Masculinity and Meat Consumption: An Analysis Through the Theoretical Lens of Hegemonic Masculinity and Alternative Masculinity Theories

Research has found that men are more likely to choose to eat meat, particularly red meat, when compared to fruits and vegetables. This study examines the theory of hegemonic masculinity and discusses how the consumption of meat assists in the production of a masculine identity. Specifically, eating meat allows one to be seen as masculine, and the avoidance of meat permits one to be viewed as feminine. This narrow depiction of gender pushes alternative masculinities and unique eating habits to the sideline, ignoring the agency individuals possess when deciding the fate of their perceived gender. This paper seeks to discover if men, who participate in alternative eating practices, have the ability to define a new variation of masculinity. Four alternative theories will challenge hegemonic masculinity: multiple masculinities, natural masculinity, protest masculinity, and hybrid masculinities. Three examples will display the way marginalized men consume meat: historical upper‐class male fasting, meat consumption within men's ministries, and the vegetarian practices among men. Overall, this paper analyzes the basic concepts of hegemonic masculinity, the gendered consumption of meat, and questions if marginalized men are redefining the way others perceive their masculinity or if they are, in fact, striving to become exemplars of hegemonic masculinity.     

Heterosexual relationships among young black men in the construction of masculinity at a South African university

ABSTRACT

Drawing on interviews conducted with young men residing in a hostel in a tertiary institution in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, in 2016, this article explores young black men’s construction of masculine sexuality, their approaches to romantic relationships, and responsibility within them. Through the use of semi-structured interviews conducted with young black men, the study investigated the relationship between the social construction of masculinities and the way in which these young men understood, talked about, and explained their views and actions regarding romance and sexuality. The study focuses on the voices of acceptance and resistance to traditional, patriarchal versions of manhood and the variations in men’s discourses and ways of being. It highlights through these voices that heterosexual masculinities are not inherently reckless, impassive, and uncaring, but are situationally and contextually constructed. The findings reveal that while the young men inhabited subject positions offered by traditional discourses of heterosexual masculinity, at the same time they also contested these dominant discourses in the complex and multifarious processes through which these young men constituted their identity.     

“Not Your Average Nerd”: Masculinities,Privilege, and Academic Effort at an Elite University

Research on hybrid masculinity shows that privileged men incorporate aspects of subordinated and/or marginalized masculinities into their gender performances, contributing to the persistence of hegemonic masculinity. This scholarship has centered on white, straight, cisgender, class-privileged men. Yet, it is reasonable to imagine that not all privileged men enact hybrid masculinities and that at least some less-privileged men engage in hybrid identity work. Here, we draw on 24 interviews with a diverse group of men attending an elite university, examining their beliefs about contemporary masculinity in relation to academic pursuits. Generally, race- and class-privileged respondents rejected academic effort as unmanly while less-privileged men unapologetically committed themselves to their academic endeavors. Exceptions to these patterns—privileged men who embraced academic effort and less-privileged men who rejected it—revealed hybrid identity work attempted by both groups. However, only privileged men were able to successfully hybridize their masculine identities, while less-privileged men were left straddling competing cultural imperatives without clearly accomplishing either. We discuss the implications of these findings for both individual men and for larger patterns of inequality and offer new theoretical insights regarding how race- and class privilege shape men's performances of hegemonic, complicit subordinated, marginalized, and hybrid masculinities.     

‘Show us your frilly,pink underbelly’: Men administrative assistants doing masculinities and femininity

Research on men tokens (or numerical minorities) at work has focused on the processes by which men try to claim hegemonic masculine identities for themselves and how workplace interactants support or reject these attempts. In contrast to masculinity studies, token theory has paid less attention to non‐hegemonic masculinities. Using interviews with men administrative assistants, I develop a more comprehensive understanding of men tokens' gender performances and their significance for gender inequality. I present a four‐part typology: hegemonic masculinity, alternative masculinity, critical masculinity and male femininity. The categories are differentiated along two axes: support for hegemonic masculinity and support for hierarchical, binary gender.     

A Localized Masculine Crisis: Local Men's Subordination within the Marcellus Shale Region's Masculine Structure

Rural economic decline in the United States has contributed to new situational conditions under which men construct masculinity. Under these conditions, men define jobs and activities that were feminized during periods of economic stability as masculine. One exception to rural economic decline for men is economic growth associated with oil and natural gas development in geographical hot spots throughout the United States and around the world. Employment opportunities in the oil and gas industry largely favor men; however, it is unclear what effect this development has on local men because itinerant extralocal male workers complete most of the labor. This article conceptualizes masculinity as a social structure, and uses economic reports and theoretically distinct literatures on natural‐resource‐based masculinities and energy boomtowns to illuminate how multinational energy companies and a predominantly extralocal, male itinerant workforce in Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale region cause adverse situational conditions for local men's constructions of masculinity. Within the new masculine structure, extralocal men's constructions of hegemonic masculinity become more important for defining the local socially dominant masculinity, which subordinates local men's constructions of nonhegemonic masculinities in their own communities. The article concludes with a discussion of how the oil and gas industry's hegemonic masculinity impedes sustainable economic development and community well‐being.     

‘Being called sisters’: Masculinities and black male nurses in South Africa

This study contributes to an understanding of the geographies of masculinities, by demonstrating how black South African male nurses negotiate hegemonic masculinity through citing masculine gendered acts. The research draws on qualitative data gathered from interviews with 15 black male nurses aged between 26 and 50 years who have worked in the paediatric, trauma, orthopaedic, oncology and midwifery fields for a period of not less than two years. It is argued that the colonially imposed hierarchies of race, gender and occupation merge with culturally specific pre‐existing African masculinities, and that this informed how the black male nurses experienced their gender identity in the occupation. The study demonstrates how, because of their career choice, the gender identities of the male nurses were positioned as marginalized and subordinate to the modes of a hegemonic masculinity, a gender identity only available to them momentarily. In this context, it was found that the modes of gender performativity in which the nurses negotiated and subverted their subordinate and marginal status was with the complicity of patients and other healthcare workers. This upheld the more generally assumed hegemony of masculinity in the hospital workplace. The study traces these experiences to the discourses of black masculinities during South Africa's pre‐colonial, colonial and apartheid eras and in the present day. In doing so, this study contributes to an understanding of the geographies of masculinities by demonstrating the locally specific modes of masculine performativity through which black male nurses negotiate their gender in South Africa.     

Hybrid Masculinities: New Directions in the Sociology of Men and Masculinities

Hybrid masculinity refers to men's selective incorporation of performances and identity elements associated with marginalized and subordinated masculinities and femininities. We use recent theorization of hybrid masculinities to critically review theory and research that seeks to make sense of contemporary transformations in masculinity. We suggest that research broadly supports three distinct consequences associated with recent changes in performances and politics of masculinity that work to obscure the tenacity of gendered inequality. Hybrid masculinities (i) symbolically distance men from hegemonic masculinity; (ii) situate the masculinities available to young, White, heterosexual men as somehow less meaningful than the masculinities associated with various marginalized and subordinated Others; and (iii) fortify existing social and symbolic boundaries in ways that often work to conceal systems of power and inequality in historically new ways.     

‘How to be a rural man’: Young men's performances and negotiations of rural masculinities

This paper is concerned with young rural men and how they ‘do’ identity politics living in a rural area of Norway. Focusing on how masculinity and rurality are constructed and interrelated in young men's narratives of living in a remote community, it is identified that young rural men reproduce, negotiate and transform local discourses of rural masculinity. First, the article shows that young men living in rural areas believe it is important to express rural masculinity through hunting and outdoor life as well as by exhibiting skills as handymen. Second, it reveals that it is important for young rural men to communicate a particular stance in the ongoing and controversial Norwegian debate over snowmobiles and carnivores, as these topics are related to rural men's sense of loyalty to place. Third, the article shows how rural men negotiate ‘the tough man’ images related to hunting, motors and handyman skills by constructing new and alternative masculinities. The analysis reveals that young rural men enact alternative masculinities, expressed in relation to new working life opportunities in the service sector, through emotional openness and caring, and in relation to traditional ‘masculine spaces’ such as hunting and snowmobiling. It is concluded that, little by little, rural communities are opening up for more flexible masculinities.     

Masculine Status,Sexual Performance,and the Sexual Stigmatization of Women

Collegiate hookup culture advances ideas of masculinity but contradicts notions of appropriate feminine sexuality. Drawing on focus group and interview data with college students, I examine how a group of class‐ and race‐privileged fraternity men face dilemmas as they enact a group constructed masculinity focused on sexual performance and the objectification of women. I employ a symbolic interactionist framework to illustrate how men, attentive to peer status yet anxious about the sexual stigmatization of women, draw on cultural ideas about appropriate feminine sexuality as they account for their approaches to sex and women (both with whom they interact sexually and how) along a range of intimacy—from hookups to committed relationships. I demonstrate that heterosexual interaction does not unequivocally link to masculine status and that men sometimes strive to limit the impact of casual sex or avoid it altogether.     

Implicit and Explicit Attitudes Toward Sex and Romance in Asexuals

Despite the recent surge of interest in sexuality, asexuality has remained relatively underresearched. Distinct from abstinence or chastity, asexuality refers to a lack of sexual attraction toward others. Past research suggests asexuals have negative attitudes toward sex, though no research has examined implicit attitudes. While preliminary evidence suggests that many asexuals are interested in engaging in romantic relationships, these attitudes have yet to be examined thoroughly, implicitly, or compared with a control group. This study investigated explicit and implicit attitudes toward sex and romance in a group of asexuals (N = 18, age M = 21.11) and a group of controls (N = 27, age M = 21.81), using the Asexuality Identification Scale (AIS), the Triangular Love Scale (TLS), semantic differentials, an Implicit Association Task (IAT), and two Single Category IATs. It was found that asexuals exhibited more negative explicit and implicit attitudes toward sex, as well as more negative explicit attitudes toward romance, relative to controls. There was no significant difference between groups on implicit romantic attitudes. Moreover, aromantic asexuals demonstrated significantly more negative explicit attitudes toward romance than romantic asexuals, though there was no significant difference between groups on implicit measures. Explanations and implications of these findings are discussed.     

The Question of Rural Masculinities*

Abstract By way of introduction to this special issue on rural masculinities, we provide an overview of masculinity studies, emphasizing the influential work of Robert W. Connell on hegemonic masculinity. We go on to distinguish between two main avenues of rural inquiry in masculinity studies: studies of the masculine in the rural and studies of the rural in the masculine, or what we also term the masculine rural and the rural masculine. We apply this distinction to the six contributions to this special issue, showing how most of the papers maintain a kind of dialogue between the two. We conclude by arguing that studies of rural masculinities are a contribution rather than an alternative to feminist scholarship in the rural social sciences, and that the topic of rural masculinities provides rural scholarship with opportunities for conducting research in other disciplines.     

New masculinities in universities? Discourses,ambivalence and potential change

In this article, we explore forms and possible implications of new masculinities in universities, and elucidate how they relate to hegemonic masculinity. ‘New masculinities’ coins a particular tradition of naming in Nordic masculinity studies. In the Nordic context, gendered social relations are shaped by State policies and equality discourses, which are increasingly embracing father‐friendly initiatives. New masculinities refers to the increased involvement of men in caring practices and especially in fathering. Our empirical study comprises in‐depth interviews with young male academics in a Finnish business school. We elucidate, first, the ambivalence and struggles between masculinities in the discourses of these men and, second, how the construction of masculinities is specific to societal, sociocultural and local contexts. Relations of class, and middle‐class notions of the ‘good life’ in particular, emerge as central for understanding the experiences of these men. Beyond the Nordic countries, we argue that while the change potential of caring masculinity stems from particular contexts, the concept of new masculinities is helpful in capturing the ambivalence and struggles between hegemonic and caring masculinities rather than dismissing the latter as subordinate to the former.     

Rethinking Homophobia and Deviant Youth Masculinities: Constructing and Interrogating Progress Toward Equality

In this article, I examine the discourse of progress toward equality for gender and sexually deviant youths to show that overemphasizing progress decenters the lived experiences of these young people. A survey of masculinity theories like hegemonic masculinity, inclusive masculinity, and fag discourse illuminates divergent ways of thinking about progress as it relates to youth masculinities and social inequality. While young people may have more opportunities to explore meanings of gender and sexuality in schools or in the media, current scholarly debates complicate the presumptions that marginalized youths have reached full equality within these institutions. Cases of bullying based on gender presentation or sexual orientation appear in daily news feeds, and this phenomenon is supported by empirical data. Harder to detect are the less visible, emergent homophobias and microaggressions which must be considered when theorizing about masculinities and progress toward equality.     

Challenging hegemonic masculinity by performance of ethnic habitus

The aim of this article is to examine the effect of ethnic habitus, in a specific setting, on the construction of alternative dominant masculinity and the challenge of hegemonic masculinity. Based on Bourdieu's notion of habitus, the article will show that in a specific ethno‐cultural setting, characterized by ethnic habitus, marginalized groups construct and perform situated dominant masculinity. The study is based on the military, which is a central organization for the construction of masculine identities, and will focus specifically on combat soldiers, who constitute the most significant model of idealized masculinity. Based on semi‐structured interviews, this micro‐level study demonstrates the part of self‐performance in the construction of masculinity and the challenge of hegemonic masculinity. Furthermore, illustrating the performance of worthy dominant masculinity by inferior ethnic groups in effect exposes the separation between the social status and the masculine status. Separation between social status and masculine status gives emphasis to masculinity as relational and contextual social practice and enables alternative dominant masculinities to be detected that challenge hegemonic masculinity within different settings.     

Youth masculinities: compelling male heterosexuality

This article seeks to extend understandings of heterosexual masculine identities through an examination of young men's constructions of what motivates young men to engage in heterosexual practices and relationships, and what not having sex might mean for them. Using the masculinity literature and work on heterosexuality to frame the discussion and to contextualize the findings, it explores the complex dynamics that frame the relationship between masculinity and heterosexuality. Specifically, how dominant or 'hegemonic' discourses of heterosexuality shape young men's identities, beliefs and behaviour. It considers these questions using empirical data from a qualitative study of young people living in close-knit working-class communities in the North East of England, with a specific focus on cultural and social attitudes towards sexuality and sexual practices. Peer group networks are a key site for the construction and (re)production of masculinity and, therefore, an important arena within which gendered social approval and acceptance is both sought and gained. In this article, I explore the reasons why young men engage in specific types of heterosexual practice in order to gain social approval. A central question is the extent to which heterosexuality is compelling for young men. That young men do feel compelled to behave in certain ways sexually, behaviours that they may be uncomfortable with and/or dislike, and the fact that they feel they are restricted in terms of how they can talk about their experiences within their peer group networks, demonstrates the power of dominant discourses of masculinity in everyday life. This is addressed through an examination of the restrictive effects of normative discourses about male heterosexuality, including their privatizing effects, which suggest that youth masculinities are often experienced in ways that are highly contradictory requiring young men to adopt a range of strategies to deal with this.     

This Sporting Life: The intersection of hegemonic masculinities,space and emotions among rugby players

Through an ethnographic study of rugby players, this research shows how when men enter a physical space, they are bound by codes that define what sort of masculinities and emotions they ‘should' perform in order to denote cultural legitimacy. The article investigates how different spaces on and off the rugby field influence how different masculinities are performed. Rugby players enact fleeting and relative masculinities as they move in and out of the multiple hyper‐masculine spaces they encounter on game day. The codes of masculinity dictated by these different spaces are manifest in the men's bodies and in their emotions.     

Trans Men: Embodiments,Identities, and Sexualities

This article examines the experiences of 25 persons who were assigned female status at birth but do not wish to live as women and take on a masculine or queer gender identity. We employ the concept of “gendered embodiment” and introduce the concept of “sexualized embodiment” to highlight what is involved in this process. We ask how experiencing a masculine gender identity is reflexively tied to a trans man's sexuality and the ways in which these two embodiments are tightly, moderately, or loosely coupled. For example, a tight coupling appeared when trans men began to use testosterone and obtained surgery such as breast removal; a moderate coupling was found where gender validation was sought from a sexual partner (with this being related to sexual preference identities as well as the interpretation of vaginal penetration); the loosest coupling of the gender‐sexuality embodiments was linked to the liberality of the locale and whether “queer” identities could be easily adopted. In sum, our research demonstrates the link between gender and sexuality as a result of the body work trans men do and the historical and geographical situations in which they find themselves.     

Problematizing contemporary Men/Masculinities theorizing: the contribution of Raewyn Connell and conceptual‐terminological tensions today

Critical studies of men and masculinities (CSMM) have burgeoned in recent times. For this reason, it seems to me a useful moment to reflect on what I see as some tensions, even contradictions, in these studies. In keeping with Chantal Mouffe's espousal of the advantages of agonism rather than consensus, I suggest that heterogeneous theoretical directions in scholarship attending to men/masculinities are by no means to be discouraged. However, the various theoretical tools employed in this scholarship may be incommensurable and thus produce a certain inconsistency or even incoherence. In this context, I suggest that in order to more clearly articulate current theoretical/terminological debates it is important to undertake analysis of key conceptual distinctions and widely used terms, such as notions of structure and patriarchy, gender identities/masculinities/men, hegemony and hegemonic masculinity, and relations between gender and sexuality, amongst others. The aim here is not to produce or require homogeneity in studies of men/masculinities but rather to provide an opportunity to consider the epistemological frameworks which inform the political intentions and goals of this sphere of scholarship.