Carr's study is also useful for its overview of previous research and hypotheses about tomboys, her consideration of masculinity and , and her cognizance of the influence of normative judgments on the part of researchers (including feminists) on their analysis.

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Bailey, Bechtold, and Berenbaum have begun a longitudinal study of girls identified by their parents as tomboys, to be followed through adolescence along with their siblings. Their critique of prior research on tomboys points out a number of limitations that they hope to address through a long-term, prospective approach.

They have developed a "Tomboy Composite" scale as a means to characterize objectively the degree to which tomboys differ from their gender-conforming siblings. They anticipate that the data they collect can provide insight on sex differences. For example, if boys' greater degree of "visio-spatial" ability results from play activity, testing tomboy girls for this ability can provide useful comparisons.

Of ironically humorous note is Green's comment that when he and his associates sought funding from the National Institute of Mental Health in 1982 for a study similar to that by Bailey, Bechtold, and Berenbaum, they were turned down by a psychiatrist who considered the term "tomboy" to be pejorative.

Overshadowing all these studies are changing social attitudes about gender roles. Determining femininity from "expressive" qualities (such as compassion and sensitivity) and masculinity from "instrumental" ones (assertiveness or self-reliance), still begs the question of culturally determined influences on child-rearing practices. Moreover, formerly male-dominated spheres such as sports and the trades have seen significant increases in female participation since the 1970s and are less associated nowadays with "boyish" girls or "mannish" women.

Indeed, whether or not "tomboy" will continue to be a meaningful designation as sex and gender roles evolve remains to be seen.

Tomboys in Popular Culture

When asked to name tomboy characters from literature, most people immediately recall Jo March from Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. That fact inspired the title of an engaging anthology, Jo's Girls: Tomboy Tales of High Adventure, True Grit, and Real Life (1997). In her introduction, editor Christian McEwen surveys spunky female protagonists in children's and adult literature from the 1800s to the present, and has taken pains to carry her search beyond white, North American sources. The result is a collection of fiction, memoir, and essays from noted and lesser-known women writers. McEwen's bibliography lists scores of related titles.

Recent short fiction, poetry, and imagery celebrating tomboys "who grew up to be lesbians" are compiled in Yamaguchi and Barber's Tomboys! Tales of Dyke Derring-do (1995). Acknowledging their own rambunctious girlhoods, the editors have assembled many perspectives on the relationship of a tomboy past to adult lesbian identity.

Halberstam carries the discussion of gender identity from eighteenth-century "peripheral sexualities" into the post-modern territory of drag king performance. En route she examines the tomboy in film history as a precursor to later cinematic butch archetypes. Olson provides another survey of tomboy movies as part of a wider look at butch and female-to-male identities in Burana and Due's anthology Dagger: On Butch Women.

Throughout their history, tomboys have had to contend with the stigma of presumed lesbianism or the accusation of wanting to be male. Both assumptions were categorically refuted by twentieth-century psychology, which established the normalcy of the tomboy experience among girls of all identities. However, for many, the tomboy stage is the first manifestation of a gender-fluid life journey.

It is impossible to understand twentieth-century lesbian literature without recognizing the significance of butch-femme relationships.

Butch-femme identities are controversial and difficult to define with precision, but both roles subvert prescribed gender and sexual expectations; ultimately, the butch-femme dynamic is a unique way of living and loving.

Although sometimes reviled by heterosexuals and homosexuals alike, the sissy has historically helped define gay culture, and has questioned the dominant constructions of sex and gender.

African-American Blues singer Gladys Bentley openly flaunted her lesbianism in the 1920s and 1930s, but recanted in the 1950s in an attempt to salvage her career.

The child of a famous show business couple, Chaz Bono has had to cope with family resistance and intense public scrutiny as he came out, first as a lesbian, then as a transgender man.

Marion Joe Carstairs, a colorful gender-bending figure of the twentieth century, first gained fame as a speedboat racer in the 1920s.

One of America's premier literary artists in the earlier twentieth century, Willa Cather reflected her own lesbianism in the creation of strong women characters and in the exploration of male homosexuality.

One of the most famous actresses of the nineteenth century, Charlotte Cushman was a commanding presence both on and off stage; she used her fortune and fame to champion the work of other women artists, among them her lover Emma Stebbins.

Despite all her triumphs, Mildred "Babe" Didrikson, one of the greatest women athletes in history, was taunted by charges of "mannishness" and "unnaturalness."

When the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses, it added in its place "Gender Identity Disorder in Childhood," or "The Sissy Boy Syndrome."