Never Said. Always Assumed.

I come from a long line of feisty, intelligent, motivated women.  My great grandmother divorced her husband and denied the Catholic church (in Ireland of all places).  My grandmother divorced her husband and raised her kids herself.  My mother was out earning a solid living as a salesperson when other women were talking about refusing to pick up their husbands' socks.

But we live in a society full of conceits (underlying assumptions) about gender - a society that has trouble categorizing women like those from my family.  Conceits that insist women should be subject to men, that men are better and stronger people than women, that constant trivializing of the female point of view is not only appropriate but, somehow, part of our DNA, thus right and good. In a society like this one, we are assailed from all sides by messages that women are somewhat lesser beings and really only physical beings at that.  We can achieve; we can be successful.  But one of the worst underlying perceptions of our success suggests that a male version of ourselves could have done much better.

I get this all the time.  I was a stage manager for a few years and, arguably, did a solid job in the role.  However, I actually had an actor turn to me and tell me that men iron better than women.  Huh?  True story.  Underlying assumption:  no matter how well I performed in the task a motivated man would always do better.

When I was a kid, we had a substitute teacher come into our grade six class.  He thought he was pretty hot, this guy, and kept talking about a book he wrote about Transylvania.  And, very quickly, he decided to do a social experiment.  His premise was this:  the boys would always do much better than the girls in a random general knowledge test.  We played the game.  I was neck and neck with the other top student all the way through the game -- he a little ahead and, then, me a little ahead.

But when the time ran out, the teacher turned around and said, "See?  John is clearly the winner."  At that moment, John was one point ahead of me.  When a number of kids in the class came to my defense, he looked at me, grimaced and said the world 'well' implying that because I am a little funny looking and I limp, I am not female anyway. So his premise could remain intact despite evidence sitting right in front of him that he was wrong. Absolutely inappropriate behaviour, now, but acceptable then.

That was a while ago, you say?  Yes, a long while ago, and things should have changed by now.  But, still, in discussions about how women and men fare, folks constantly call me the exception that proves the rule.  This is clearly not the case.  There are tons of strong, intelligent, motivated women out there.  We can't all be exceptions.

And, so, along comes my little girl.  Unsurprisingly, she's a lot like me.  She's smart and geeky and loves things that little girls are expected to spurn.  But she's tall and gorgeous.

I wonder how they are going to try to explain away her.


Jacqui Burke is a freelance director, writer, and theatrical teacher living in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  She is currently directing and producing Oleanna by David Mamet for a two week run at the Red Sandcastle Theatre, prepping and leading her Shakespeare is Boffo! theatre arts camps for active kids, directing Love Letters for Encore Entertainment, and directing Lend Me A Tenor for Scarborough Theatre Guild.  She is, also, serializing The Pretender, her first novel, online at http://thepretender-amarcienoelnovel.blogspot.ca/.  



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Jacqui Burke
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Jaybird Productions
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