Why Boys Don't Talk and
Why It Matters
(McGraw Hill , January 2005)

There is a nationwide crisis among boys. “Violence has become one of the very few means by which boys feel they can express their emotions,” note respected teen experts Susan Morris Shaffer and Linda Perlman Gordon, LCSW-C, M.Ed. “We have seen evidence of this in the rapid escalation of shootings in our schools and in our homes. When boys lack the full range of affiliations and emotional expressiveness, they often turn to competitive models defined by winning or losing. By allowing competition to be one of the few acceptable models of expression of emotion, parents and educators undercut boys’ ability to succeed in a variety of areas.

In addition, boys begin to think of themselves as ‘winners or losers,’ and those who are labeled as ‘losers’ can become dangerous to themselves and others.” In Why Boys Don't Talk and Why It Matters: A Parent’s Survival Guide to Connecting with Your Teen (McGraw Hill Trade Paperback, January 2005, $14.95), Ms. Shaffer and Ms. Gordon address the harsh realities and societal pressures facing teenage boys today, and provide parents from a wide variety of cultures with essential suggestions on how to maintain emotional connections with their sons. They interviewed teenage boys and girls, mothers, fathers, coaches, counselors, teachers, and psychologists to outline issues.

From these findings, they provide strategies for parents, and identify resources for increasing the ways in which boys can both stay connected and become men.

 

 

“This is an important book. As both an educator and parent, I found WHY BOYS DON’T TALK AND WHY IT MATTERS to be a profound ‘wake-up’ call.”

--Lee Canter, author of Assertive Discipline

“In the name of masculinity, boys are asked to renounce their relationship with their mothers, to “separate,” to disconnect from what is actually their first real relationship. It provides the model for all subsequent disconnections. This wise and warm book encourages mothers not to let their sons become unemotional robots, but instead to stay connected.”

--Michael Kimmel, Professor of Sociology
SUNY Stony Brook

“If you’re a parent who despairs of ever knowing what your adolescent sons is thinking and feeling, this is the book for you. Shaffer and Gordon shed light on the cultural reasons boys frequently don’t talk, then show you to encourage conversation and when to respect the necessary silences. The connectedness they encourage is a vaccine as valuable as anything a physician can provide.”

--Laura Sessions Stepp, author of Our Last Best Shot: Guiding Our Children Through Early Adolescence