Gender Stereotypes in Textbook

 

One way that gender norms are taught and enforced in schools is through the textbook (Java & Parcon, 2016). However, throughout the past studies, it has become evident that school textbooks and teaching materials conduit strong messages about gender role stereotyping. The presentations of gender in textbooks are problematic in three ways: either they promote rigid gender roles, there are gender-bias stereotypes, or the nature of the roles presented disadvantage women (Shapour & Bahiyah, 2017).

The perception of gender bias would give an impact on students’ academic and professional choices since it is portrayed in the textbook that males monopolize the upper status either in the occupation fields or in contributing to society. Conversely, women are portrayed as helpless and dependent on men in accomplishing every task. This situation creates a perception that females are unskilled and inferior, hence leads to the underestimation of the value of females (Jin, N., Ling, Y., Tong, C., Ling, L., & Tarmizi, M. 2013).

It is important to address this problem because learners have always had this notion that materials that have been printed are facts to be abided by. Students’ understanding of the false stereotypes in the books is what they are going to grow up with if the textbooks are portraying the segregation of gender and their roles in the society (Jin et al., 2013).

There are several evidences showing gender stereotypes in textbooks. According to Jin et al. (2013), Malaysian secondary textbooks demonstrate that the male characters dominate most of the stories and exposed as strong, powerful, crook and creative characters. On the other hand, females are depicted as independent, soft, conventional and passive characters. Also, according to Islam and Asadullah (2018), there is a pro-male bias in Malaysian, Indonesian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi School Textbooks. Female characters were mostly associated with traditional and low wage occupations as well as more passive personality traits.

The Commission on Higher Education has given an instruction through memorandum order No. 1, series of 2015, that the Philippines, being a state party to the United Nation (UN) Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), is obligated to pursue and implement programs, projects and activities that will contribute to the achievement of women's empowerment and gender equality. Also, there is a policy for the revised General Education Curriculum (GEC) via memorandum order No. 20, series of 2013 otherwise known as the “General Education Curriculum: Holistic Understandings, Intellectual and Civic Competencies.” This policy offers greater flexibility than the current curriculum. Moreover, the law paves the way for the exposure of undergraduate students to various dimensions of knowledge and ways of comprehending social and natural realities that promise to develop in the process, intellectual competencies critical, analytical and creative thinking and multiple forms of expression and civic capacities demanded of members of community, country and the world (CHED, 2013, p.1).