Class-Based Masculinities: Divorce, Fatherhood, and the Hegemonic Ideal

Abstract

This study is based on current research and theory that suggests that divorce creates fundamental changes in the organization of families in terms of gender. We use feminist theory, with its elevation of gender to a central category of analysis, to begin to explain the mechanisms that shape fathers’ responses to divorce. Based on a review of narratives from 20 nonresidential, recently divorced fathers, we found that divorce prompted a transformation for these men in terms of their families’ gender relations of power. Men occupied positions of relative privilege when married, and divorce called this status into question. The relational and legal changes prompted by divorce signified a loss of access and authority to which many of the research participants felt entitled. Changes in the gender order in families influenced men’s constructions of masculinity. Moreover, an examination of gender and social class as components of an interacting system illustrates the constraints that class position imposed on men as they negotiated postdivorce family relationships.