Terry Arendell

Terry Arendell has taught sociology at Colby, focusing on gender and family issues, since 1994. She spoke to Colby about her work, her students and our changing culture.

What is the interest that students have in these issues, when they aren't that far from being boys or girls themselves?
Both the young women and young men students are still reflecting on their own experiences and still trying to sort their way through into adulthood, so they're really caught, I think, in terms of gender identity and understanding, really on a cusp. Generally my experience has been that the women are actually more thoughtful at this point and more open, boundaries are more permeable. College-age men are much more locked into conventions of masculinity.

There is a difference?
Gender class mostly attracts women. What I always find interesting is that women are especially interested in trying to understand men. And I'm talking about straight women here. We have an increasingly visible population of lesbian women, too. Often their interests are different in terms of gender issues. But all my friends who teach gender, we often find that one of the motivating reasons for coming into the class for women is to try to understand men, especially men's sexual lives. That's very generational, I think, very much age related.

Do they find the other gender perplexing?
Yeah. And alluring and all of those things. And especially the women, because of the culture at the moment, coming in and hoping to find a way to have it all. They want the perfect career, the perfect house, the perfect children, the perfect spouse. And of course, you look at American society--you can't have all that at once, generally. The work world is still set up for non-parents, basically. Especially for professionals. The data are showing that professional people are working longer hours, not less. It's a very sobering course in that way.

The students realize that before they get there?
I don't think they realize it before, but they begin to realize it as they read more and more. Of course a few students will have families where it seems to be handled very smoothly and easily. But that's less and less common, too. Many students come from single-parent families where the struggles were obvious, one parent having to do it all. Other students will come from families with two parents, both working long hours. So they had some personal experience. We saw some students who come from "more traditional" families.

So what is the traditional family? Or is that a misnomer?
It is a misnomer. You still use it in the culture, and even sociology shares the basic definition that it's the father/husband who is the full-time provider, mother/wife is homemaker and mother full time, and then their offspring or adopted children. I think that data show now that it's less than one in six that fits that model. In fact, I expect that one in six is even high, that if you catch families at any particular point in time, you'd see even fewer families.

Do you find your teaching evolving as the culture evolves?
I hope. Otherwise I'm an anachronism, right? I was thinking about this this morning. I've taught gender for years now and I've always included some on sexuality and sexual variations but only in the last couple of years has that become a key component. In fact, now I offer a course in sexuality. That's very much reflective, I think, of where the discipline is headed but also the culture. We're talking much more explicitly about sexuality.

Do you think that's true at Colby right now with the recent activism and call for "queer studies" offerings?
Yeah, I actually think we're behind. Queer politics has been going on for a decade at major institutions. We're somewhat behind, but we're probably on par with other small liberal arts colleges. It would be interesting to know that.

What are you teaching in the fall?
In the fall I'm teaching a 300-level seminar, Childhood and Society. I'm also teaching gender. In the spring I'm teaching an introductory course in sexuality.

In the gender course, what do students want to know?
A couple of things, and I actually broaden it for them. Not biological but socio-cultural constructs. So I think that's the fundamental question. How is it we raise boys and girls in this culture to become who they are? Or is it inevitable that they become who they are? . . . They're very interested in interpersonal dynamics, the pop culture thing, "Men are from Mars, women are from Venus." Our students have seen a lot of pop TV. So they've seen a lot of things that are of interest to the general population.

Is that a change?
That's changed some. I think because there are more talk shows available, high schoolers are watching more TV than they were even six, eight years ago. And prime-time TV deals with some of these issues in a way it didn't in the past.

So they have some exposure?
Yeah, the women are interested in issues about employment and the wage gap. Many come believing that most of that is corrected and resolved, although they have some awareness that the gender difference is still institutionalized and embedded in our structures. But I think they're surprised and sobered by the material we cover to see how extensive it still is, particularly in the workplace. Yes, there have been gains, but some estimates say it will be three hundred to five hundred years before women have parity with men in the workplace, the gains have been so slow.

What's the reaction of men in the class?
It's a struggle. With the gender class, one of the challenges is that we not make the men defensive, that they don't become the token representatives of manhood in the culture, that they're also entering the structures, they haven't determined them. But actually oftentimes the men who come into the classes are somewhat progressive in attitudes and approaches. One of the things I'd really like to see is the classes become more equitable in terms of representation of men and women so that family, sexuality, gender, all these courses become a little more balanced. So I admire the men who hang in.