s no way, if anything it probably drove me on to be, to want to do, you know, more. Although I did stop [throwing] because they started to, once I got to about sixteen they wanted me to do weights and I didn’t want to do them. I didn’t want to be Fatima Whitbread. . . Which is probably the only thing that I actually . . .then suddenly, I mean football and that I carried on but with [throwing] for some reason as soon as sort of weights . . . very . . . I suddenly just stopped. They kind of said that weights was the way to improve and carry on. I suppose I got to the point where I wasn’t really improving and then I sort of stopped really. (Christie) If, as suggested above, these young women are constructing a sense of self which in many ways draws upon neo-liberalism, it is hardly surprising that

Consequently, their narratives reflect both social reproduction and change. As Kenway (1994) suggests we should do, these women, through their active participation in particular activities, are experimenting with a variety of ways of being female, and as Wright (1996) suggests, finding ways of empowering themselves to feel confident and skilled in using their bodies in particular practices. Whilst many are laying cross-gender foundations, they are also at times uncomfortable that they may be taking too great a drisk with their gender identitiesT (Kenway, 1994, p. 200) with some of the things they might say or do. Whilst these young women may not be dblindT to these inequalities, the demands of liberal individualism may well prevent them from challenging such constraint. bI wouldn’t say that I was a feminist, I just know what I valueQ . . .. (Christie): Liberal Individualism and the Politics of Feminist Identities For feminists, resistance is a slippery construct in which we grapple with the need to claim a position as a subject, resisting our erasure, while recognising that the very appropriation of subjecthood reifies the category of subject that has been essential to patriarchy (Gilmore, 1994; Jacobs, Munro, & Adams, 1995; Munro, 1998, p. 30). Negotiating the contradictory positions outlined above became particularly difficult when the participants took up posts in schools as student teachers. Before starting their teacher training, all of the women had expressed a concern to be teachers who could provide equal opportunities for all their pupils to access positive experiences of education. Alongside this, they also claimed that they did not see themselves as feminists, as Sam comments dI think in terms of, for me the word feminist, I don’t really like the word. . .it’s a bit too in your face but I haven’t a problem with equality, there’s a difference I thinkT. I continued to interview the women as they were undergoing their teacher training, and had begun to go out and practice teaching in schools as part of this course. During this time, many of

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them reported witnessing or being subject to forms of inequality that became particularly personal and direct, and at times of a sexual nature, as Christie describes: There was one bloke there [male PE teacher] and he was very funny and he was a good laugh but some of the comments that he made to the kids were very derogatory, you know one of the lads had a buckle on his shoe and he was calling him a. . . I can’t remember what he called him now .. a dancer .. he was saying oh you look like a . . .I don’t know if he actually called him a poof but it was some term along that line. And I’d think I don’t really think you should have quite put it like that and they make some comments to me about, you know, football, of what do you know about football. And just . . .I’d give as good as I got for a bit and then I’d just be like oh carry on .. To be honest I’ve been amazed by some of the stuff that I’ve heard at the school. I mean the other day, there is this one teacher, a male, and he is supposed to be one of the best teachers in the school. Anyway, we were all in the staff room and they’ve got exams on at the moment and this guy was talking about the fact that when the kids sat at their desks, during exams, the girls skirts like come up and he was going on about the fact that he could see the girls knickers. They even call them slappers and things like that, and you know its just not appropriate but everyone laughs, everyone joins in and that’s it. . . how are you supposed to fight that? I really want to just walk out of the room but then it would just be the case that the tables would have been turned around onto me and I would be the one to look bad, you know? The above are alarming practices which one would hope no teacher would engage with. Such classroom talk, which clearly objectifies young girls and boys, contributes towards sexist norms and demonstrates a deep-seated acceptance of misogynist attitudes as natural (Nayak & Kehily, 1996). The presence of such a powerful heterosexist discourse makes the stakes high for women and others speaking up in these contexts. Christie, like many of the other women who described similar experiences, claims that she simply felt unable to challenge these practices. To do so, would result in being positioned in a stigmatised way, in Christie’s words, she would dbe the one to look badT. Christie was concerned about the ways in which challenging such inequality would result in being labelled a feminist, something which she had previously experienced:

I think if you say that you are a feminist then there is all that negative comments or opinions in people’s minds. I wouldn’t say that I am a feminist although I have been described as it. People say oh Christie is on her feminist run again, just because I might question a referee. How long do you play? What do you mean how long do we play it’s football we play 90 minutes. . . I hate that question. As captain if the referee asks me and there was anyone nearby they’d be like dOh no, Christie is going to get on her feminist pointT. I wouldn’t say that I was a feminist or even that I knew that much about feminism . . . I just . . . know what I value. But then I know it’s probably not his fault, inexperience with women’s football, and it may be a genuine question from his point of view. But.. oh . . . I don’t know . . . I suppose I’m not a feminist but then . . . (Christie) Much of this distancing appeared to be related to a caricature of dfeminist-as-activistT located in second wave feminism, and its irrelevance for these women, as Christie suggests, dI’m not about to start lobbyingT. To engage in a feminist discourse was to be associated with disadvantage, or to draw upon a position of dvictimT or as Christie describes it, to be the dpathetic femaleT. To draw on a traditional feminist discourse was for these young women, to risk including disadvantage in their narratives, to be the victim of male oppression, and rupture a powerful sense of self-determination so intimately bound with the discourse of individualisation: I believe in some of the issues but I also think that sometimes it can be taken to an extreme as soon as you mention feminism and I think that is just the same as male. . . I don’t think we should go over the top . . . I think the fact is that we want it to be equal, we are all equal and that’s it. (Christie) A further complexity emerges here. The accounts above suggest that alongside the dvictimT position, there are also other undesirable discourses that feminism raises for the young women that cut across older, established and seeming unchanging discourses about conventional femininity. That is, there is much slippage between being active and strident, demanding and assertive; all of which is read as aggressive, unfeminine, and in some ways unacceptable—dshe took it too farT (Sam, see below). I wasn’t even aware of what a feminist was and I thought they were all lesbians and thought that females ought to be better than males, not just

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equal and as far as I am concerned I just want them equal. . . It’s like the women playing football and things like that, I don’t have a problem with that at all. But I don’t want women to play football against men, I want women to play football against women, and that will just take a lot longer to develop. (Claire) In the following, Sam, who claims she is very much for dequalityT, goes on to describe a dfeministT lecturer who had taught her, describing her as one of the dweird ones. . . that we’d sort of go.. mmm aboutT; Yes, and we used to say, oh here we go another man bashing session again. She would just come out and reel it all off. She had this brilliant way, at the beginning of the session she’s say like this isn’t going to be a man bashing session and we’d all look at each other and go dyeah rightT (laughter). . .I think we very much saw her as a raving feminist. I mean I don’t think, have you met her or seen her? . . .she’s quite an overpowering character, you know you see her straight away, and she always used to dress in sort of flowing dark clothes and all her hair. She would just come in and say things like . . .er . . . oh my Husband, but never mind we’re finished now, or my son he does this and it’s not good. You think, oh, I don’t want to put a foot wrong because she’ll shout at me. There’s a lot of jokes about [her] you know, . . .raving feminist. . . Yes, because she always, I think one of her lectures she was talking about equality and she just took it, and most of the football team were friends together and we were all in the same lectures. I remember sitting down after the lectures and us saying you know that wasn’t equality she wanted, she wanted women to be better than men in football. We would think well no it’s a completely different game. I think quite a few of us would quite happily stick our hands up in the lecture and go actually no we disagree with this. But not to the extent that we don’t want equality, she took it that stage too far. (Sam) [. . .] I think lots of people would see a feminist as anti-men. It could be I don’t know, really stereotypical gay women. Women’s rights and that sort of thing. . . it’s seeing things from a woman’s point of view. (Anne) These extracts suggest that the women were very much aware of having to tread an extremely thin line

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between not being victims, exercising their agency and choice, and remaining dfeminineT. The ambiguity they have to manage therefore is trying to distance their identities from feminist labels, whilst at the same time attempting to maintain a dsystem of equalityT and the ability to exercise individual rights. In some cases this lead to confusion, a sense of incoherence and instability. For example, they ultimately have to justify why, despite their own values, they choose to stay in these contexts and contribute to sometimes, oppressive practices. Interestingly, the resources drawn upon to cope with this, were those of individualisation. Christie resolves this tension by suggesting that she could challenge this herself once she was given the agency and autonomy to do so, by moving from a student teacher position into a full time position in her own school: I think when I am in my own school, full time job, I will be in a better position to challenge things like that, I mean at the end of the day it’s pretty offensive to any woman, and yet there were so many women in there going along with it. The thing is because it is said as a joke, then you’re the one that is seen to be spoiling, the bad one, if you try to challenge it. But I guess in your own school. . . (Christie) By suggesting she had dno other choice at this stageT, Christie is ironically still able to construct a self-image as an active subject. In essence, reifying these professional discourses, whilst simultaneously disrupting it through the telling of her fiction (Walkerdine, 1990) (that she had no other choice). Such experiences rupture the stable narratives that they had attempted to construct, as these young women suddenly find themselves powerless to challenge something they are so strongly against. It raises questions about the types of resources available to them in these and similar scenarios, and the various feminist discourses that are appropriated. Conclusion The life stories presented in this paper illustrate the way in which young women occupy more than one subject position in relation to gender, equality and feminism. In particular, the data supports Gonick’s (2004) argument that the individualism that underlies the possibility of subjectivity in late modernity, or dglobal timesT, may well offer young women and girls new positions that were previously denied to them, but may also constrain what they might become and how they might practice dresistanceT. It is clear that these young women draw upon various discourses at differ-

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ent moments in constructing a sense of self and identity, and in dchoosingT how to live their lives. Whilst these young women do not identify as dfeministT it is clear that much of their interpretive framework draws upon feminist ideals of equal opportunities. However, the data also alluded to the ways in which the individualistic position which to many of these women felt empowering, also had negative implications for how these women came to understand, challenge and resist various forms of gender inequality. What emerges from the accounts of these young women is the gendered processes of what Roberts et al. (1994) called dstructured individualisationT whereby the processes of individualisation (reflexively negotiating ones own life path) are mediated by the continuing effects of social reproduction and structural influence (especially the reproduction of gendered inequalities). Herein lies one of the key complexities as represented in Fig. 1: These women are negotiating gender dynamics as a structure which in many ways constrains them, whilst at the same time constructing a neo-liberal narrative of gender inequality being seen as undesirable and a thing of the past. Similar ambivalences in current discourses on gender have been highlighted by Volman and Ten Dam (1998, p. 541) who suggest that dgender inequality does still exist. . . despite the dominance of the emancipated discourse that emphasizes individual freedom of choiceT. Many of these dilemmas centred on the desire and opportunity to be equal (have access to sport, education, careers, etc), but being positioned as ddifferentT by others (see Bacchi’s, 1990 Same Difference). Such dynamics reflect Gonick’s (2004) argument that girls live out the effects of neoliberal discourses of individuality in particularly complicated ways, largely due to the traditional oppositional construction of femininity and masculinity. Whilst on the one hand they are constructing a sense of self as autonomous and free to choose, the above extracts are suggestive of the way in which their gendered sense of self and choices are relationally positioned within and against other discourses. Thus, the production of subjectivity is not free in the absolute sense of inventing new subjectivity as one chooses, even though the individual may take an active role in engaging in repositioning themselves. But these may feel dfreeT when made sense of through a discourse of individualism. As Bauman (1998, p. 86, cited in Brannen & Nilsen, 2002) suggests dall of us are doomed to the life of choices, but not all of us have the means to be choosersT. The life stories allude to the ways in which these dynamics may work negatively to reduce problems that

young women experience in exercising their rights, as dindividual problemsT, rather than dpoliticalT dsocioculturalT or dcollectiveT ones. In this sense, individualistic feminism did appear to be problematic when trying to challenge or resist sexism, homophobia and other inequalities. This would appear to be a fundamental problem of a liberal individualist politics (Whelehan, 1995, p. 220). Volman and Ten Dam (1998, p. 542) suggest dyoung people are no longer brought up with the discourses that explicitly legitimise gender inequality, but neither do they have access to discourses that effectively acknowledge, explain and oppose gender inequalityT. The data in this study goes on to reveal an even more complex picture—Many of those discourses that could help to challenge gender inequality are not only stigmatised as dunfeminineT, but gender inequalities are being masked through a neo-liberal position which in many ways, rather paradoxically feels empowering to young women. This is not however, to suggest that feminism carries no currency in the lives of these young women, but that it has a rather ambiguous place when being female under neo-liberalism. Whilst young women in this study were not involved in feminist activism, nor did they claim to be feminists, there is of course a strong sense that what they do is guided by feminist ideals. Moreover, there are occasions where they draw on alternative discourses other than individualistic ones. It would be remiss to say that these they are apolitical or focused solely on the pursuit of achieving personal goals above and beyond helping those who may not be so well disposed to challenging inequality. Indeed, the ambiguities around the dfeministT identities that they negotiate may well be a reflection of the ways in which dchoiceT has become a taken for granted right (Budgeon, 2001), a central and expected feature of the ways in which young women shape their biographies. References Bacchi, C. L. (1990). Same difference: Feminism and sexual difference. Sydney7 Allen and Unwin. Bail, K. (1996). Introduction. In Bail Kathy (Ed.), DIY feminism. St Leonards7 Allen and Unwin. Baumgardner, Jennifer, & Richards, Amy (2000). Manifesta: Young women, feminism, and the future. New York7 Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Bhavani, Kum-Kum, Kent, K. R., & Twine, F. R. (1998). Editorial. Signs, 23(3), 575 – 583. Bjerrum-Nielsen, H., & Rudberg, M. (1994). Psychological gender and modernity. Oslo7 Scandinavian University Press. Bloom, L. R., & Munro, P. (1995). Conflicts in selves: Nonunitary subjectivity in women administrators life history narratives. In

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Hirsch, Marianne, & Keller, Evelyn Fox (Eds.) (1990). Conflicts in Feminism. London7 Routledge. Jacobs, M., Munro, P., & Adams, N. (1995). Palimpsest: (Re)reading women’s lives. Qualitative Inquiry, 1, 327 – 345. Kenway, J. (1994). Making dHope PracticalT rather than dDespair ConvincingT: Feminist post-structuralism, gender reform and educational change. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 15(2), 187 – 210. Kirk, D. (1993). The body, schooling and culture. Geelong7 Deakin University Press. Lucey, H., Melody, J., & Walkerdine, V. (2003). Project 4:21 transitions to womanhood: Developing a psychosocial perspective in one longitudinal study. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 6(3), 279 – 284. Munro, P. (1998). Subject to fiction: Women teachers’ life history narratives and the cultural politics of resistance. London7 Open University Press. Nayak, A., & Kehily, M. (1996). Playing it straight: Masculinities, homophobias and schooling. Journal of Gender Studies, 5(2), 211 – 230. Rich, E. (2004). Exploring teachers’ biographies and perceptions of girls’ participation in physical education. European Physical Education Review, 10(2), 220 – 245. Roberts, K., Clark, S. C., & Wallace, C. (1994). Flexibility and individualisation: A comparison of transitions into employment in England and Germany. Sociology, 28(1), 31 – 54. Skeggs, Beverly (1997). Formations of class and gender. London7 Sage. Skeggs, B. (2004). Class, self, culture. London7 RoutledgeFalmer. Sparkes, A. C. (1995). Living our stories, storying our lives, and the spaces in between: Life history research as a force for change. In A. C. Sparkes (Ed.), Research in physical education and sport: Exploring alternative visions (pp. 74 – 89). Lewes7 Falmer Press. Talbot, M. (1993). A gendered physical education: Equality and sexism. In J. Evans (Ed.), Equality, education and physical education (pp. 74 – 89). London7 Falmer Press. Trioli, Virginia (1996). Generation f: Sex, power and the young feminist. Port Melbourne7 Minerva. Volman, M., & Ten Dam, G. (1998). Equal but different: Contradictions in the development of gender identity in the 1990s. British Journal of Sociology of Education, 19(4), 529 – 545. Walby, S. (1997). Gender transformations. London7 Routledge. Walkerdine, V. (1988). Counting girls out: Girls and mathematics. London7 Falmer Press. Walkerdine, V. (1989). Femininity as performance. Oxford Review of Education, 15(3), 267 – 279. Walkerdine, V. (1990). Schoolgirl fictions. London7 Verso. Walkerdine, V. (2003). Reclassifying upward mobility: Femininity and the neo-liberal subject. Gender and Education, 15(3), 237 – 248. Weir, A. (1997). Sacrificial logics: Feminist theory and the critique of identity. New York7 Routledge. Whelehan, Imelda (1995). Modern feminist thought: From 2nd wave to dPost-FeminismT. Edinburgh7 Edinburgh University Press. Wright, J. (1996). The construction of complementarity in physical education. Gender and Education, 8(1), 61 – 79. Wright, J. (1997). The construction of gendered contexts in single sex and coeducational physical education lessons. Sport, Education and Society, 21(1), 55 – 72. Zita, Jacquelyn N. (1997). Introduction. Hypatia, 12(3), 1 – 6

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Further reading Bulbeck, Chilla (1997). Living feminism: The impact of the women’s movement on three generations of Australian women. Cambridge7 Cambridge University Press. Scott, J. W. (1988). Deconstructing equality-versus-difference: Or, the uses of poststructuralist theory for feminism. Feminist Studies, 14(1), 33 – 49.

Walkerdine, V., Lucy, H., & Melody, J. (2001). Growing up girl: Psychosexual explorations of gender and class. London7 Palgrave. Winship, J. (1985). dA girl needs to get street-wiseT: Magazines for the 1980s. Feminist Review, 21.