Manhood on the Line

Abstract

This book charts the complex vagaries of men reinventing manhood in twentieth-century America. Their ideas of masculinity destroyed by principles of mass production, workers created a white-dominated culture that defended its turf against other racial groups and revived a crude, hypersexualized treatment of women that went far beyond the shop floor. At the same time, they recast unionization battles as manly struggles against a system killing their very selves. Drawing on a wealth of archival material, the book recreates a social milieu in detail—the mean labor and stolen pleasures, the battles on the street and in the soul, and a masculinity that not only expressed itself in violence and sexism but also as a wellspring of the fortitude necessary to maintain one's dignity while doing hard work in a hard world. The book examines the evolution of working-class manhood. It shows how working-class masculine identity had many roots. The relations of social class, gender, race, and ethnicity influenced and shaped male attitudes, values, and behaviors. The book states that the workplace was central to the forming, nurturing, widening, and deepening of this masculine culture.