Notes on Herzog's "Sissies, Dolls, and Dancing..."

Notes on Ricky Herzog's "Sissies, Dolls, and Dancing: Children's Literature in the Seventies."

Fear of "gender deviancy"- (a) reflection on parents (62), (b) harassment by society (62), (c) confrontation to gender duality (62), (d) pathologization= something IS wrong if your boy "acts like a girl" or visa versa (63), (e) fear that children will develop into sexually stigmatized adults (63)

Weakness of argument- why does Herzog consider fatherhood to be distinctly heterosexual?

Importance of voice for "gender-inappropriate" children (72)

1965- first "gender identity clinic" opens at Johns Hopkins
1966- first sex reassignment surgery completed
*1969- Stonewall Riot
1972- William's Doll is published
1973- "Homosexuality" removed from APA's list of psychiatric disorders.
1977- Supreme Court uphold's school board's decision to fire a teacher for "immortality" after he comes out as gay (Murdoch, 197, qtd. 65)
1979- Oliver Button is a Sissy is published
**1980- "Gender identity Disorder" is formally pathologized.
**1980- First APA DSM that does not contain "homosexuality" as a mental disorder

*The 1969 Stonewall riot- which flared up in retaliation to a police raid on a gay bar in which the police were "checking for attire 'appropriate' to gender" (Kaiser 198)- marked the birth of the modern gay-rights movement. As Charles Kaiser put it, "The stonewall riot had served as the [gay-rights] movement's de facto Declaration of Independence" (240) (63).

**Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick notes, "This is how it happens that the depathologization of an atypical sexual object-choice can be yoked to the new pathologization of an atypical gender identification" ("How" 256, qtd. Herzog 63)

Richard C. Friedman, in his book Male Homosexuality: A Contemporary Psychoanalytic Perspective, reasons, "The rights of parents to oversee the development of children is a long-established principle. Who is to dictate that parents may not try to raise their children in a manner that maximizes the possibility of a heterosexual outcome?" (260) (65).

I have discussed the state of society in the seventies and the numerous anxieties regarding boys' femininity that leads to this "policing of gender" in order to contetualize the very real stakes and manifestations of the discourge on gender and sexuality in this era. Children's literature is an influential and vital part of this discourse. (66)

A Guide to Non-sexist Children's Books--
William's Doll
Oliver Button is a Sissy
Tough Eddie
What's This about Pete
Tomboy
The Boyhood of Grace Jones
Nice Little Girls
Berkeley's 2003 "males in nontraditional roles" booklist
Mem Fox
Marvin Redpost: Is He a Girl?

OPPOSITE--
Gay is Not Good
Anita Bryant's "Save Our Children" campaign

OTHER-
Courting Justice: Gay Men and Lesbians v. The Supreme Court
Homophobia and the Law
The "Sissy Boy Syndrome" and the Development of Homosexuality

Ricky Herzog- Strategic Literacy Initiative.

Works Cited

Herzog, Ricky. "Sissies, Dolls, and Dancing: Children's Literature and Gender Deviance in the Seventies." The Lion and the Unicorn 33 (2009): 60-76.