Gender representations in the 6th, 7th and 8th grade ELT coursebooks published by the Turkish Ministry of National Education

Abstract

How genders are represented in teaching materials affect social values, behavior; and messages conveyed through gender roles presented in the coursebooks influence the development of students’ self-esteem and their attitudes towards genders (Lee and Collins, 2009). Hence, there is a need for guidance through the correct selection of the coursebooks and teaching materials by taking gender representations into account. This study explored how genders are represented in the 6th, 7th and 8th grade English language teaching (ELT) coursebooks published by the Turkish Ministry of National Education and used at state schools. The books were analyzed by using written content analysis for texts and dialogues, and visual content analysis for pictures in the coursebooks within a conceptual framework adapted from the ABC of Gender Analysis by Kabira and Masinjila (1995). The results of the study showed that there is an overall balance between the representations of females and males. However, imbalance is observed when individual categories in individual grade levels were examined more closely. Therefore, the results of this study indicate a need for the evaluation of the content of coursebooks with the purpose of eliminating gender bias.