Two patterns of girlhood: Inconsistent sexuality-laden experiences across institutions of socialisation and socio-cultural milieux

The home, school and peer setting play a crucial role in processing socio-cultural conceptions of female sexuality (the social meanings attributed to the girl's sexual and reproductive capacity). This process is not necessarily consistent across institutions of socialisation; yet, notwithstanding growing scholarly interest in girlhood, little is known about institutional variations in sexuality-laden socialisation practices and experiences. The present research simultaneously examines the home, school and peer group experiences of girls from two different milieux, focussing on convergence or divergence between institutions, within and across groups. First-hand accounts of daily experiences, elicited through interviews of 50 teenage girls (advantaged and disadvantaged) studying in two innovative residential settings, suggest that the three institutions of socialisation generate divergent sexuality-laden practices and experiences, and thus that the profile of socialisation differs for each group of girls. The conservative understandings of sexuality generated by practices in the home and the female peer-group of disadvantaged girls were paralleled by progressive understandings in the innovative school. Conversely, it was the school which perpetuated conservative conceptions among advantaged girls, while their homes and female peers instilled progressive ones. An examination of such inconsistencies in gender socialisation can be expected to enhance the understanding of gender identity formation in adolescence. The revealed divergence between institutions within and across groups points to the limits of theories of social reproduction in explaining socialisation practices and experiences, particularly those related to gender socialisation.