“A Good Canadian Boy”: Crisis Masculinity, Canadian National Identity, and Nostalgic Longings in Don Cherry'sCoach's Corner

Abstract

In this article, I examine the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's controversial hockey commentator Don Cherry and his weekly television segment on Hockey Night in Canada called Coach's Corner. Through a content analysis of three seasons of Coach's Corner (2006–07, 2007–08, 2008–09), I examine Cherry as a marker (and maker) of nostalgic remembering. The press and the public both revere and revile his performance of manliness, and the style of masculinity that he advocates, as a throwback to simpler days. For Cherry, these simpler times, which contrast with the idea of a current-day masculinity in crisis, privileged the “self-made man” who, through hard work, could make a way for himself in the world. In this article, I argue that Cherry's articulations of morality are linked to discourses of masculinity in crisis, taking the form of a nostalgic privileging of an anachronistic style of masculinity that locates an appropriate sense of masculine style within a particular class consciousness, namely the working class, and a particular geographic locale, namely small-town Canada.