Rethinking Masculinity Studies: Feminism, Masculinity, and Poststructural Accounts of Agency and Emotional Reflexivity

Abstract

The past decades have seen a broadening of critical masculinity studies, where terms like the metrosexual, and frameworks like hegemonic masculinity have become staples in the study of men. Although helpful, such terms denote a categorical experience that is either taken up or rejected by men. If rejected, new identities and forms of masculinity emerge to explain away what men are doing and feeling regarding their masculine identity, with little reflection on the question of men’s agency. Drawing from feminist accounts of agency and emotional reflexivity, this article provides an overview of how categorical analyses have become embedded within the study of masculinity, and how they continue to paint masculinity as a static and fixed entity despite their attempts to theorize its fluid multiplicity. In this work, I challenge men and masculinity scholars to return our analytical gazes to our descriptions of masculinity, and encourage the return to feminist theorizing.