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  3. Sweden has a longstanding reputation as an egalitarian country with a narrow gender gap. But a national debate about gender equa

Sweden has a longstanding reputation as an egalitarian country with a narrow gender gap. But a national debate about gender equa

admin2014-09-05  61
问题     Sweden has a longstanding reputation as an egalitarian country with a narrow gender gap. But a national debate about gender equality has revealed substantial dissatisfaction, with some Swedes feeling it has gone too far. Rousing controversy now is the issue of gender pedagogy, a concept that emerged in the early 2000s and typically involves challenging gender stereotypes in learning material and in avoiding treating male and female pupils in a stereotypical manner. But what has sharpened the debate in Sweden has been the argument that schools should also be gender neutral, giving children the opportunity to define themselves as neither male nor female if they wish.
    Kristina Henkel, a gender expert specializing in equality in schools, disputes the argument that gender pedagogy and neutrality are being foisted on Swedes. " Sweden has a long tradition of working with equality and this has had strong support among politicians," she says, and adds that " the question of gender neutrality, or of everyone having equal rights despite their gender, has also been driven by activists at the grassroots level. "
    But Elise Claeson, a columnist and a former equality expert at the Swedish Confederation of Professions, disagrees. "I have long participated in debates with gender pedagogues and they act like an elite," she says. "They tend to be well-educated, live in big cities, and have contacts in the media, and they clearly despise traditional people. "
    Ms. Claeson has been a vocal critic of the word "hen," a new, gender-neutral pronoun that was recently included in the online version of the National Encyclopedia. Around the same time, Sweden’s first gender-neutral children’s book was published. The author, Jesper Lundqvist, uses hen throughout his book, completely avoiding han and hon, the Swedish words for him and her.
    Claeson believes that the word hen can be harmful to young children because, she says, it can be confusing for them to receive contradicting messages about their genders in school, at home, and in society at large. "It is important to have your gender confirmed to you as a child. This does not limit children; it makes them confident about their identity. . . Children ought to be allowed to mature slowly and naturally. As adults we can choose to expand and change our gender identities. "
    Last fall, nearly 200 teachers gathered in Stockholm to discuss how to avoid " traditional gender patterns" in schools. The conference was part of a research project run by the National Agency for Education and supported by the Delegation for Equality in Schools. " I work with these issues in Finland and Norway and it is clear to me that they have been inspired by the Swedish preschool — and school curricula," says Ms. Henkel, the gender expert. But Henkel also insists that gender equality is a rights issue that cannot simply be left to the state to handle. Instead, she says, it requires the active involvement of citizens. "Rights are not something we receive and then don’t have to fight for. This is about a redistribution of power, and for that initiative and action are needed, not just fancy legislation. "
The problem that bothers Swedes most nowadays is______.
选项 A、the controversy about gender pedagogy in school
B、the attempt to experiment gender neutrality in school
C、the slow progress of gender equality in school
D、the stubbornly serious gender stereotype in school
答案B
解析 文章第一段开门见山引出话题。瑞典国内现在对于性别平等问题最大的争议是关于性别教学法的问题(gender pedagogy)。所谓的性别教学法指的是消除教材中隐藏的性别成见，避免因循守旧对男生和女生区别对待。而在性别教学法施行的过程中，最引起争议的问题莫过于这样一种观点，那就是gender neutrality，要求学校不仅仅应该停留在不强化性别歧视的层面上，而且应该保持性别中立，孩子们可以自己按照自己的理解定义自己的性别。因为题干中问的是最近最困扰瑞典人的问题，故应该选择[B]，关于gender neutrality在学校内部的施行。
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