A Comparative Study of Gender Representation in Iranian English High School Books and TouchStone Series: A Critical Discourse Analysis

Abstract

The present study aims to critically compare Iranian English high school books, namely Vision 2 & 3 with TouchStone 2 & 3 to disclose how male and female genders are represented. For this purpose, some factors, including the frequency of male and female characters, the frequency of male and female genders in terms of photographical presentation, and the ratio of ownership by male and female genders were calculated, interpreted, and explained in light of Fairclough’s (2001) three-dimension critical discourse analysis model. Results revealed that although both series of textbooks suffer from gender bias in favor of the male gender, the Iranian English high school books privilege the male gender compared to TouchStone 2 & 3. It was hypothesized that this inequality in gender representation in the Iranian English high school books might trace back to the cultural context of Iran wherein the females have been more or less marginalized. However, the authors of TouchStone 2 & 3 may have tried to mirror equality status between males and females in the western world. It was concluded that different stereotyped gender representation with the prevalence of an androgenic view in the Iranian English high school books has its roots in methodological and epistemological failures rather than strict adherence to Islamic ideology or Iranian cultural norms because Islam has adopted an egalitarian stance about sexes in society and other areas. Finally, in light of the findings, some pedagogical implications are proposed.

Keywords

• critical discourse analysis
• gender representation
• ideology
• elt textbooks