NCJ Number
195344
Journal
Gender & Society Volume: 16 Issue: 3 Dated: June 2002 Pages: 386-402
Date Published
June 2002
Length
17 pages
Annotation
This article focuses on “girl watching” as a disputable form of sexual harassment.
Abstract
The most significant finding in sexual harassment research is the ambiguity in defining acts of sexual harassment. Some men claim that women are too sensitive or that they often misinterpret men’s intentions. Some women claim that men just “don’t get it.” In-depth interviews were conducted with 43 employed men and women to examine a particular social practice -- girl watching -- as a way to understand these gender differences. Girl watching within the workplace was analyzed because it is fairly prevalent and is still often trivialized as only play, or “boys will be boys.” Girl watching has various forms and functions, depending on the context and the men involved. Results show that, in its most serious form, girl watching operates as a targeted tactic of power. The gaze demonstrates the right of men to sexually evaluate women. The targeted woman is reduced to a sexual object, contradicting her other identities, such as that of worker or leader. Girl watching is a game played by men for men; the woman’s participation and awareness of her role seem fairly unimportant. Girl watching works as a dramatic performance played to other men, a means by which a certain type of masculinity is produced and heterosexual desire displayed. The role that objectification and lack of empathy play in men’s girl watching has important implications for sexual harassment training. To be effective, sexual harassment training programs must be grounded in a complex understanding of the ways acts such as girl watching operate in the workplace and the necessity of a choice of empathy to some forms of masculinity. In relating stories of social relations in their workplaces, most men failed to identify specific behaviors as sexual harassment when they matched the abstract definition. The source of this contradiction lies not so much in ignorance but in acts of ignoring. Traditional sexual harassment training programs address the former rather than the latter. Their effectiveness against sexually harassing behaviors like girl watching is questionable. 1 table, 10 notes, 50 references