When Will I Become a Woman?: The Complexities Behind the Term “College Girl”
November 22, 2023
Writer: Emily Becker
Editor: Alena Miklosovic
At this stage of our lives, males are called “guys”. We say it all the time: when we’re telling our girlfriends about this guy we’re talking to, about some guy from our English class, or when we see a group of guys walk past us in the diag. It’s become a part of our daily vocabulary. It would be weird to say we were hanging out with a group of “boys” and saying that a group of “men” invited us over just sounds wrong, suggesting the perfect word to describe them is “guys”.
Yet there is no such middle-transition word to describe college-aged females. There are only two options for us: girls or women. On the internet and social media especially we have been told that we’re still “girls” at this age. The Pinterest “college girl aesthetic” trend shows us the most in-style fashion looks to fit our demographic while the entire premise of the famed program “The Sex Lives of College Girls” on HBO Max focuses on the stereotypical expectations placed upon us at this age. There are so many platforms where “the college girl” has become a label and an aesthetic in itself with businesses appealing to us as their specific target market — just like what has also become of the term “frat guy”. While the “college girl” is supposed to be the term to best describe us, we are met with the disparities of growing up and already being told we’ve crossed into womanhood and nonetheless have faced the responsibility and maturity expectations that come with it.
My mother always told me that the day I got my period was the day I finally became a woman. Did I become a woman at 11 years old then? Is it when you develop curvaceous hips and luscious lips that make you more “desirable” and “worthy of attention?” How about when the clock strikes midnight on your 18th birthday and you get the stamp of approval saying you’re now a legal adult? Did I become a woman then? “Exiting girlhood” is a concept that never has one specific event but it surely happens before we enter our college years. So, why does the idea of a “college woman” sound so foreign and unnatural to our modern ears? I myself know that even at 19 I definitely do not feel like a woman. So many of us have spoken recently about the feeling of still being 16 years old, for many of us do to a phenomenon called the “Pandemic Skip” as described by The Cut — the idea that we feel three years younger than we actually are due to the lack of social development during Covid-19. For others, the feeling of still being a teenager stems from having to prove our knowledge, worth, and value in many everyday (and often male-dominated) environments, suggesting a potential societal setback with the term “college girl”. Does the use of the word “girl” — due to its connection with juvenility — immediately put us at a disadvantage compared to our male counterparts? That leaves us to wonder: does the “feeling” of entering womanhood come when we are finally accepted as such by all members of society? Is it then when we’ll start being taken seriously?
As females living in this transition period we are constantly balancing between two expectations of us. Half the world just thinks we’re silly party girls in small tops wearing shiny lip gloss while the other half expects us to be grown women since we’ve already gone through puberty, gotten catcalled, and/or sent in our first voting ballot. The use of the word “guys” gives males our age the space to just live and create in this state. They’re not “boys” anymore who need someone to watch them on the playground and they’re not “men” who are supposed to know every answer from behind their desks. They’re just “guys” who are learning to navigate the real world for the first time — an enviable leniency that is not granted to women at this age. The lack of a “middle-transition word” perpetuates the idea that women are constantly proving themselves: in the workplace, in team projects, as anything other than the stereotypes already placed upon us. A term like this is important to acknowledge the stage of life women are in right now. Without one, we are constantly trapped in this never ending cycle of either being infantilized as girls who need help with every little task or expected to be mature women ready for the future stages of our lives. We’re repeatedly told there’s no rush in growing up but this continuous push and pull makes balancing the college age period for females a tricky one. Why are we constantly having to prove ourselves as something? Can’t we just, especially for these four fleeting years, be enough as we are?
Works Cited
Schneider, K. (2023, September 14). The Pandemic Skip. The Cut.
https://www.thecut.com/article/post-covid-pandemic-age-essay.html
