Masculinity Studies Research Articles

Sticky Masculinity

Despite the consolidation of “critical studies on men” or “masculinity studies” in recent years, critics have pointed to a kind of feminist theory deficit due to the relative lack of engagement with contemporary developments of feminist theory. By focusing on post-structuralist feminist and feminist phenomenological accounts of subjectivity, this article seeks to contribute to the emerging body of work that brings such theories into critical studies on men. I argue that making use of these perspectives is not only a matter of replacing dominant theories, but rather offers possibilities for creative rereading of earlier work on masculinity, which may not have been sufficiently appreciated from the viewpoint of dominant structural perspectives. My argument proceeds through a reading of John Stoltenberg as a post-structuralist feminist, and a reading of Victor Seidler as a feminist phenomenologist. I suggest that the study of masculinity can benefit from both traditions, and as an example I consider Jonathan Salisbury’s and David Jackson’s work on “boys’ work.” Drawing in particular on Sara Ahmed’s innovative combination of post-structuralism and phenomenology, I suggest an understanding of masculinity as “sticky.”

Post-World War II Masculinities in British and American Literature and Culture: Towards Comparative Masculinity Studies

Post-World War II Masculinities in British and American Literature and Culture: Towards Comparative Masculinity Studies

A Manly Art: Plowing, Plowing Matches, and Rural Masculinity in Ontario, 1800–1930

Abstract: This article draws on recent studies of masculinity, labour and recreation to consider rural men. More Canadian men worked in farming than any other single occupation and yet we know little about their sense of masculine identity. This article examines the processes of fashioning, practising and performing masculinity associated with the archetypal farming skill passed down from father to son – plowing. In the early 1800s improving farmers created the plowing match, an educational and sporting event. The author analyzes media representations of the match, reporters' rhetoric, visual images and interviews with plowmen and spectators. She argues that their depictions and discussions of plowing at home and at the match shed light on their masculine ideals, ideals that were challenged with the introduction of the tractor. Rural men continued to value a rugged individualism and mastery over nature, but the value of being a skilled horseman, stoic toiler, and muscled man gave way to new masculine ideals based on speed, comfort, and expertise with machines. In the process farmers helped reposition the countryside in the shifting cultural hierarchy and moved in parallel with other Canadian men who were refashioning concepts of manliness, skill, fatherhood and recreation in the new industrial age.

Masculinity and Advertisements: The Case of Nepal Television

The article explores the television commercials broadcasted by the Nepal Television (NTV) that have male roles to analyze how masculinity is presented in them. In Nepal, studies of men and masculinities remain a rare compared with studies of women and femininity. It is essential to analyze the representation of masculinity to understand men’s experiences, attitudes, beliefs and practices, not only to challenge men’s superiority over females, but also to create gender equality. ! e aim of this article then is to study how a hegemonic masculinity is represented and constructed within NTV commercials. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3126/ctbijis.v1i1.10463 Crossing the Border: International Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies Vol.1(1) 2013; 1-10

Beyond bad behaving brothers: productive performances of masculinities among college fraternity men

Research on fraternity men focuses almost exclusively on problematic behaviors such as homophobia and sexism, alcohol abuse, violence against women, sexual promiscuity, and the overrepresentation of members among campus judicial offenders. Consequently, little is known about those who perform masculinities in healthy and productive ways. Presented in this article are findings from a qualitative study of productive masculinities and behaviors among 50 undergraduate fraternity men from 44 chapters across the US and Canada. Findings offer insights into participants’ steadfast commitments to the fraternity’s espoused values; their acceptance and appreciation of members from a range of diverse backgrounds; strategies they employed to address bad behaviors (including sexism, racism, and homophobia) among chapter brothers; and the conditions that enabled them to behave in ways that contradict stereotypes concerning men in collegiate fraternities.

The study of masculinities

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to review the development of the field of knowledge about masculinities, and particularly to show the need for post-colonial perspectives. Design/methodology/approach – Reading major texts in the field and analysing their conclusions, inclusions, and exclusions. Findings – Study of masculinities is necessary to gain an adequate understanding of the whole field of gender relations. This field is now global, but the consequences of a global field of knowledge are not sufficiently recognized because of the continuing hegemony of the global north in theory, methodology, and academic networks. The coloniality of gender is outlined. Significant contributions from the global south are identified and the issues involved in decolonizing the field of masculinity studies are analysed. Research limitations/implications – Mainly Anglophone texts discussed. Practical implications – Redesign of curricula for teaching in this area; redeployment of resources in academic publishing and other knowledge production projects. Social implications – Knowledge in this area is relevant to HIV prevention, poverty reduction, economic development, prevention of violence, international conflict, and educational attainment. Originality/value – To stimulate rethinking among scholars in the field of masculinity and gender studies, and through them among those dealing with the practical issues mentioned.

The ethics of nobody I know: gender and the politics of description

Purpose – This paper aims to bring together feminist philosophy, phenomenology, and masculinity studies to consider the gendered formation of ethical practices, focusing on the construction of “male” and “female” identities in quotidian social encounters. While scholarship on masculinity has frequently focused on hegemonic modes of behaviour or normative gender relations, less attention has been paid to the “ethics of people I know” as informal political resources, ones that shapes not only conversations about how one should act (“people I know don’t do that”), but also about the diversity of situations that friends, acquaintances or strangers could plausibly have encountered (“that hasn’t happened to anyone I know”). Design/methodology/approach – The paper rethinks mundane social securities drawing on Martin Heidegger, Simone de Beauvoir, and Sara Ahmed to consider anecdotal case studies around gender recognition and political practice, and in doing so also develops the notion of interpellation in relation to everyday ethical problems. Findings – The paper suggests that inquiry into diverse modes of quotidian complicities – or what de Beauvoir calls the “snares” of a deeply human liberty – can be useful for describing the mixtures of sympathy, empathy, and disavowal in the performance of pro-feminist and queer-friendly masculinities or masculinist identities. It also suggests that the adoption of an “anti-normative” politics is insufficient for negotiating the problems of description and recognition involved in the articulation of gendered social experiences. Originality/value – This paper approaches questions around political identification commonly considered in queer theory from the viewpoint of descriptive practices themselves, and thus reorients problems of recognition and interpellation towards the expression of ethical statements, rather than focusing solely on the objects of such statements.

The Influence of Declining Homophobia on Men’s Gender in the United States: An Argument for the Study of Homohysteria

Generations of scholars have examined the variety of correlates of attitudes and behaviors of heterosexual men toward gay men. There has also been substantial exploration of the impact of homophobia on gay men and its gendering of heterosexual men. However, less research exists into the effects of the liberalization of sexual attitudes on these groups. In this forum, we call for scholarly engagement with a relatively new arena of masculinities studies: the impact of decreasing homophobia on socially acceptable gendered behaviors among heterosexual males in the U.S. We offer homohysteria as a concept to examine the social impact of heterosexual male’s fear of being thought gay; suggesting that homohysteria is an effective heurism for investigating micro- and macro-level processes relating homophobia to masculinity. Our thesis is that as homohysteria declines, heterosexual males are able to engage in homosocial relationships characterized by a number of positive traits, including: the social inclusion of gay male peers; the embrace of once-feminized artifacts; increased emotional intimacy; increased physical tactility; the erosion of the one-time rule of homosexuality; and a rejection of violence. We focus solely upon heterosexual males and their attitudes toward gay males because these are the demographics of the participants in the empirical research in this area. We then highlight eight key areas where further research could both develop homohysteria as a concept and enhance understanding of social life.

Masculinidades em jogo na América Portuguesa: a expedição de Pero Coelho de Sousa em 1603

This article shall examine some contingencies, transformations and inventions about some masculinities aspects. The latter are perceived in the trajectories of some men who had made part of conquest and colonization activities in the Northern captaincies of Portuguese America, during the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Special attention was given to the captaincy of Siara and Captain Pero Coelho de Sousa’s expedition, started in 1603. For this purpose, it was analyzed the relationships, expectations and behaviors of some men who were the main officers in Portuguese America. Those men developed governance practices in “Brazil”, especially when they deliberated about their advance/internalization in Rio Grande, Paraiba, Siara, Piaui and Maranhao. Based in gender and masculinity studies, this paper intended to analyze the invention of masculine identities in the context noted above, questioning the aspects of identification and differentiation existing between men. This research is supported by the analyses of official documents, such as letters; royal decrees; royal regulations; royal records and certificates; all of them safeguarded in Brazilian and/or Portuguese institutions. It was also examined chronicles; religious memoirs; and some memoirs of those men who adventured themselves in conquest activities. Keywords: Masculinity, gender, identity, Portuguese America.

El hombre y su representación en Lincoln (Steven Spielberg, 2012): un análisis textual.

This journal article centres on the representation of masculinities in the film text Lincoln (Spielberg, 2012), following the four sites Pat Kirkham and Janet Thumim define for the study of masculinities in film: the body, action, the external world and the internal world (1993: 11). The textual analysis reveals that the use of the word and even its absence run through those four sites, defining the character perfor med by Daniel Day-Lewis.

Behind closed doors! Homosocial desire and the academic boys club

Purpose– The aim of this paper is to explore the nature and power of the academic boys club. In many organisations, the political significance of the boys club goes largely unremarked and unacknowledged. Yet, the way that male colleagues intimately relate to each other, sometimes called homosocial desire, is crucial to their success at gaining and retaining power at work.Design/methodology/approach– Feminist, poststructuralist, ethnographic, qualitative, and longitudinal data were collected over a five-year period from male and female academics in a British university.Findings– The boys club is still a powerful feature of British universities. Their apparent invisibility shrouds the manner in which they can and do promote and maintain male interests in a myriad of ways, including selection and promotion. These findings have resonances for all organisations.Research limitations/implications– Researching the intimacies between male colleagues requires time-intensive field work and insider access to men interacting with each other.Practical implications– Meaningful gender equality will not be achieved unless and until the more sophisticated forms of female exclusion are revealed and deconstructed.Originality/value– This research makes an unusual and crucial contribution to the study of gender, men and masculinities by providing longitudinal, rich, detailed data, observing men at the closest of quarters and then analysed by a feminist and poststructuralist gaze.

Text as Palimpsest: Gender in the Work of Agota Kristof

This paper investigates the portrayal of gender in the work of Swiss-Hungarian writer Agota Kristof. Texts from her oeuvre that belong to different literary genres and creative periods are analyzed through a framework of materialist feminism, masculinity studies and narratology. Based on an analysis of the incidence of the female voice, two aesthetic strategies can be observed: on the one hand, Kristof’s early texts show a certain interest in women’s subjectivity, on the other, her later writings foreground male characters and their perspective. Overall, women are portrayed as homebound wives and mothers and men are dominant as narrators, writers and protagonists. While this seems to reflect the patriarchal dichotomy, other elements undermine this reading: male characters are weak and marginal, and in a few significant texts, women’s life in the family is represented as a prison from which they wish to escape. In these texts, the female character’s voice reveals the internal conflict between her aspirations and the pressures to conform to prescribed roles, which, in some instances, leads to subversion in the form of violence against her husband. Thus, though on the surface Kristof’s work seems to reinforce or merely reflect patriarchy, the deeper layers of meaning bring into succeeding focus a fundamental interrogation of gender roles.

Science education for all, some or just a few? Feminist and gender perspectives on science education: a special issue

This special issue of Culture Studies of Science Education has articles that adopt a critical stance by building on feminist, gender and/or queer perspectives on science education. Before a more detailed introduction and overview of the present issue, I will start by positioning gender studies and gender research, what it is and what it includes. Gender studies is an interdisciplinary subject emerging from feminist and critical research on gender and power issues, which comprises the knowledge of theories, methods and approaches from earlier and current feminist and gender research. Gender research is the study of gender and the intersection of gender with other socio-cultural categories of analysis and identity, such as ethnicity, sexuality, class, disability, nationality, language and more. It analyses the complex constructions of gender in different historical contexts, in various cultural arenas, and varying global processes. One aspect of gender research is feminist critique of the scientific knowledge production. Gender studies also includes other critical studies related to power and gender, such as women’s studies, masculinity studies, and queer studies, among others. Thus, gender studies and gender research problematize the importance of gender in different contexts. At the focal point are questions such as: What are the explicit and implicit expectations of women and men in different social, cultural, and historical contexts? How is gender performed in daily life and practices? How do these norms and expectations limit the ways in which we are allowed to move, look, talk, behave, and learn? In this special issue the context is science education, including all levels from preschool to doctoral studies. When the idea of a special issue arose, the intention from the beginning was to have a strong focus on feminist research. For some researchers, feminist research uses gender as an analytical category. For others, it has a specific meaning that is applicable to certain parts of the field and is characterized by including political activism and movement for social change. In that sense such research not only studies and problematizes the

Au nom du père? Rethinking the History of Fatherhood in Quebec

This article presents a reading of the literature on North American fatherhood as a category of gendered historical experience and as an area of inquiry within masculinity studies. The main focus is on Quebec, where the scholarship in this area has developed more slowly than in English Canada or the United States. The discussion is framed around three key questions: (1) Does the literature suggest that American and Canadian fathers shared in common understandings of their paternal identities in the twentieth century?; (2) Was French-speaking, Catholic Quebec thoroughly distinct in this area or were there common North American ideologies of fatherhood in which Quebecers participated?; and (3) Do Quebec historians of masculinity and fatherhood continue to write in a theoretically impoverished way (Vacante 2005a, 2006) or can we discern the beginnings of a more sophisticated approach that situates the paternal experience within the power dynamics of patriarchy?

Conflicting discourses of church youths on masculinity and sexuality in the context of HIV in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo

Masculinity studies are fairly new and young churchgoers are an under-researched group in the current Congolese church context. In response to this knowledge gap, this paper attempts to explore discourses of young churchgoers from deprived areas of Kinshasa regarding masculinity and sexuality in the era of HIV. A series of 16 semi-structured interviews were conducted with unmarried young churchgoers from the Salvation Army, Protestant and Revival churches. The interviews were tape-recorded, transcribed verbatim and analysed using discourse analysis. Five main discourses emerged: ‘we are aware of the church message on sex’, ‘young men need sex’, ‘young women need money’, ‘to use or not to use condoms’ and ‘we trust in the church message’. Although all informants knew and heard church messages against premarital sex, many of them were sexually active. The perception was that young men were engaged in sexual activities with multiple partners as a result of sexual motivations surrounding masculinity and sexual potency, while young women sought multiple partners through transactional and intergenerational sex for economic reasons. These sexual practices of young people conflicted with church messages on sexual abstinence and faithfulness. However, a small number of participants challenged current gender norms and suggested alternative ways of being a man or a woman. To elucidate these alternatives, we suggest that church youths and church leaders might take concrete actions to deconstruct misconceptions about being men. In this way, they can possibly enhance a frank and fruitful dialogue on sex, sexuality and gender to promote positive masculinities and constructive partnerships to prevent HIV.

Combining hegemonic masculinity and intersectionality

This article discusses the most influential contribution to studies of men and masculinity, i.e. the concept of hegemonic masculinity developed by R.W. Connell. It points to some problematic elements of the theory and some suggestions for improvement. One criticism is that the use of the concept during recent years has been characterized by ambiguities. We argue that these problems are not based on Connell's original conceptualization but on the ways the concept of hegemonic masculinity has been adapted and used by different researchers. We argue that this ambiguity is especially a problem when it comes to questions of power relations. In the article we first outline the reception of the concept. This is followed by a critical discussion of whether dominant masculinities are necessarily always related to legitimizing patriarchal gender relations. As an alternative we suggest that an intersectional approach may offer a theoretical tool for analyzing the complexities of differences and hierarchic power relations between men. In the concluding discussion we advance some suggestions that can improve and clarify the use of the concept of hegemonic masculinity, e.g. distinguishing between internal and external hegemony and emphasizing that both dimensions of power presume an open empirical and contextual analysis.

Chinese masculinity studies in the twenty-first century: Westernizing, Easternizing and globalizing wen and wu

This ‘state of the field’ article on Chinese masculinity frames the English-language research on Chinese masculinity in the twenty-first century in the context of the rise of China and her use of ‘soft power’ in this millennium. The use of this soft power coincides with the increasing wealth and mobility of educated Chinese who are traveling to the Chinese cities, and also to various parts of the world. The article shows that as a consequence of these factors, the traditional Chinese masculine ideals of wen (cultural attainment) and wu (physical prowess) have had a discernable impact on perceptions of masculinity ideals internationally. More importantly, the article traces the way that wen and wu have themselves evolved due to influences from the West and the East (Japan and Korea). These influences come mainly from popular culture, with initiatives from the traditionally less powerful people like women and the young.

Tupac's Law: Incarceration, T.H.U.G.L.I.F.E., and the Crisis of Black Masculinity

This article discusses Tupac Shakur’s relationship with policy debates in the 1990s using an interdisciplinary approach to examine historical, musical, archival, and policy sources. Key episodes in his life, especially his incarceration at the Clinton Correctional Facility in New York from 1995 to 1996, illustrate numerous challenges Black men of the hip-hop generation encountered, such as incarceration, targeted enforcement, and police corruption. Shakur’s contributions to the study of Black masculinity should not be relegated only to his music, but also include his contributions to policy discourse by engaging his T.H.U.G.L.I.F.E. code in its proper historical and cultural context. This research demonstrates how unsettled policy questions and cultural debates have continuing significance in the present, as well as the limitations of public policy approaches that exclude diverse perspectives on race, gender, and culture.

Men’s antiviolence activism - The case of two men’s networks in contemporary Italy and Spain

This article focuses on the phenomenon of men’s engagement with gender equality and what scholars in the field of critical studies of men and masculinities (CSMM) have called profeminist antiviolence activism. The main aim of profeminist antiviolence men’s groups is to raise gender awareness among men in order to involve them in the making of a more egalitarian society. Their primary action is aimed at eradicating male violence against women. This article presents how this type of collective engagement is emerging in the contexts of contemporary Italy and Spain, and draws upon research conducted by the author among the members of the Italian men’s network Maschile Plurale http://www. maschileplurale.it/ and the Spanish men’s Asociación de Hombres por la Igualdad de Género (AHIGE) http://www.ahige.org/.

Man’s Estate: Landed Gentry Masculinities, 1660–1900, by Henry French and Mark Rothery

Henry French and Mark Rothery’s study of elite masculinities during the long eighteenth century is based on a study of 10–15,000 personal letters from the archives of gentry families. The authors use this enormously rich body of material to examine the processes by which male individuals made the transition to manhood, starting with educational experiences in schools and universities before they turn to apprenticeships, young men’s travels abroad and, finally, fatherhood. The letters allow French and Rothery to demonstrate how individuals manipulated established norms and languages to produce a variety of outcomes, often shifting between different models of masculinity as the occasion demanded. The use of letters also allows the authors to move easily from practices to subjectivities, fully appreciating the fact that ‘male identity was linked intimately not just to the “fact” of being a husband or a father, but to the emotional bonds and burdens that accompanied these positions’ (p. 232). Particularly welcome is the sensitive reading of women’s role in reproducing forms of masculinity: whether as mothers or sisters, gentry women took an active role in both inculcating and policing acceptable forms of masculinity.