Adolescents, the Internet, and the Politics of Gender: A Feminist Case Analysis

Author(s): Meenakshi Gigi Durham

Source: Race, Gender & Class , 2001, Vol. 8, No. 4, Race, Gender & Class in Media (2001),
pp. 20-41
Published by: Jean Ait Belkhir, Race, Gender & Class Journal

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41674993

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Race, Gender A Class; Volume 8, Number 4, 2001 (20-41)

Race, Gender & Class Website: www.suno.edu/sunorgc/

Adolescents, the /nternet,

and the Politics of Gender:
A Fèminist Case Analysis

Meenakshi Gigi Durham

Journalism and Mass Communication
University of Iowa

Abstract: This case study is based on field observation of the first hands-on
Internet sessions experienced by a group of lower-income minority teenagers in an
inner-city middle school. Using feminist analysis to interrogate the social dynamic
within which the Internet use took place, I explore how new technologies are
appropriated by adolescents as a site of social bonding. I conclude that the
adolescent users' social locations in terms of gender, race, and class work to
constrain Internet use to support dominant relations of power.

Keywords: adolescents, gender, Internet, new media, teenagers

Meenakshi Gigi Durham is Assistant Professor at the University of Iowa. She has
published widely on representation of women in fashion and beauty magazines and
on adolescents' negotiations of mediated discourses of gender. Her book, Media
and Cultural Studies : KeyWorks (co-edited with Douglas M. Kellner) was
published by Blackwell Publishers in December 2000. Address: School of
Journalism and Mass Communication, 615W Seashore Hall, University of Iowa,
Iowa City, IA 52242. Ph: (319) 335-3355. E-mail: gigi-durham@uiowa.edu

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 Adolescents and the Internet 21

control and censorship: much of the existing discourse, both

Current control popular
populardiscussion and and
and academic, censorship:
is fraught withacademic, of teenagers
concerns about how to is much fraught on of the with the Internet existing concerns centers discourse, about on issues how both of to
prevent children and teens from accessing online pornography (see, for example,
Dormán, 1997; Brake, 1997; Lord, 1997; Wilkins, 1997; Kniffel, 1995). This study
involves a different angle on the phenomenon. I focus here on the gendered social
dynamics of adolescents' peer-group interactions with the Internet via a case study
of middle-school students exposed for the first time to it. The study of adolescents
on the Internet has considerable import in contemporary society, considering the
widespread use of the medium in schools as well as other arenas, and in view of the
social implications of the Net as a new media technology. Newhagen and Rafaeli
(1996) observe:

The popular press is already depicting the Net as having the power to
snatch our babies right from the cradle and poison their minds. Based on virtually
no empirical evidence, the power to mesmerize and seduce our youth is being
attributed to the Net, just as it was to television and film before. Perhaps we should
stand off from this discussion until we have a solid empirical understanding of the
relationship between the individual user and the technology.

This paper provides the kind of empirical findings Newhagen and Rafaeli
call for, by means of an ethnographic field observation of teenagers using the Net
in a naturalistic context. My research approach employs the case study method,
which, as Stake (1994) points out, can be usefully engaged to provide insight into
a broader social phenomenon. The case here is what Stake identifies as an
'instrumental' case study: "The case is looked at in depth, its contexts scrutinized,
its ordinary activities detailed, but because this helps us pursue the external
interest." Here, the dynamics of a group of teenagers in relation to the Internet
provides a means of advancing our understanding of the role of media technologies
in adolescent socialization. Sproull and Faraj (1997) emphasize that the Net must
be understood as a social technology that carries with it new understandings of
social codes of behavior and relational boundaries, some of which I explore in this
paper.

Qualitative research is often a process of discovery in which "new

experiences are interwoven and new voices are heard" (Reinharz, 1992). This
particular case analysis happened serendipitously in the midst of a larger and
unrelated ethnographic project in which I was engaged. In the Spring of 1997, 1
was conducting field work among young adolescents at a middle school in a mid-
size Texas city. The school was in an inner-city low-income neighborhood and had
a predominantly minority student population. My interest was in adolescent girls
and their interactions with popular culture; as part of my field observations, I was

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22 Adolescents and the Internet

spending a great deal of time with the students in their c

As part of my routine observations of an eighth

accompanied them into the school's Media Technology
to get to know them better: I reasoned that my contin
routine would render me part of the background so I c
their natural peer-group interactions. I was not, at the
opportune circumstances I would witness in the lab.

For most of the 22 children in the class, the comp

provided them with their first hands-on experience of
them had used the Internet previously, in out-of-sch
Internet neophytes. The class had had previous lectures
search strategies, etc., but had never been allowed to actu
use it. In the first session I observed, the students w
complete a research assignment in which they found
looking up Web sites. They were told that when they
could use the rest of their time to explore the Internet
in the two subsequent Internet classes I observed with th

These periods of unstructured, and somewhat uns

provided me with the data for this paper. Case study m
al., "allows the observer...to grasp the total complex w
unfolds" (1991). These authors argue that the case stu
observer to come closest to understanding social action
actors themselves. The case in question presented
observation and analysis, in that it captured the studen
with the Internet. The ways in which the students addre
and to each other in small-group interactions around the
deal about gendered patterns of adolescent society
technologies.

Specifically, the significance of this study lies in th

the natural, complex engagements of teenagers with eac
Generalizability and replicability are not goals in this
deepen our theoretical understanding of gender and te
developmental turning-points. As Williams (1991) has n

Because of the inherent size limitation in most quali

sense to limit the sample to a specific group of in
same or similar constraints on their behavior. But it
studies must be carefully selected for their illustrat

This case analysis serves as an illustration of the

adolescent world, and the ways in which new technol
those politics, in the context of a media-saturated env

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 Adolescents and the Internet 23

culture as an important site of social bonding.

Background for the study

The physical context of the study was a school I will call East Middle
School. It is located on the "nonwhite" side of a racially segregated city. Th
segregation is not, of course, officially codified; rather, the informal color line is th
interstate highway that runs through the center of town. All areas to the east of th
highway are tacitly designated as the African American and Latino sections. A
areas to the west of it are considered to be the "white" part of the city; in addition
the further west of the highway one is, the more affluent the area.

East Middle School is situated within the city limits, in a poor and
working-class residential neighborhood that is very close to the interstate highway.
Heavily trafficked streets bound all sides of the schoolyard. The school building
is a concrete block; inside, there is little natural light. "Bilingual education" (i.e.,
classes for children whose dominant language is Spanish) are conducted in
makeshift "portables" at the back of the school building.

East Middle School has a total student enrollment of 1,164, of which the
majority are African American (60 percent, or 704 students). The next largest
student ethnic group comprises Latino students (26 percent, or 298 students).
Thirteen percent (157) of the students are Anglo/white. A majority of the studen
(76.5 percent) are categorized by the school district as "economically
disadvantaged."

In the class I observed, the racial breakdown was as follows: Of the 22,
1 1 were classified by the school as Latino1, 9 as African American, one as Asian
and one as Caucasian/ Anglo. (Several of these children were actually mixed-race
and when I asked some of them privately how they would self-identify by race
their responses contrasted with the school's official record.) All students were in
the honors program, which meant they were in advanced classes in all subjects
The Internet instruction was part of their social studies coursework.

The computer lab, officially known as the "Media Technology Lab," was
a large room on the first floor of the main school building. It contained 33 Powe
Macintosh 7500 computers, connected to a server. Eleven computers lined each o
two walls of the room, while 1 1 more were arranged on a long table bisecting th
room. Other tables and chairs allowed students to attend to lectures when they were
not using the computers. A blackboard ran along a third wall. The classroom also
contained two carts that held television monitors and VCRs.

Because there were 22 students in the class, each student was assigned by
the computer teacher to his or her own computer. However, for various reasons
(principally malfunctioning computers) some students were asked to share wit

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24 Adolescents and the Internet

each other at different points during the classes. Two t

periods in the Media Technology Lab: the social studie
white woman whose curriculum included a unit on Inte
teacher, Mr. F., a middle-aged Mexican-American
popular with the students, and the computer sessions
and enthusiasm among the eighth-graders.

The social studies curriculum included three hand

and I observed all of them. They took place over a per
1997. Each class period lasted for one hour and 2
observation time was relatively brief, in the context of t
study I conducted with these students, the Internet sessi
particular behaviors associated with a new environme
these behaviors stood out from the day-to-day social d
school lives. Thus, I argue here that this case anal
representation of a complex cultural situation, a
understanding of adolescent uses of Internet technolo
(1975) assert,

all settings and subjects are similar while retainin

means that qualitative researchers can study gen
any single setting or through any single subject. Th
understand these general processes as they o
circumstances.

While the data set used here has obvious limitations, it must be considered
in light of the fact there are at this time no existing empirical data on minority
adolescents' use of new media. Thus, this case study provides a detailed and in-
depth account of a seldom-observed phenomenon and offers a point of entry into
further investigations in this area.

A final note: My field work at East Middle School stemmed from my

interest in studying adolescents from minority cultures and particularly members
of immigrant diasporas, since there is a paucity of research on youth from these
groups. Thus, the data in this study are inflected with racial, ethnic and class
subtexts that must be understood in conjunction with the gender dynamics that are
the primary focus of my analysis.

Girls, boys, and gender socialization

Much attention has been paid in recent years to girls' psychosocial

development during the transitional years of adolescence, which Brown and
Gilligan (1992) characterize as "a troubled crossing." In general, research indicates
that girls suffer a loss of self-esteem and self-confidence during these years (Brown
& Gilligan, 1992; Fine, 1992; Orenstein, 1994; Pipher, 1994). While most of the

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 Adolescents and the Internet 25

knowledge available comes from observations of whit

that has been done with girls belonging to ethnic and
contradictory conclusions. An early, groundbr
Shortchanging Girls, Shortchanging America report
American girls tend to have higher self-esteem
However, the report also found that black girls'
adolescence; and other researchers doing work with
found that the intersections of social racism, classism and sexism work to
compromise minority girls' youth in various ways. Thompson (1994) notes that
minority girls' problems, such as eating disorders, are frequently overlooked and
unremediated because of racist social myths that dismiss and trivialize their
occurrence; Orenstein (1994) notes that black girls "report far lower academic self-
confidence than their white counterparts." This latter observation is important in
the context of the present study, where the girls were challenged with a new
technology and the use of recently acquired academic skills.

In general, boys are seen to have more academic confidence and higher
levels of self-esteem than girls as they chart the turbulent waters of adolescence.
However, these patterns are complicated by various factors, two of which are class
and race. A significant body of literature documents the life crises faced by
minority boys (Harris, 1995; Kunjufu, 1983; Ready, 1991). Some consequences of
these crises include high school drop-out rates, academic underachievement, drug
use, involvement with gangs, unemployment, and other forms of social
marginalization (see Holland, 1996; Hopkins, 1997; Romo & Falbo, 1996;
Rodriguez, 1995). Socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with minority
achievement: low-SES youth tend to face greater barriers to success (Moore, 1978;
So, 1987).

With regard to science and technology, minority youth of both sexes are
believed to be at a disadvantage compared to their white counterparts. In a critique
of science education in the United States, Mullis and Jenkins (1988) noted
"substantial disparities" between the performance of racial minorities and that of
white students in the scientific classroom. While, again, socioeconomic status is
an important factor in such studies, there is also evidence that minorities are
provided with fewer opportunities to participate in science and to perceive
themselves as potential members of the scientific community (Johnson, 1992).
Dickerson (1995) found that African American children expressed keen interest in
science-related careers, but had considerable anxiety about their ability to achieve
these goals. Although it is important to keep these findings in mind, it should be
remembered that in this study, while the children belonged to low SES groups, they
were also high academic achievers and had shown promise of academic success.

At this time, very little is known about minority children's uses of new
media and Internet technologies. However, some research is available about gender
and its relationship to new computer technologies that can add to our contextual
understanding of the phenomena under observation here.

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26 Adolescents and the Internet

The politics of gender online

The latest AAUW report on gender equity in schools documents th

existence of a significant gender gap in schoolchildren' s use of technolo
(AAUW, 1998). Synthesizing 1,000 research studies, the report reveals gender
inequities in technology use (as well as in math and science enrollment) t
threaten to place girls at a disadvantage. In particular, the report indicates that gi
take fewer computer science and computer design curses than boys. These findi
underscore the prevailing notion of the Internet as a masculine domain. As Ken
(1996) observes, "Gender has a great deal of meaning online."

Analyses of gender and Internet technology highlight issues of power an

dominance in this arena, which is typically constructed as a male preserve. 'T
question the masculinity of computers is tantamount to questioning our image
masculinity itself," Coyle (1996) points out. "Computers are power, and power,
our world, must be the realm of men." In a penetrating essay on the gender
construction of the Internet, she notes that computer culture not only tends
exclude women but works to alienate them through the persistent onlin
representation of women as objects of desire or pornography.

Although more and more women are using the Internet, the gender
hierarchies of the medium continue to be restrictive. Turkle (1995) has observe
that while there is considerable "gender-bending" on the Internet (with both m
and women using the anonymity of cyberspace to adopt personae of the oppos
or a neuter gender in chat rooms and multi-user domains (MUDs)) the constructi
of gender remain firmly rooted in social convention. Men find solace in develop
less aggressive, less competitive "feminine" personalities, while women f
freedom in the adoption of "masculine" characteristics of boldness and defianc
This gender-bending opens up the possibility of deconstructing the social rules
gender, Turkle says; yet in her account it appears that gendered norms are rare
transgressed in cyberspace, for all its possibilities.

One motivation for gender-bending on the Internet, according to Turkle' s

account, is the possibility of engaging in "cybersex" as a creature of a differen
gender; these erotic forays are "part of the larger story of people using virtual sp
to construct identity" (Turkle, 1995).

Nowhere is this more dramatic than in the lives of children and

adolescents as they come of age in online culture. Online sexual
relationships are one thing for those of us who are introduced to them as
adults, but quite another for twelve-year-olds who use the Internet to do
their homework and then meet some friends to party in a MUD. (Turkle,
1995).

Currently, there is a dearth of empirical research about adolescents' use

of the Internet; very little is known about teenagers in cyberspace, and still less

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 Adolescents and the Internet 27

about the ways in which race, class and gender migh

Much of our understandings of teenagers and the Ne
"moral panic," to use the cultural studies term (Ha
that "netsex" is commonplace among teenage boys, a
the idea of a male Internet culture. Yet given that
product of society" (Williams, 1991), it is important
technology might contribute to the construction of an

The few empirical studies that exist reveal som

patterns of Internet use, even unrelated to sexuality.
and Fleetwood (1989) found that boys are more conf
than girls; boys also report a higher level of interest i
have access to computers significantly more than do
their study that over time, as both boys and girls ga
technology, girls' confidence in their computer
challenge to future researchers," they write, "is to d
lies in the characteristics of the computer experience
in which boys and girls live."

Fletcher-Flinn and Suddendorf (1996) found tha

both sexes believe girls to have a lower degree of com
On the other hand, in a study of much younger childr
fifth-graders participated in an online newsgroup i
girls actively engaging in the online environment a
realizes that

[i]f the children had been a few years older, en

adolescence, their experiences may have b
Psychologists who have studied children as they
found that girls seem to be more strongly aff
boys are. Perhaps the girls in my project wou
freely as they did if they had been dealing w
expectations and insecurities brought on by ado

The only way to gauge whether these projecti

to observe adolescents in their use of the Internet. W
not have the opportunity to observe long-term uses of
the dynamics of behavior I observed in the field sett
processes at work among girls, boys, and technology

Method
During the spring of 1997, from January until May, I attended the
studies honors class at East Middle School in order to observe this group of st
in the classroom. I also accompanied them to lunch and attended other s
activities with them. The students were completely aware of my presence
purposes of my research; I had introduced myself and explained my study

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28 Adolescents and the Internet

beginning of the semester, and although they frequen

they grew increasingly comfortable with me as the week

The three Internet sessions that form the basis of

the social studies curriculum and fell in the middle of th
I took field notes while observing the students in th
Although I was able to tape record conversations amo
times in the study, the tumult of their unstructured Int
recorder from being a useful data-gathering tool. In
notes to be a more effective method of documenting the
complex activities that went on in each lab sessi
distinction between surface-level field notes, "which are
was observed,' and comments, which "provide a contex
speculations about the researcher thinks it means." I u
notes while I was in the lab, and I also took time to reco
diary immediately after each session. My main focus w
recreate the sociosexual cross-currents in the room via a

My own relationship with the students significantl

which I was able to closely analyze these relationship
critical importance to this study are the affective di
interactions I observed; much of this analysis is devo
ways in which those emotional currents worked to const
physical context of the computers. Because reflexivit
feminist scholarship (Fonow and Cook, 1991), it is nec
the influence of the researcher on this analysis. Smith
the significance of the researcher's presence in any
involves the "sensory organization of immediate exper
field work in East Middle School had granted me a som
as an intimate observer of the students' lives. Because I was neither a teacher nor
a peer, the students had gradually come to trust me as an "outsider within." I was
privy to the complex entanglements of their lives without directly participating in
them. In the computer lab, this meant that I could circulate freely among the
students without being seen as an intruder. They allowed me to watch them
interacting in ways they took pains to hide from the teachers, and they invited me
to observe their discoveries when they were not interested in sharing them with
other students. My familiarity with the students' social lives was an important
factor in interpreting the processes I observed. Addelson (1991) points out that a
more rational science is one that takes into account the metaphysical commitments
of the scientist as well as the social arrangements of conducting research. It is this
awareness of metaphysical commitments, both between myself and the students and
among the students themselves, that led to the identification and interpretation of
the themes examined below.

Analysis
Keshawn: Ooh, that's Tyra. Lookit that Tyra. She fine.

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 Adolescents and the Internet 29

Nona: That's nasty. You shouldn't be looking at

Marta: We don't want to look at that.

In that first hands-on session, the students' ap

marked by relationships of power that played out
extent racial, lines. These arenas included profic
orientations, social connections (both within and a
intimacy. The day-to-day pecking order of the var
gave way in the computer lab to different small-gro
that were related to these factors. Although the pow
themselves in the lab were interlocking and related
below.

Computer skills
From the beginning, the Web proved to be a source of immense
fascination for the students; but in direct contrast to the trends documented in t
literature, the girls in the East Middle School classroom engaged with t
computers more intensely and with a greater degree of absorption and compete
than the boys. Even during the first part of the first class session, in which t
students were asked to complete an assignment that guided them to various W
sites in search of information, the girls worked intently and confidently; by
large, they finished the assignment ahead of the boys and were the first to plu
into unstructured Web exploration. This greater proficiency on the part of the gi
turned out to be an important factor in the ways that the students engaged with
online technology.

During the initial part of the class, the students applied themselves to thei
assignments individually and quietly, with a minimum of interaction; from tim
time they raised their hands to ask for assistance from the teachers, or, occasiona
from me, if a teacher was unavailable. This disciplined behavior underwent a
marked change as they completed their assignments and became free to play on
Web. Again, it was the girls who demonstrated the greatest proficiency in locat
and using Web sites that interested them which, for the most part, involved
entertainers (actors, actresses, and rap and pop musicians). Overall, while the gi
did not overtly interact with one another when they first began exploring the W
they were acutely aware of what the others were doing, so that all the studen
ended up looking at the same types of Web sites in every class, mostly to do w
various celebrities.

In the first class, the boys initially hung back from aggressive exploration
of the Web, watching to see what the girls were doing in part because some of the
girls were quickly and easily finding sites on musicians and movie stars that
interested the boys.

Shanequa, a quiet and serious African American girl, was very skillful in
her use of search engines, and a few of the boys began to gather around her

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30 Adolescents and the Internet

computer, directing her to find sites for them. Shane

their attention. In my earlier observations of the class
mainly with other girls; she did not have a boyfriend an
"popular" clique around which the boys normally flock
rendered her the cynosure of their attention. The boy
and quickly took advantage of it .

"Find Tyra Banks," instructed Samson. "Find

Banks." Shanequa eagerly complied. It did not her lon
"supermodel." The first one she clicked onto featured
Banks clad in tiny bikinis and lingerie. The students ha
specifically warned by the teachers that their Web use w
they were not to access "inappropriate" sites. The boys
Tyra Banks site was off-limits, which delighted them.
approval of the images, clustering closely around Sha
pictures downloaded in order to see better, as well as t
the teachers. As the images appeared, the boys got
laughing, pointing, hooting, and teasing each other abou
extremely verbal, and there was a lot of apparent bond
getting aroused by these pictures. Shanequa was silent,
Aimee, another African American girl, looked at the
getting up to join the boys or saying a word.

The boys continued to direct Shanequa to find site

some risqué pictures of the singer and actress Vanessa
much appreciated by the boys. The boys use of Shaneq
until one of the teachers noticed what they were doin
around her computer.

I watched as Mariah, Aimee and Shanequa, three A

played separately on the Web. Although they were sea
one another (Shanequa and Mariah back to back, Aime
not interact very much. They were interested in fin
Aimee first found a site that listed a number of actors
Tom Cruise. Then she asked me how to find rap artist
on rap musicians, using Yahoo. She found links to Ma
the meantime, Shanequa found an animated site on Tup
for the URL; so did a couple of the boys.

In a subsequent class, when Mariah tried to lo

Netscape wouldn't open, so she tried to share with
"dumb" and "stupid' because Aimee tried several links
was agitated because she could not get to any sites on h
ability to use the computer and complained about havin
clear that all three girls wanted to work separately and w
that forced them to share their computers or activities

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 Adolescents and the Internet 31

Shanequa had been glad enough to let the boys into he

Interestingly, while the African American girls

maintained their preference for independent work t
observation, the Latina girls quickly became social in
moving their chairs so that they could interact in sma
They were interested in each other's Web searches and
became more vocal in voicing their opinions of the Web

Goal Orientations

Jacobson (1996) suggests that girls "tend to need a reason to us

computer, an overriding purpose of some kind. They also typically prefer a
that are more social and provide them with connections to others."

By contrast, in the East Middle School classroom, it was the boys who
evinced an obvious goal orientation in their use of the Web, and this goal
grounded in the need for social connections made around the Web sites th
accessed. The girls seemed to have no particular purpose in mind, and no i
in collaboration, as they looked up various entertainers. Especially
beginning, the girls' use of the Internet was independent, solitary and silent,
the boys, which was loud, interactive and comradely about finding sites on
sex symbols.

As the girls began to locate the Web sites they wanted, however, the
patterns of use altered slightly. One of the Latina girls, Ariana, looked up the pop
group Boyz II Men, and the girls around her exclaimed over the large picture that
came up on her screen. "That's such a cute picture!" Ariana gushed over and over;
the girls in nearby seats agreed and began talking about which Boyz II Men songs
they liked.

Ariana began to get adventurous about searching. Every search she tried
was related to music, but as she located them and began looking at them, the images
served as stimuli for the girls to talk about norms of feminine culture, especially in
terms of beauty and gender roles. When Ariana found a site on Whitney Houston,
for instance, the pictures that came up on her screen attracted the immediate
attention of other Latina girls.

"She's so pretty," said Denise. "She looks kind of fake but you know she really
looks like that, in real life."
"She is pretty," Marta agreed. "Her hair is cool."
"I like Tina Turner," said Ariana. "I like Tina Turner' s hair. I know she's ugly, but
I like her hair because she does this." Ariana tipped her head back, ran both hands
through her hair, and shook her head. "I want hair like hers."
Ariana later found a Madonna site. After scrolling through the home page, Ariana

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32 Adolescents and the Internet

clicked on a link called "Madonna and Child." Nona and Marta craned their necks
to read with Ariana about Madonna's baby. A cartoon sketch of a pregnant
Madonna at the bottom of the page earned their approval.
'There's a picture of her pregnant!" Denise observed. 'That's cute!"

They spent a long time examining the photograph and trying to find details
of the pregnancy and birth. This was very much in line with other observations I
had made during my time at East Middle School, where marriage and motherhood
were central topics of conversation among the girls.

As time wore on, the girls continued to look for musicians and movie stars
and to talk about which ones they liked and why. A couple of the girls, Marta and
Nona, even moved onto the same computer to work. At one point they came across
a link that had a label with something about "hot sex" on it. Both girls were vocal
and clear about not wanting to click on it. On the other hand, one of the boys,
Keshawn, who was seated nearby, found a semi-nude picture of Tyra Banks and
was gleeful about pointing it out to the girls.

"That's nasty," said Nona. "You shouldn't be looking at that."

"We don't want to look at that," said Marta.

Keshawn tried using the image to attract the attention of some of the boys,
a few of whom came over to look at it. The way the boys searched the Web was
clearly influenced by the results of those searches on other boys: the goal was to
find sites that would draw the approval and admiration of male peers. The boys'
Web searching seemed to be a power play that established their status, particularly
in sexual terms, among the group. The girls, on the other hand, moved from solo
work to a model of Internet surfing that led to a reification of feminine community
in the classroom.

Social and physical connections

From the beginning, the boys were very physically intimate in their u
the Web: they clustered around Shanequa's computer in a tight group, jostlin
and elbows as they looked over her shoulder; when images came up that e
them, they pushed one another and slapped each other's backs, teasing each
about being "horny." When they settled down to searching the Web thems
they tended to do it in pairs or groups, moving their chairs together, sugg
search terms to each other, and commenting on the sites. My field notes i
that the boys were intent upon sharing their activities:

Jaime called to Paco and Denzel to check out the Toni Braxton site he had
found. They came over to the computer and Denzel said something
disparaging about how old Braxton was. Jaime protested, "No, she's not,
she's hot," and Paco agreed, "She's hot, man."

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 Adolescents and the Internet 33

Most interactions took place among friends, but

involved boys who were not part of the same clique.
a vehicle for male bonding and the establishment o
computers and Web sites were not construed as "turf'
common ground on which to build affiliations and af
example, when Jesse found a site on Dennis Rodma
with one of the girls sitting nearby:

Lourdes: Did you see, they're making nail polish

colors like blue and black ... and they showed Dennis
Rodman is gay.

Jesse: He is not gay, he just loves the camera .

dresses, because he wants attention.
Denzel: He's not gay.
Lourdes: He is gay. He wears women's clothes,
acts like that ... I'm not saying any more about it.

Lourdes' comments perturbed Jesse and Denzel

away from the site to look at something else. It appe
stay with Web sites that did not disrupt the conventio
to maintain in their peer interactions.

Ethnic/cultural differences manifested thems

among the girls than among the boys. The boys' gro
fluid. The girls segregated themselves more by race,
socialization outside the computer lab.

The African American girls were most inclined

personal space. They engaged with the screens intens
talk about or share their findings with each other. In
were forced to share a computer, both were vocal ab
the arrangement. Among the African American girls i
an interesting site, though this took the form of pers
the flaunting that characterized the boys' searching. F
call me or a teacher over to admire a site she had f
animation or other gimmick on the screen, but gir
attention of other girls.

The Latina girls worked independently at first,

went by and they became more aware of each othe
look at others' search results and to talk about the
rarely moved physically away from their assigned c
Web searching independently. The dissemination of
passive rather than active (that is, a girl could evince
but it was implicitly taboo for a girl to deliberately ca

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34 Adolescents and the Internet

work. The boys, on the other hand, were active and asser
to their discoveries on the Web -- indeed, this was a neces
dynamic.

The Latina girls used the Web to verify conventions of femininity within
their peer groups. Like the boys, they, too, sought out celebrity sites, for the most
part looking for women entertainers who conformed to mainstream standards of
beauty and sexuality. Interestingly, while the boys focused on people of color, the
girls looked at Anglo as well as Latina and African American entertainers (the
former included Madonna, Jewel and the Spice Girls. The girls' conversations
about them revolved around their looks, clothes and marital status (markers of what
Ferguson (1983) has characterized as a "cult of femininity." By contrast, the boys'
comments on male stars focused on their achievements, but their talk about female
celebrities centered on their sexual desirability and looks. These patterns did not
change over the course of the two- week period of observation.

Conclusions

Feminist media research suggests that mass culture plays a significant ro

in the social construction of gender (McRobbie, 1991; McCracken, 1993
Zoonen, 1994; Macdonald, 1995; Durham, 1996; Durham, 1998). These
perspectives generally offer a top-down model of ideological process wherein
media messages prescribe gender-appropriate behaviors and attitudes that tend to
sustain patriarchal power and dominance, and audience members either succumb
to, negotiate, actively resist or sometimes actually reappropriate these directives.

The data from this case study offers the potential for a theoretical inversion
of these models, in both a hermeneutic and strategic sense. In considering the
context of the study, it is significant that the media audience in this case was
comprised of young first-time users of a new media technology. Their approach to
the technology was thus relatively unconstrained by prior knowledge of its
possibilities and limits. In addition, I did not enter the classroom with any a priori
expectations of behavior. The audience was made up of lower-income, inner-city
minority youth, a marginalized and disenfranchised social group whose interactions
with mainstream media contain more potential for resistance than other groups, yet
there is no available data on their use of Internet technology. Finally, because of
the wide range of subject matter available on the Internet, the users had a greater
degree of control over the content they chose to engage with than they would have
with most other mass media. This brings us beyond the cultural studies notion of
an active audience to an ontological position in which a means of constructing the
medium is situated within the media user - it imbues the user with a considerable
degree of agency with regard to media content. Indeed, the reproduction of
sexuality, male and female, that happened among the students as they used this new
medium, was not a media-driven process. Instead, the definition of social norms
came from the students' interpersonal interactions while using the medium to reify

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 Adolescents and the Internet 35

their already held beliefs.

Within that dynamic, the students' agency was se

by the medium itself but by their social locations as
noted, the sociocultural context of media consumers in
they are able to read media messages; the context "limit
readings on the part of consumers." Gonzales (1996) a
the peer context is crucial to African American and L
having the potential to affect it both positively and n
situation.

In this observation of adolescents' initial engagem

it was clear that the pre-existing social, and more specifi
and norms of adolescent society governed the way
information available on the Web. From a virtually lim
girls and boys selected Web sites that sustained the ge
"successful" social behaviors in their peer groups.

The boys' initial selection of Web sites pertained

heterosexual desire and its role in the construction of masculine communities.
Connell (1987) notes, "The most important feature of contemporary hegemonic
masculinity is that it is heterosexual." A recent study of boys in school settings
found that heterosexual masculinities are produced through the collective actions
of schoolboys as they negotiate their social environment (Mac an Ghaill, 1994). In
general, interrogations of the concept and ideology of masculinity indicate that
participation in heterosexual practices helps to consolidate male power by clearly
positioning women as objects of male sexual desire (Connell, 1987; Brittan, 1989;
Stoltenberg, 1990; Redman, 1996). Sedgwick (1985) argues that both men's
heterosexual relations with women and their opposition to homosexuality act as
ways of regulating relations between men. Both of these dimensions were apparent
in the ways that the boys in this classroom appropriated the Web. By proclaiming
their common sexual interest in celebrity women who functioned as markers of
agreement among them, they established their membership in the male society
within the classroom. When issues of homosexuality arose (as in the conversation
about Dennis Rodman), they were quick to show their rejection of it in order to
retain their place within the masculinist context. The very public, communal nature
of their interactions with the Web acted as a means of defending and resecuring the
masculine presence in the room.

Girls' attention to the Web was an interesting corollary to this process.

The boys' appropriation of the Web for a public display of masculinity stood in
contrast to the girls' initial preference for solitary and individual interactions with
the technology. McCracken (1993) observes that mass media serve in women's
lives to create "a privatized subcultural space" in which secrets of femininity are
divulged. Radway's groundbreaking work, Reading the Romance , documents the
intense, personal relationships of women with romance novels as a "fundamentally

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36 Adolescents and the Internet

private, isolating experience" (Radway, 1991). The noti

to fulfill personal needs is borne out by the girls' reluc
another as they began their Internet explorations. Howev
blossomed into communal discussion and the establishment of conventions of
femininity, particularly related to women's physical appearance, among the Latina
girls. Any reference to Web sites that might disrupt this ideology of femininity was
quickly quashed by the girls (at one point, one of the Latina girls found the New
Moon Magazine Web site, an "alternative" multicultural space for girls. She was
lauded by the teacher, who urged the other girls to call it up on their screens; one
of them, Lourdes, responded bluntly, "We don't want to look at it"). Thus, even as
masculine ideology was reified through the boys' behaviors, a culture-specific
feminine ideology was similarly constructed through the girls".

The differences between the African American and Latina girls'

approaches to the computers calls for further interrogation. Historically, schools
have been inhospitable places for ethnic minorities, especially minority girls. In the
face of a new academic challenge and an unfamiliar technology, it is possible that
the girls behaved differently according to their learned sociocultural responses to
a threatening situation. The centrality of community among Latina women may
have played a part in the Latina girls' tendency toward group activity in the
computer lab, while the African American girls' insistence on solitude may have
been rooted in legitimate fears about appropriate behavior in the classroom and the
potential for punishment if they became too loud or boisterous.

On the other hand, in my observations, it was the African American boys

who exhibited leadership in the Internet explorations undertaken in the classroom.
Harris (1995) has noted that "African American male youth are especially
vulnerable to the demands of ... same-sex peer groups," adding that this
"overdependence" on male peer group approval often results in diminished
capacities for independent decision making. She points out that African American
boys are reported to be less autonomous than African American girls "and seem to
value relatedness as evidenced by an extreme reliance on the peer group" (Harris,
1995). The manifest male-bonding behavior of the boys in the classroom is related
to race, in that a history of racial discrimination in the academic context necessitates
an increased reliance on the maintenance of peer group solidarity among minority
boys, perhaps especially when confronted by new challenges such as unfamiliar
technologies.

Both boys and girls achieved peer group strength via the objectification of
women's bodies on the screen. The girls were more likely to cross racial lines in
their affirmation of norms of feminine beauty. Collins (1991) has recounted how
issues of beauty are used to control and ultimately denigrate women of color - the
normative standards of beauty are based in whiteness. "African American women,"
she writes, "experience the pain of never being able to live up to externally defined
standards of beauty." These standards, according to Collins, affect women's
relationships with one another, as well as their relationships with men. Women

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 Adolescents and the Internet 37

who do not subscribe to conventional standards of be

social rejection. In this Internet classroom, the gi
identifying the markers of conventional beauty and usin
understanding. As Kaufman (1987) has noted, these in
acquisition of masculinity for boys because they are int
busy acquiring the complementary femininity. Ea
reinforces the gender acquisition of each sex."

These observations underscore the fact that peopl

a preconstituted social context. Watching how adolescen
a different way to look at media texts and consumers:
text, these teenagers had the opportunity to create their
responded to this challenge by finding ways to use the
safe and dominant gender and social ideologies. One o
that social fears of the Internet's power to corru
complexities of adolescents' uses of the Net; in a sens
entrenched understandings of social relations in their us

The Internet then can be seen as an "unformed p

some degree on its use to find its structure. It is at t
technology that socialization instills order to the disor
present case, that order was based on patriarchal socia
Internet users tended to access Web sites that sustained d
a finding that to an extent confirms the fears of parent
beginning of this article. But these sites literally cann
some pre-existing purpose in a social arena - a purpos
media technology but by the rules of society.

Thus, the Internet in the hands of early adolesc

democratizing space where egalitarian or even resista
Kellner (1997) has posited. Here, the discussion o
interaction with the Web indicates that the next front
explorers will allow it to be. This case study turns the cl
to the mores that precede the Web as a technology. In or
of the Web to disrupt and challenge dominant practi
especially among adolescents, it will be necessary
educators to develop interventions that address the pol
well as within the sphere of new media technologies.

Endnotes: The word Latino was used to describe th

students who were mainly U.S.-born Mexican- Americ
students of Puerto Rican, Cuban, and other Central a
Some of these students were mixed-race and self-iden
according to the school's classification system.

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38 Adolescents and the Internet

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