Gender Benders, Bronies and Heroines

The first Saturday of every May is Free Comic Day - Were you able to head to your favorite comic book store and support such a wonderful event?  Many happy faces were leaving the stores once they could get inside! But the long lines are worth it for the experience =)!

I hope everyone had an awesome Star Wars Day! May the Fourth be with you and also the Fifth! I supported the day by wearing my Yoda shirt. A few children I saw around the city had Princess Leia hairstyles, Star Wars character shirts or lightsabers. The Disney Store had an event at noon with a giveaways and fun for all ages. Yay!

George Lucas and Disney Characters in their Star Wars roles.

One topic that appeared Fall and Spring semester in my field notes was the children looking at characters and not knowing really knowing their gender. Children could tell with ease the gender of characters from stories like Star Wars. They told me it was based on their clothing. Yet, My Little Pony (MLP) brought up major debates in the classroom. Is Rainbow Dash a boy or girl?? Most of the ponies have a clearly masculine or feminine look. Yet, Rainbow Dash's look is gender neutral. Her body color is blue, her hair type is multi-colored with a messy style compared to the other female MLPs with neatly combed hair. A few of the three year olds, both boys and girls, believed Rainbow Dash was a boy because, "He do what he wants!" and "He is wild!" When I asked what does being wild mean to them, most of the three year olds paused and could not respond. Another three year old tried to explain it to me with many "Um.. Um.. Um.. Um...well...I don't know! He ....just is!" I was really curious about this answer. When watching MLP, I can see why a child would interpret Rainbow Dash's actions as wild or as some of the three year old girls say to other girls when playing boys or daddys, "You have to act like a boy!" Rainbow Dash is not as feminine as the other female ponies. She is very adventurous and very impulsive, traits children typically associate with boys in the classroom. When I told the Pre -K boys and girls about what the three year olds felt, they thought it was silly they mistook her for a boy. But, they did agree that Rainbow Dash was wild! One boy described jumped up with both hands up describing Rainbow Dash as free! He liked her because he wanted to be like her and make his own rules. He always mentions hating nap time because he never wants to sleep. Girls that participated in the conversation felt that Rainbow Dash was "really cool" and "funny silly" because she got into trouble but was still a good friend.

           

Dr Whooves  

Rainbow Dash

Rainbow Dash

Rainbow Dash is the pony pulling the others to safety.

The boys and girls mentioned Twilight Sparkle and Rainbow Dash as their top favorite ponies. You can check out their personalities in the clips below.

Fall semester, one Pre K class was so involved in MLP, their large class of 26 had daily Bronies and Princess Pony sessions. While I tried to capture all of the dialogue by hand, it became nearly impossible when six groups of Dr. Hooves, Princess Celestia and Rainbow Dashes were stampeding through the room! These teachers were aware of their classroom's  popular culture power play and let the play continue as long as they galloped and without running. The girls often fought over who would be Princess Celestia but there were two girls who were always Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle because those ponies were "bffs" on the show and the girls grew up together after meeting at school when they were in the Toddler room. The most interesting dialogue between the boys and girls was exchanged when they assumed their pony personalities. The girls and boys playing Fluttershy and was really accurate. So much so, their teachers mistakenly thought the children were scared by sudden lights, darkness and voices/sounds in the room. It was also quite the event when the children continued their pony personas during snack. Rainbow Dash was scolded by Princess Celestia for having her hooves on the table as well as eating her yogurt and graham crackers too quickly. Twilight Sparkle was told to be a better princess by sitting up straight.  Dr. Hooves said he would help anyone who had a tummy ache from too much yogurt at his doctor's office and send them to the store for free medicine.

The drawing below is of  a "Princess Pony." When I asked her which pony she drew, she asked me to guess. Of course, it is Princess Celestia! When I showed this child's picture to the Pre K children at the school who called Rainbow Dash free and wild, the three year olds could also tell it was Princess Celestia. After examining the photo closer, the majority of the class decided  it was not really Princess Celestia and just a Princess Pony because her "cutie mark" was wrong. Some girls protested that it could only be Princess Celestia if the cutie mark was a sun like the Real Princess Celestia. Some of boys and girls felt that it could be whatever she wanted it to be. Through MLP, children

Princess Pony - Princess Celestia

Princess Celestia

Many of the children in my classrooms become aware of gender through their choice of clothing, hairstyle and the personas of their favorite characters. When we sing songs from Disney's Frozen, children from all of my classrooms ask me what the other children are doing. I noticed that many questions are emphasizing gender, "Do the boys sing Frozen too like me?" "Are the boys  Elsa or Anna?" "Do the girls play Hans and Kristoff? 'Cuz no one likes Hans. I can be Kristoff and you be Anna!" While there are many boys and girls in my classrooms who love MLP,only the girls wear MLP clothing: hoodies and shirts. One boy did like one of the girl's new MLP sweatshirt. When she entered, I said, "Good Morning Pinkie Pie!" She giggled and pointed to the other two ponies. I continued, "Wow! Its Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle!" One of the boys ran up and hugged her and said, "Now all the best friends are here!" He is huge Rainbow Dash fan! His parents mentioned to me before that they would prefer he plays with MLP's of other children at school rather than buy him MLP toys and he feel embarrassed later. It reminded me of a recent MLP incident at an East Coast elementary school...

The incident caused quite a bit of sadness in my school age classroom when I informed them about a boy who was bullied in his school for being a liking MLP. He was picked on for bringing his MLP lunch box to school. Since the school administrator deemed the lunch box the cause of the bullying rather than discipline the bullies, many of the Pre K and school age children were shocked. They felt very sad for the boy for not being able to bring what he loved with him to school. It alludes to the connections children build with each object from popular culture they accumulate. Each popular culture artifact was chosen by the child because they identify with qualities of the character and place meaningful memories and feelings representing the experience they had when the artifact was bought/given to them. 

But I feared there were more incidents than just this one. I googled boys bullied for liking MLP and came across the story of an eleven year old who attempted to commit suicide for being a brony.

RuPaul!



I assumed with the highly successful and popularity of RuPaul's Drag Race franchise and movies with superheroes of both genders found in Avengers and X-Men that children were growing up with images of gender flexibility promoting gender freedom. There are so many toys marketed for boys and girls to create play free of gender it seems one boundary that not all children or adults will choose to break. It is a step forward that there are so many types of toys, cartoons and pop culture items children can choose to represent themselves just the way they want. It is just such a shame children are suffering to stay brave and show who they are. Individuals who are not accepting of another child's bravery to be themselves and do things differently than other children of the same gender shows there is much to be said for children and their identity building as well as adults' acceptance of children working through multiple traits and qualities children want to incorporate into their identity. 

 X-Men Heroines (Bottom left: Psylocke, Center: Storm, Bottom right: Rogue,
Bottom far right: Rachel Grey
Upper left: Jubilee, Upper Right: Kitty Pryde,

A Purple Crayon, Children's Imagination and Superman

A Purple Crayon is a nod to a child's imagination that all of us should cherish even as we age. One of my brother's customers had a little brother, now in his early 20's, who when asked as a child, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" consistently answered, "A purple crayon." As a child, he did not explain his reasoning. As a man, his reasoning is simple, "Shut Up!" While my brother and the customer laughed at the response, when I was told the story, I reflected on all the children I have worked with. No one wanted to become an object always a professional or a person such as "A doctor," "A [insert job] like Mommy/Daddy/other family member," "Mommy," "Daddy," or their older sibling.  Even when I think about my own childhood, looking through photo albums I was a fairy godmother, photographer, a gymnast, a teacher, an artist and a race car driver. Even now, I really enjoy dragons and unicorns but I do not think I wanted to become one as an adult. Why become someone or something permanently when you can continually change who you are through the video games you play, stories you create, books you read and the movies you watch? The idea of growth and change were qualities I embraced throughout my childhood and adulthood. It was what my mother instilled in both my brother and I throughout our childhood and adolescence. Through my favorite stories I read and watched I did become a dragon and unicorn: The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle, (check out his page here. Hopefully he will come back to San Francisco soon! He is a wonderful person to meet and speak with so hopefully you get an opportunity to meet him as well!) The Baby Unicorn and The Flight of Dragons being my top three childhood favorites.

Another childhood favorite! Does anyone else remember the adventures of this brave mouse? 

Back to purple crayons. I still find it intriguing he chose purple specifically. He could have said an expected color such as red or blue (I am referring to cartoons such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and Voltron where the popular characters are usually wearing these colors) but he chose purple. While many associate purple with royalty and power, I wonder what this child associated purple with. Maybe Barney? He was one popular dinosaur when his television show premiered. But we will never really know his reasoning. So how do we as educators promote a child's growing imagination? First, we must remember and reflect on our childhood to appreciate the dreams and wonders children hold dear. Second, providing children a secure space to freely become whoever they choose to be without labels or restrictions on their identity. 

During my childhood, I was indecisive about my favorite color. I liked them all! One thing I knew for sure was my tastes in stories, cartoons and video games. My love of RPGs (Role Playing Games) and later MMORPGs (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games) began with watching Star Wars, Thundercats, Silverhawks, Macross (introduced to U.S. audiences as Robotech) The Last Unicorn, The Flight of Dragons, The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit animated features with my family. I did not realize until my adult years that the Japanese animation studio illustrating these animated features later reformed after bankruptcy and became Studio Ghibli, home of Miyazaki Hayao's animated features such as My Neighbor Totoro, Nausicaa of the Wind and what he has deemed his last film The Wind Rises.  

   

From the animated features pictured above, my interests in Anime, Japanese Animation, styled cartoons grew to include my interests in the video game franchises Phantasy Star and Final Fantasy. Phantasy Star first appeared on Sega Master System. Does anyone remember that system? I still remember when my mother first brought it home for my brother and I. Excitement! Ever since then, we owned every game console on exception of the Sega Genesis and Neo Geo. The photos below are from the game cover and a promotional artwork. Myau, was my favorite character in this series who gained an ability later on in the story to fly your party members to the fortress above the clouds. If you are interested, check out a Phantasy Star Saga fan page here. 

While many of us are able to revisit many wonderful memories from our childhood through looking at these images, images, brands and icons are ever present in children's lives. When you take your first education class do you remember the instructor mentioning children know icons before they can read? Coming from a family who read Marvel Comics daily, I knew exactly who this was before I knew the McDonald's icon. 

Superman, Spiderman and Batman I saved for last because they are representative of the power icons hold in children's lives. With recent movie additions over the past four years, these characters are well known to children's school gear, dramatic play, storytelling and at times problem solving in the Pre - K class: "Good guys save the day and bad guys go to jail so we are all good guys right?" Some educators I spoke with about their class favorite superheroes, they told me how violent capturing bad guys is. It seems children's love of superheroes gets lost in violence moving the focus from one's duty to be responsible, protect and care for others. When I graduated from undergrad, we were given the opportunity to vote on three commencement speakers, Steven Spielberg, Oprah and Christopher Reeve. Each of these individuals would have been a wonderful speaker but we all felt so honored to see and hear Christopher Reeve. We all wore Superman icons on our gowns; buttons, iron patches and "S" icon balloons adjourned many of our gowns while others wore "S" shirts under their gowns. Everyone was decked out in something with the "S!" 

When Christopher Reeve rolled up in his wheelchair, many of us had tears running down our cheeks. We were so high in the football stands but we could see him clearly. The stadium was silent as he adjusted his microphone before he spoke. He was smiling. He told us to persevere through all obstacles to reach our goal. The hard work would pay off in the future and to keep trying our best to reach our goals. When he finished his speech all of us jumped up to applaud and reveal our Superman gear if the gown was concealing it. Our school of scarlet and grey was covered in red and blue as he exited. I could not wait to tell my mother and brother who were somewhere in the stadium also watching and listening. When I managed to find them after the ceremony, my brother and I cheered and to this day are still so appreciative we got to hear him as my graduation speaker. The following year when we heard the news announcement that he had passed away, we were saddened and reflected on how he really was a Superman through his philanthropy, activism and using his celebrity to bring awareness to world issues. As for the children we work with who enjoy superheroes, just think they could become the next Christopher Reeve or grow up into a young adult who was a child who simply loved purple crayons.