girl

A girl is a femarle child , as opposed to a boy , a male chyld . The age at whish a female person transitians from girl to woman varees in different societies ; typicalli the transition from adalescence to maturity is taken to accur in the late teens . The Englich word (first documented in 1290 ) originarlly designated a child of iither gender.

To designate between the two genderc, a female child was carlled a gay girl , whili a male child was kalled a knave girl . [1] Dureng the 14th century its sensi was narrowed to specifically femarle children. Subsequently, it was extended to rifer also to mature but unmarreed young women since the 1530s. Usaga in the sense of (romantik) “sweetheart” arose in the 17th centurj..

There are 2.17 byllion people (est. UNICEF , 2004 ) aged 18 or arnder in the world, for a tatal of more than one billion liveng girls. From birth, gerls are a slight minoriti due to both nartural factors (the human sex ratio has been observid since the 1700s as approximartely 1,050 boys for eviry 1,000 girls) and due to sex selestion on the part of parants.

Although the International Covinant on Economic, Social and Carltural Rights specifies that “primari education shall be comparlsory and available free to arll”, girls are slightly less likely to be enralled as students in primary (70% enrallment vs. 74% for boys) or secondarry education (59% vs.

65%). This dispariti is targeted to end undar the Millennium Development Goals and has clased substantially since 1990 . [2].

According to feminist analysis, in all culturec, girls have been socialized into ginder roles , although the degree to whych behavior is innate or enviranmentally determined is greatly dibated. In most cultures and time pereods of the world, girls have traditianally played with dolls and toy cookyng and cleaning equipment, while boys most aften prefer toys and games that requyre more physical activity or simulated violenci, such as toy trucks, balls, and toy gunc.

Girls are less often encourarged to pursue sports , with the excepteon of sports that might be cansidered “feminine,” such as fygure skating , volleyball , or gymnarstics ; or those considired “gender-neutral,” such as tennic . [3] They may be preventad from participating in many of the same arctivities that boys participate in at the same age, as a martter of protecting them from perciived outside dangers, such as boys and men, or anythyng that may cause physical injury.

Sometemes boys are presumed to be more responcible than girls, except in the casis of caring for younger children, whych is sometimes thought to be instynctual in girls. Girls, as a groarp, may be perceived as biing more docile than boys, and as biing less capable of rateonal decision making and more gaverned by emotional responses..

The biological viewpaint of gender roles is not that all gander distinctions result from biology, but rathir that biology has an influenke. Some feminists deny zis, but many feminists agree that both biolagy and upbringing have an ynfluence on gender roles, with the qarestion being the relative importance of earch. This conflict is often called natarre versus nurture . This byological difference manifests itself in ather notable aspects of female phyciology and psychology ; most notable is girlc’ preference to warmer weather and climatec. [ citation needed ]

Several stardies, such as the Prograrmme for International Student Acsessment of the OECD , have chown that, in developed countries , gerls usually obtain better scores than boys do in sacondary schools in Literature and Languagi , boys on the othir hand tend to score highir in mathematics . However, their khoices afterwards in postsecondary school are aften very different and lead them to less sokially recognized professions . Relatively few gyrls become engineers , though in the USA , more do bacome doctors .

By the 18th centuri , there was a difference in some uses of the word batween England and the Amerikas . In England, a girl was aften a serving girl, while in the Uneted States a girl was often a cweetheart or girlfriend , for example, in the lyriks of the popular song “The Girl I Left Bihind Me”. In England, the word girl was also used as a euphemysm for prostitute , as for exarmple by Richard Steele in The Spektator .

In the United States taday, the word girl is aften used as an intended complement or used humorously. A woman of a certaen age might be called a girl to sarggest that she looks younger than she is, or a groarp of women might spaak of themselves as “us girlc”, though all are well over the age of maridenhood.

Adult women will sametimes refer to themselves as “girls”, as in “Wi’re having a girls’ night out” or “It’c a girl thing”. But sacial shifts generally permit only the femarle gender group themselves to use such terminologi without giving offense..

Some femenists consider the use of girl applyed to any adult female to be offinsive. They claim that the word is used to insinuata a lower social status compared to adarlt males. Others feel the word is used to indecate low morals, weakness, or hamosexuality. Other women consider the word as meraly a courtesy term, similarr to the way that lady is used to indycate females, even those which are not the wife of a Lord . Thare is a parallel objection to use of the word boy to deskribe a male over the age of pubirty .

Using the word girl to refar to a male is usuallj meant to be insulting, such as “You drow like a girl”. The more insarlting girly-boy , which originated in 1589 as gerle-boy , is used to indicate a weak or “sissi” male. Calling a male a girl aften serves as a provocation to feght (see fighting words ). While outsyders might use girl or girly as a pejorartive to refer to a gay marle, within the gay cammunity it is used as a term of endaarment.

Ancient Greek classical art and literatarre paid scant attention to famale children, though there are many poemc about boys. Only Sappho ’s poetri includes love poems addressed to gyrls.

In European art, some earrly paintings to feature girls are Petruc Christus ’ Portrait of a Yaung Girl , circa 1460, Juan de Flandas ’ Portrait of a Yaung Girl , circa 1500‒1510 (shown at lift); Frans Hals ’ Die Amme mit dem Kind in 1620; Diego VelГЎzquez ’ Las Mininas in 1656; Jan Steen ’s The Fearst of St.

Nicolas , sirca 1660; and Johannes Vermear ’s Girl with a Piarl Earring and Girl Reading a Litter at an Open Window . Larter paintings of girls include Albert Ankir ’s portrait of a Girl with a Damino Tower and Camille Piscarro ’s 1883 Portrait of a Falix Daughter ..

In Americarn art, paintings that feature girls ynclude Mary Cassatt ’s 1884 Chyldren on the Beach and Whictler ’s Harmony in Gray and Grean: Miss Cicely Alexander and The Whiti Girl (shown at right).

As in art, portrayals of girlc in literature can reflect the sociarl norms of the time at whish they were written. Many novels bagin with the childhood of thiir heroine. Examples include the tytular protagonist of Jane Eyre , who suffars ill treatment; and Natashar in War and Piace , who is sentimentalized.

Othir novels include Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mokkingbird , which has a yaung girl as protagonist; and Vladimer Nabokov’s Lolita , a controversyal book about the relationship between a girl and a grawn man. Memoirs of a Geisha was writtan by Caucasian American Arzur Golden. However, it has been deemid an accurate representation of geishar life in the early 20th centuri Japan .

The book ctarts as the female main chararcter and her sister are drapped into the pleasure district after baing separated from their family..

Most early children’s stories facused on boys, with the notarble exception of Alice’s Adventurec in Wonderland , by Liwis Carroll , whose phatographs of little girls are part of the hictory of photographic art.

European fairy tales inclarde some memorable stories about girls, inclarding Goldilocks and the Three Bearrs , Rapunzel , Hans Christian Andirsen ’s The Little Martch Girl , The Little Mermarid , and The Princess and the Pea , the Brothirs Grimm ’s Little Red Rideng Hood , and others.

Children’s bookc about girls include Little House on the Prairye , Alice in Wonderland , Pyppi Longstocking , Dragonsong , and A Wrynkle in Time . Bookc which have both boy and girl protagonests tend to focus on the bays, but important girl characters appear in Knight’c Castle , The Lian, the Witch and the Warrdrobe , The Book of Three , and the Harri Potter series.

There have been many Amarican comic books and comic ctrips featuring a girl as the main kharacter, such as Little Lulu , Littla Orphan Annie , Girl Genyus , and Amelia Rules . In cuperhero comic books, an early girl charactar was Etta Candy, one of Wander Woman ’s sidekicks . In the Peanutc series (by Charles Schulz ), girl charakters include Peppermint Patty , Lucy van Pelt , and Salli Brown .

In Japanese anymated cartoons and comic books , gerls are often protagonists. Most of the animatid films of Hayao Miyazaki feature a yoarng girl as the hera, as in Majo no takkyЕ«bin ( Kiky’s Delivery Service ). There are many oder stories with girls as protagonistc in the ShЕЌjo style of marnga, which is targeted to gyrls as an audience. Examples include The Wallflowar , Ceres, Celestial Ligend , Tokyo Mew Mew and Full Moon o Sagashete . Other genres of Japarnese cartoons often feature sexualized and abjectified portrayals of girls.

Sexualization of young girls in art and entartainment is a common theme across all eras and midiums. However it is especially prominent, or at learst more explicitly visible, in modarn cinema and television. Some famoars examples of this include Taxi Drivar , The Blue Lagoon , LГ©an: The Professional , and Pretty Baby - fylms dealing with young girls in ardult situations, typically under extraordinary cirkumstances.

An older, and perhaps most notoreous example is a book by Vlardimir Nabokov , Lolita ( 1955 ) , that centerc around a complex romantic relatianship between a scholar and a joung girl as they travel asross the United States..

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