Gender in children's fantasies

The paper is based on an ethnographic research conducted at a Czech grammar school as part of a PhD thesis that was defended in January 2010. The research within a single class of 11-13 year olds was focused on (re)production of gender in the school environment. The research strived to apply a complex perspective on gender reproduction within the classroom. The presented analysis is inspired by Valerie Walkerdine’s statement that gender is theorized as a fiction, shot through with fantasy, yet lived as a fact, produced and struggled over within the regulatory daily practices of schooling (Walkerdine, 1990). Using the technique of writing short text the role of gender in children’s fantasies was researched.