Parenting Beyond Pink & Blue: How to Raise Your Kids Free of Gender Stereotypes

Written by Christia Spears Brown, PhD

Narrated by Stina Nielsen

A guide that helps parents focus on their children's unique strengths and inclinations rather than on gendered stereotypes to more effectively bring out the best in their individual children, for parents of infants to middle schoolers.



Studies on gender and child development show that, on average, parents talk less to baby boys and are less likely to use numbers when speaking to little girls. Without meaning to, we constantly color-code children, segregating them by gender based on their presumed interests. Our social dependence on these norms has far-reaching effects, such as leading girls to dislike math or increasing aggression in boys.



In this practical guide, developmental psychologist (and mother of two) Christia Spears Brown uses science-based research to show how over-dependence on gender can limit kids, making it harder for them to develop into unique individuals. With a humorous, fresh, and accessible perspective, Parenting Beyond Pink & Blue addresses all the issues that contemporary parents should consider—from gender-segregated birthday parties and schools to sports, sexualization, and emotional intelligence. This guide empowers parents to help kids break out of pink and blue boxes to become their authentic selves.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: Nov 19, 2019
• ISBN: 9781541438620

Reviews for Parenting Beyond Pink & Blue

[Candace Catus · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I cannot continue this book. It’s awful. The author uses sex and gender interchangeably and clearly does not understand the difference. Even worse, she mocks parents who’ve chosen to raise their kids gender free. Trash book.

[lorax_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book is very good for what it is, which is a discussion of how completely ubiquitous gender norms are in childhood and parenting, the harm it does children, and the total lack of any scientific basis for common assumptions like "boys like trucks, girls like dolls." (Yes, my toddler son loves trucks; he also will have his toy animals greet each other with kisses, or methodically hug every stuffed animal at a friend's house.) There is extensive data, and discussion of how young children, at an age where their brains are actively engaged in pattern-matching, rule-finding, and classification will notice that their teachers refer to "boys and girls", or their parents say "that boy on the swing", and conclude that gender is the most important characteristic of people. I've been deliberately trying to avoid doing this since reading the book.

What the book doesn't do, which disappointed me, is talk about gender non-conforming kids other in a cursory and somewhat dismissive manner (explaining that many children briefly experiment with gender roles without being genderfluid or transgender.)