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Savannah Smith
ENG 413
Final Research Paper
5/4/2015
Teaching Gender through Genre in the Secondary Classroom: Reading and Writing as Acts of
Agency in the Socialization Process
In many discussions surrounding teaching genre in the English Language Arts classroom,
learning to write in a genre is positioned as separate from a unit focused on reading a text that
falls underneath a certain genre. Lattimer, for instance, asserts that genre study is an inquiry into
a text form that is not about reading a particular text but rather about developing strategies of
comprehension appropriate for the genre (4). Smagorinsky, in discussing how one teaches the
writing of fictional narrative (in this case, a suspense story), emphasizes a structured process
approach in which students are taught a set of procedures for how to write such stories (38).
Since each genre of writing is dependent not only on the formal structures of the text, but also on
the audience and purpose in the specific context, it seems counter-intuitive to extricate thematic
content of mentor texts from the strategies related to structure that one can learn from that text.
In other words, no piece of writing is created in a vacuum, so if the goal is for students to
produce authentic, genuine works of their own, one cannot simply model an empty list of
characteristics and steps without exploring how those characteristics impact and inform the topic
that the author of the mentor text is discussing. This essay proposes an investigation of genrein
this case, fictional narrative, dramatic works, and poetry because of the potential Theory of Mind
practice that students can receive, that is tied together under the specific theme of gender and
power. Through looking at a culturally conscious theme in relation to reading and writing,
students can begin to unpack the process of socialization in which they currently find themselves
and assert their own views while using the structures and characteristics that are contextualized
through mentor texts that are provided.

While informational texts about societal issues can provide facts and context for a topic
discussed in the classroom, works of literature offer a different experience while still addressing
those same topics. Lisa Zunshine, in Why We Read Fiction: Theory of Mind and the Novel,
discusses the cognitive concept of Theory of Mind, or mind-reading, in which someone intuits
the mental state or motivations of another person based on actions and expressions. She argues
that all readers practice the same mind-reading with fictional characters, as well. In this case,
she offers the example of Peter Walsh trembling when encountering the love of his youth, Mrs.
Dalloway, yet again. The reader knows that this is trembling is due to his overwhelming
emotions, rather than Parkinsons, for instance (3-4). She asserts that [a]ttributing states of
mind is the default way by which we construct and navigate our social environment, incorrect
though our attributions frequently are (6). Since the use of Theory of Mind in neurotypical
persons is the default way by which [they] construct and navigate [their] social environment, it
is both a reflection of and an influence on the way in which people are positioned in society. For
instance, reading a girl flicking her hair as flirtatious could be a correct attribution in
patriarchal, Westernized culture, but it is not inherently so. Therefore, society influences the use
of Theory of Mind. On the other hand, misattributions in mind-reading could lead to the person
doing the reading being Othered because they are literate in ways that are different than the
dominant culture.
Activating Theory of Mind in the context of literature provides an overt construct for
students to assert their agency within, which can lead to students having the skills necessary to
assert their agency in relation to constructs that they find in the society that they find themselves
in. Zunshine explains that our Theory of Mind allows us to make sense of fictional characters
by investing them with an inexhaustible repertoire of states of mind (20). In this way, the reader

chooses to invest characters with infinite states of mind in the process of meaning-making in
the text. Readers, in making sense of characters, actively construct the social practices that are
evoked on the page by body language, expressions, etc. In the process of mind-reading fictional
characters, the society that readers find themselves in is the point of reference for completing the
construct of fictional mental states. These characters, therefore, have the societal norms of the
readers real-life cultures imposed upon them, and they themselves can be seen as
realistic.Zunshine asserts that [o]ur pleasant illusion that there are at least some minds in our
messy social world that we know well is thus tarnished by our suspicion that even those
ostensibly transparent minds harbor some secrets (20). Instead of providing simplified minds
that provide mind-reading on easy mode, so to speak, the infinite amount of possibilities for
states of minds makes fictional minds just as complicated as those of other human beings.
In Zunshines work, she primarily focuses on the novel, but one can see how this theory
of mind-reading characters can extend to both poetry and drama. In many cases, poetry is still
attempting to evoke a truly human experience, and the job of the reader is to attribute a mental
state to the poetic speaker or other people mentioned in the poem. Drama provides a very unique
Theory of Mind experience. If the play is only experienced on the page, then the reader must
read the characters minds solely based on dialogue and stage directions. If the play is watched,
then the audience must mind-read in real time with actual people in front of them, but in a
completely fictional construct. If the play is enacted, then the actors must read the play, attribute
mental states to their specific characters, and physically construct those mental states in a way
that they believe will be understandable and readable to the audience.
In relation to Theory of Mind in literature and its role in education, adolescents are in a
stage of identity formation that is, in part, informed by the act of mind-reading. Dubb details how

Erikson, a pioneer in childhood development theories, argues that the primary goal of
adolescence is to form an identity based on the skills learned through observing culture. These
skills learned are based on the cues one picks up from [his or] her surroundings (220).
These cues are going to include things such as body language, expressions, and an
understanding of what these kinds of physical indicators mean in society at large. It would be
over-simplistic to jump to the conclusion that being able to read cues in literature will lead to
people being able to be better mind-readers in general, but it does have important implications
for students. By analyzing how a characters fear is evoked, for instance, students are gaining a
skill that they can use to analyze how an actual persons fear is evoked, along with discussing if
misattributions are possible based on societal stereotypes and misconceptions.
On a broader scale, through having to construct the mental states of characters that are
evoked by words on the page, students can become consciously aware of the process of
expressing the human experience through these three broad genres. If the act of mind-reading is
made explicitly known to students, it can give them a new lens that easily lends itself to critical
thinking about the society in which the students find themselves. In analyzing how a character,
poetic speaker, or role in a dramatic work, along with his or her mind and motivations, is
constructed and to what ends, students can discover how this is a reflection of the society that
they themselves have been born into, along with that of the author. Students can extend this
investigation of the construction of a persons identity and mind to the world they find
themselves in. In exploring society through text, an educator could piece together works of
literature that focus on one societal issue (or many that intersect) and relate them back to how
and why human experiences are articulated in a certain way.

If educators ground lessons in student writing in mentor texts that are positioned as part
of a larger conversation about an aspect of society as a whole, students can assert their own
agency in that conversation through the creative process and understand and consciously act
within the constructs that they find in their own culture. Dubb articulates this concept of
literature leading to a better knowledge of society by arguing that in reading [w]e look to
narratives to help us understand our worlds (222). Writing, however, is equally as crucial,
because we look at our worlds to help us create our own stories and eventually understand
ourselves more completely (Bruner, 1991)" (222). Reading literature can provide the social
literacy that students will need to maneuver through their lives in an environment that is
constructed by the author and then interpreted and manipulated. Students, in writing, can then
utilize social literacy in a process of self-reflection and activism in which students are conscious
members of society.
One facet of identity that adolescents are socialized into is that of normalized gender
roles. While understanding what is girly and what is boyish comes in early childhood, it has
been found that a notable increase between 7 and 15 years of age in beliefs that males are
granted more power and respect than females (Martin and Ruble 6). As children enter
adolescence, they become more cognizant of exactly how these gender roles will affect their
position in society and agency. This can be assumed to affect not only those who conform to
these roles, but those who do not even fall within the norms, as well, since their agency and
position is not acknowledged in the research shown above, and by extension, is often overlooked
in society at large. This aspect of identity is not formed solely by an interaction between the child
and the world, however, but involves parents and siblings, peers, other socialization agents, and
the individual child, who all act and interact in varied contexts(18). One of the contexts that

children will find themselves in will be the classroom, and as such, educators play a key role as
gender socialization agents in the lives of their students. It is imperative that the educator is
aware of this important role that he or she plays in students identities and takes it into account
when planning curriculum.
Detailed below are some broad ideas for how one could implement a unit that
incorporates both the reading and writing of genre while focusing on the overarching theme of
the power dynamics of gender. The three genres, as already mentioned, are extremely broad and
include novels, poetry, and drama. The selection of these three is intentional with a goal of
allowing for as much room for student expression as possible, so that students create their own
stories. They also allow for unique mind-reading experiences that allow them to see overt
constructs in many ways. In each of the three genres, there are three suggestions of mentor texts
that range various spaces, times, cultures, and sub-genres. While articulating the implementation
of each genre, there are many broad suggestions for how these could be realized within the
classroom setting.
In relation to dramatic works, a possible text set could include Hedda Gabler by Henrik
Ibsen, The Further Adventures of Hedda Gabler by Jeff Whitty, and Heddatron by Elizabeth
Meriwether. All three of these texts center on Ibsens original titular role of Hedda, but they
explore the issue of the power dynamics of gender in different ways. Hedda Gabler shows the
experiences of a young woman who cannot find a place within the confines of society, and
therefore decides to leave by ending her life. The latter two are adaptations that include the
character of Hedda, but The Further Adventures of Hedda Gabler occurs after Hedda ends her
own life and finds herself in the afterlife with many other characters and archetypes. Heddatron
shows a housewife bored with her mundane life being forced to play the role of Hedda by robots.

These three texts together explore a lot of larger aspects of society in relation to gender, but are
all set in different places and times.
On a thematic level, this exposure to a gender lens could be a beneficial first step, since
these plays lend themselves very easily to looking at gender on a more universal scale. Drama
itself is a good first choice in relation to exploring gender constructs and a characters motives
and mental states, since it inherently relies on the co-creation and negotiation of meaning where
artistic processes can provide new insights and shared understandings (Hatton 156). Hatton is
primarily discussing enacted drama, which offers the most room for students to grapple with the
constructs they may find within the text. By having to take on a role that is inherently gendered
and positioned a certain way within society, students will actively have to make choices about
the way that they will interpret and convey the exact feelings and motives of a given character. In
the classroom, it may impose too many time constraints to act out every scene of a play, but it
would be extremely beneficial for the students to have to perform some of the salient scenes (i.e.
the opening scene of Hedda Gabler in which Hedda is openly annoyed with her husband George
and his aunt, but they are oblivious).
By having students enact some of the text that they are reading, the classroom becomes
an evocative space where voices become visible, where stories can be created, embodied and
shared and, importantly, where belonging, self-esteem and agency can be playfully rehearsed and
revised (Hatton 156). In the process of actually performing a scene, students will have created,
embodied and shared a story of their own making, since no other realization of the text will be
exactly the same. The decision-making process that comes with performance can then be
transferred over to other genres, and the students can carry that self-esteem and agency with
them. In an assessment for this subtopic of this proposed genre unit, students could craft a scene

using one character they have seen in class with two characters that are either archetypal or from
pop culture in order to explore the power dynamics that come with different gender roles within
the norms of society. In this way, students are further claiming their agency over the construct
of gender within society by making it applicable to the current society they find themselves in.
The amount of overwhelm is reduced by the requirement of incorporating one character that they
have already seen in class. The students have moved from reading the minds of characters
through a gender lens and having to think of how their reading would be conveyed to crafting the
characters in a way that will allow their minds to be read by an actor and an audience. The
prompt, however, does not put any constraints on the exact way that students convey their ideas,
and the teacher should emphasize that students can use structures that they have seen before in
the classroom, so that the mentor texts are being utilized to their full potential as necessary.
In relation to novels, three texts that could be part of a text set could include The Yellow
Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, and Jazz
by Toni Morrison. These three novels vary greatly in relation to content, style of narration, and
their setting, but they all offer very poignant views of different familial, platonic, and romantic
relationships in relation to gender. In looking at drama, the students were exposed to the power
dynamics of gender in society at large, and through these novels, they can explore how the power
dynamics of gender affect relationships. These novels vary in setting from the late an isolated
mansion in the late 1800s to Harlem in the 1920s, and the narration varies from first person
stream of consciousness to a third person magic realism narrative. By providing many different
settings with different relationship dynamics and styles of narration, the hope is that students will
be able to see many ways in which constructs have changed and can be evoked through
literature. The type of mind-reading that students can conduct (and craft) will be different when

reading the effusive first-person ramblings of a young woman dealing with postpartum
depression while being confined to her house than when understanding why the dish that Tita
from Like Water for Chocolate makes using rose petals will make everyone who eats it filled
with passionate desire.
In a writing prompt that would allow students to compose their own piece of writing in
relation to the novel, an educator could ask students to write a short sensory first or third-person
narrative that demonstrates the unique and vivid experiences of one person in a relationship
(i.e. siblings, a romantic couple, etc.) Yet again, the prompt gives just enough confines to give
students some traction in moving forward on a piece of writing, such as the limits on narration,
the sensory requirement, and that it must focus on the overarching theme of gender dynamics in
a relationship. The students should feel free to incorporate whatever forms they found most
effective or interesting in the novels so they can claim their own agency over their piece of
writing and the themes they are trying to articulate. In this way, the students will be able to
read the world around them, find their own narrative voices, and eventually affirm their

places in society by creating their own subjectivities and becoming authors of their own
stories(Dubb 219). Since the piece of writing can focus on any type of relationship and
setting, the students should have enough openness in the requirements to really make this
short narrative their own in the way that Dubb envisions. By breaking down the gender
constructs of characters found in mentor texts first, they can then create their own
subjectivities and affirm their places in society in relation to how gender affects
power.
From the narrative form, the unit could move into a more specific themethat of
the power dynamics of gender in romantic relationships. Three poems that would work

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together in a text set include the canonical sonnet, How Do I Love Thee (Sonnet 43) by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and two poems in free verse, The Applicant by Sylvia Plath, and
The Man Who Loves Me by Gioconda Belli. These three poems all discuss the power
dynamics between a man and a woman in a romantic relationship. In How Do I Love Thee
(Sonnet 43), the female speaker discusses how she can serve and love the man in the
relationship. Sylvia Plaths poem renders the wife a literal object that is pushed upon the man.
The Man Who Loves Me details the requirements that the female speaker has for her romantic
partner. They all show different levels of agency given to both the man and the woman in very
distinct formats that would be interesting to practice mind-reading on in order to break down the
constructs of the relationships. The writing prompt for this text set could be to construct a poem
using the Petrarchan sonnet structure, free verse, or incorporating a different medium in order to
discuss the power dynamics of a romantic relationship. Yet again, there is a balance between the
confines of the prompt and the connection to the theme of this specific genre. All three poems
have structure to them, the first being a Petrarchan sonnet, the next imitating an advertisement,
and the final poem being written in a list format. It would be important that students have the
freedom to use these kind of structures as they please, just as with drama and narrative.
Poetry is the main genre out of these three that discusses how reading and writing are
constantly intertwined and the use of mentor texts is crucial. Many conversations about poetry
argue that it is highly important that students are given some kind of structure off of which they
can build, otherwise they may struggle to convey the thematic content that they desire, which is
highly important to a discussion of societal norms. Anthony Wilson, in Finding a Voice? Do
Literary Forms Work Creatively in Teaching Poetry Writing? argues that:
If the rhetorical space is not provided with sufficient information about how to structure
the writing there may result poems which convey personal feelings, or are written in a

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lively voice, but shut the reader out because of their lack of shape or coherence, their

design, as it were. If on the other hand the rhetorical information is provided at the
expense of exciting childrens interest there may result poems which use poetic
techniques, for instance, but do not engage the reader with personal vision or meaning
(443).
In this passage, it is clear that content and form are inextricable from one another in poetry. If
one does not offer sufficient information about how to structure the writing, students may
accidentally shut the reader out because of their lack of shape and coherence. On the other
hand, one cannot simply teach rhetorical skills without engaging the students interests and
agency within the writing, or the students will simply try to meet whatever structural requirement
without putting any personal vision or meaning within it. This echoes back to the overarching
argument of why reading and writing must be taught in tandem and build off one another, rather
than exposing students to the two in isolation.
When structure and helping to provoke the thoughts of the students are paired, the teacher
and students have the power to access the transformative potential of poetry, where students
engage with and use poems toward what June Jordan calls a foundation for true community: a
fearless democratic society... ( Damico 145). Not only can students write with personal vision
and meaning, they can join a conversation had by a fearless democratic society in which
poetry can transform, rather than simply declare. If an educator desires to foster critical
consciousness in his or her students, it is absolutely essential that he or she provides the students
with both the rhetoric to employ and opportunities to think through their ideas completely, so that
they do not write a structurally sound piece without meaning, or a muddled piece with much
meaning.
If poetry has the power to transform society if students are given the both the discussions
and contextualization necessary to write honestly and effectively, then it would seem that other

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genres should follow suit. Any piece of writing is going to have an audience and a purpose that
are inextricable from the society in which that author has lived, and if the students are forced to
pretend that this is not so, then they are losing some of the power and validation that their writing
could have in relation to larger conversations in society. The genres of drama, novels, and poetry
all lend themselves very well to a readers activation of Theory of Mind, in which that reader
must attribute motivation and mental states to a role, character, or poetic speaker based on
expressions, body language, and the like. This act is completely grounded in societal norms, and
if it is unpacked, any societal construct can be broken down. Once constructs such as gender are
explored, the students then are informed and have rhetorical tools with which they can claim
their own place, agency, and identity within society through the act of writing.

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Works Cited
Damico, Jamico S. Evoking Hearts and Heads: Exploring Issues of Social Justice through
Poetry. Language Arts 83.2 (2005): 137-146. ERIC. Web. 27 April 2015.
Dubb, Christina R. Adolescent Journeys: Finding Female Authority in The Rain Catchers
and The House on Mango Street. Childrens Literature in Education. 38 (2007): 219
232. ERIC. Web. 27 April 2015.
Hatton, Christine. Educating Rita and her Sisters: Using Drama to Reimagine Femininities in
Schools.RiDE: The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance. 18.2 (2013):155-167.
ERIC. Web. 27 April 2015.
Lattimer, Heather. Thinking Through Genre: Units of Study in Reading and Writing
Workshops Grades 4-12. Portland: Stenhouse Publishers, 2003. PDF file.
Martin, Carol L., and Diane N. Ruble. Patterns of Gender Development. Annual Review of
Psychology. 61 (2010): 353-381. Web. 27 April 2015.
Smagorinsky, Peter. The Dynamics of Writing Instruction: A Structured Process Approach for
Middle and High School. Portsmouth: Heinemann, 2010. Print
Wilson, Anthony. Finding a Voice? Do Literary Forms Work Creatively in Teaching Poetry
Writing. Cambridge Journal of Education. 37.3 (2007): 441-457. ERIC. Web. 27 April
2015.
Zunshine, Lisa. Why We Read Fiction: Theory of Mind and the Novel. Columbus: The Ohio
State University Press, 2006. PDF file.

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