In which I review a book I haven't read
Jul. 27th, 2007 04:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
browngirlWell, not review, but discuss.
While I was looking up other things, Amazon recommended to me (ironically), The Dangerous Book For Boys.
My first thought was that, were I the teenager I used to be, I'd've photocopied the whole thing, rather than buying it or checking it out of the library, to read it. My second thought was that, were I the college girl I used to be, I'd've checked it out and read it, then sent the authors a letter saying, "I read your book and I'm a GIRL, so there!"
I'm not either anymore, of course, and I'm not about to do either. If I get the chance I'll definetely flip through it, because books about fun things for kids are still fun reading. I'm annoyed that the authors designated it as specifically For Boys, because in reading about it it looks like a book of fun and variously adventurous activities with a chapter on heterosexual teenage courtship at the end, and I think female children are as entitled to fun and adventure as male children are. And the way that For Boys designation seems to have gone unquestioned... the backlash against feminism continues apace, it seems. *sigh* I'd better vote while I still have the right.
(To say nothing of the heteronormativity. Oy.)
One of the reviews mentioned the "truth that boys and girls are different". Statements like that always make a warning bell go off in the back of my head, because in my experience what it tends to mean is not "the average boy and the average girl would be different, not least in gender-linked ways" but "all boys and all girls are completely different and if a girl does a 'boy' thing or a boy does a 'girl' thing they should be stopped and corrected." Doubtless people are going to tell me I'm overreacting, and to be honest, I rather *hope* I am, in that I really hope the writer of that comment wouldn't punish his hypothetical daughter for reading this book. But I probably would bet that he would.
If I were wealthy, I might buy a bunch of copies of this and deliberately give them out to girls as well as boys, except that I'm not sure I'd have many girls who'd be willing to be seen reading it; I've been reminded, working in a high school, that one tries to fight the power of social normativity at one's peril. *sigh* Well, if I get a chance to read the book I will, and if I get the chance to help a kid who wants to read it do so I surely will, regardless of whether the authors would've wanted us to or not.
While I was looking up other things, Amazon recommended to me (ironically), The Dangerous Book For Boys.
My first thought was that, were I the teenager I used to be, I'd've photocopied the whole thing, rather than buying it or checking it out of the library, to read it. My second thought was that, were I the college girl I used to be, I'd've checked it out and read it, then sent the authors a letter saying, "I read your book and I'm a GIRL, so there!"
I'm not either anymore, of course, and I'm not about to do either. If I get the chance I'll definetely flip through it, because books about fun things for kids are still fun reading. I'm annoyed that the authors designated it as specifically For Boys, because in reading about it it looks like a book of fun and variously adventurous activities with a chapter on heterosexual teenage courtship at the end, and I think female children are as entitled to fun and adventure as male children are. And the way that For Boys designation seems to have gone unquestioned... the backlash against feminism continues apace, it seems. *sigh* I'd better vote while I still have the right.
(To say nothing of the heteronormativity. Oy.)
One of the reviews mentioned the "truth that boys and girls are different". Statements like that always make a warning bell go off in the back of my head, because in my experience what it tends to mean is not "the average boy and the average girl would be different, not least in gender-linked ways" but "all boys and all girls are completely different and if a girl does a 'boy' thing or a boy does a 'girl' thing they should be stopped and corrected." Doubtless people are going to tell me I'm overreacting, and to be honest, I rather *hope* I am, in that I really hope the writer of that comment wouldn't punish his hypothetical daughter for reading this book. But I probably would bet that he would.
If I were wealthy, I might buy a bunch of copies of this and deliberately give them out to girls as well as boys, except that I'm not sure I'd have many girls who'd be willing to be seen reading it; I've been reminded, working in a high school, that one tries to fight the power of social normativity at one's peril. *sigh* Well, if I get a chance to read the book I will, and if I get the chance to help a kid who wants to read it do so I surely will, regardless of whether the authors would've wanted us to or not.
