WRITING, SEXISM AND SCHOOLING: A Discourse‐analytic Investigation of Some Recent Documents on Sexism and Education in Queensland∗

Abstract

Queensland, somewhat belatedly by comparison with other States (Taylor, 1982), has recently taken up ‘sexism in schooling’ as a problem for official treatment. In the course of so doing, the Education Department has produced a number of widely distributed texts, most notably a Departmental Policy Statement. The purpose of the present paper is to examine textual production and effectivity in this context. In particular, it is argued that the production of such texts is highly constrained, especially by prior and precedential texts. In effect, there can be no ‘fresh starts’ under such intertextual conditions. These constraints on the conditions of textual production of ‘anti‐sexist’ policy, it is argued, generate policy texts fraught with contradictions. Recent work in discourse analysis is used to describe those contradictions. Further, the question is raised as to whether such policy documents are indeed anti‐sexist in their effectivity or whether, by transforming, incorporating and neutralising feminist discourse, they are effectively conservative.

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