The picture I have chosen for my research paper is a picture from a book entitled "I'm Glad I'm A Boy! I'm Glad I', A Girl! “by Whitney Darrow. Though this book was published in 1970, only 44 years ago, it perpetuates very sexist ideals on the roles of girls and boys in society. The images in the book, like the one I have displayed, clearly show how people in the past did not think that women could be valuable contributors in society. For example this image perpetuates the sexist view that boys are supposed to do the fixing and girls are supposed to do the breaking, and that boys are the rulers of the country while girls are their passive companions. The scary thing is, many books like this one used to be teaching tools in schools. Books with sexist undertones like this one teach our girl students that they can not be leaders in society and that all they are good for is attending to men.

     While this picture clearly proves that sexism was perpetuated in schools in the 70's, does it prove that sexism is still around in schools today? In their 2013 update of Failing at Fairness, Still Failing at Fairness, Myra and David Sadker find evidence that teachers still use sexist teaching materials in the classroom. In their book the Sadkers describe finding that, " In a popular history text published in 2005, there were eight full-page biographies of men, and only one female biography" (Sadker 17). Now is this because women have not done anything to get them into the pages of our history books? Absolutely not. 

     These sexists textbooks that depict a womanless history have a crippling effect on students. In their book the Sadkers also conducted an interview with a Utah teacher. In that interview the teacher says, "Last year I had my U.S. history classes write biographies about famous Americans. When I collected all one hundred and fifty, I was dismayed to find only five on women. When I asked my kids why, they said they didn't know any famous women. When I examined their textbook more closely, I saw there were few females in it" (17). Because students are exposed to sexist and bias teaching materials they grow up believing that women really aren't famous for anything. Sexist textbooks create a never-ending cycle of sexism in societies and schools. If teachers grow up learning about a womanless history they in turn teach a womanless history.

     The fact that many schools, sometimes unintentionally, teach from books that are sexist and do not depict women as valuable members in society shows that even though not on purpose schools perpetuate sexism. Though not as bad as Whiney Darrow's book published in 1970, schools across the United States preserve sexist ideals with womanless textbooks, which lead girls everywhere to believe that women have not made important contributions to society.

Works Cited:

Sadker, David, and Myra. Still failing at Fairness: How Gender Bias Cheats Girls and Boys in School and What We Can Do about It. New York: Scribner, 2009. Print.