As some of you may be aware, I’m a sociology major. Sociology majors have a bad habit of using words that make sense to other sociology majors, but make the entire rest of the fucking world tilt their heads and say “buh?” or, in extreme cases coughpatriarchycough, think the sociology majors are saying the exact opposite of what they are actually saying. Some of these words are actually cool and useful for analysis of gender, though, so I’ve decided to do a bit of a series explaining them.
So what is hegemonic masculinity? These dudes right here define it as:
A particular variety of masculinity to which others—among them young and effeminate as well as homosexual men—are subordinated.
Which is nice enough as far as it goes, I guess, but it’s not exactly what one would call specific.
The sociologist Erving Goffman actually tells us what the damn thing is:
In an important sense there is only one complete unblushing male in America: a young, married, white, urban, northern, heterosexual, Protestant, father, of college education, fully employed, of good complexion, weight and height, and a recent record in sports… Any male who fails to qualify in any one of these ways is likely to view himself—during moments at least—as unworthy, incomplete and inferior.
I’m sure everyone reading this could add a couple of items to the list: cis; having a conventional sexuality (not kinky, asexual, aromantic, interested in fat women, etc.); not physically or mentally disabled; tall; employed in a professional career; not a nerd or a member of any other subculture; not a fan of The Notebook or anything Broadway-related; intelligent but not too intelligent; doesn’t cry. (You could also debate the necessity of being married or a father, but I think that depends on age– twentysomething men are supposed to be more promiscuous, and then around thirty settle down and get married and start reproducing.)
That guy– and there’s about five of him in the entire United States– generally has it pretty good, to be honest. The entirety of the kyriarchy was set up in favor of him, so he’d better. Which is not to say that he has a perfect life– entire issues of the New York Times Book Review have been devoted to ways in which this man, usually in his disguise as an English professor, can be unhappy. (His kids hate him! His wife is getting fat and talking about a divorce! Office politics suck! His career is stalling!)
It’s also not to say that any of this is that guy’s fault. He didn’t choose to be born white, heterosexual, athletic and the rest of it, any more than I chose to be born a white bisexual who couldn’t hit a ball if her life depended on it. He’s just lucky. There is no point in hating someone because of privileges they can’t change.
Besides, it’s not exactly great for him either.
Because the thing about hegemonic masculinity is that it’s a state that can be lost at any time. The second you watch a Twilight movie and say “hey, that wasn’t half-bad, actually,” poof, you are no longer hegemonically masculine. You have to continually be looking over your shoulder. That works out okay for the guy who naturally dislikes Twilight and doesn’t want to cry, in addition to all the rest of it, but how many of that guy are there out there? One?
Having an entire social system set up in favor of one dude in Ohio somewhere seems like a pretty bad plan to me.
And for everyone else, hegemonic masculinity is a cage. It might be a little nicer cage, with some gilding on the bars and better food, but it’s still a cage. Being forced to be strong when you’re actually weak might be slightly better than being forced to be weak when you’re actually strong, but ideally no one would be forced to be anything at all and could be strong or weak as it pleased them.
About ozyfrantz
Wasn’t it Raewyn Connell who coined the term?
Actually, I don’t think the term is particularly useful, because if something isn’t empirically particularly prevalent (five people) then the claim that the notion is still hegemonic is a rather questionable projection that is usually informed by the authors biases.
From the Wikipedia article -
Of course, there are various more prominent aspects of masculinity that probably also feature as a part of “hegemonic masculinity”. But as a concept, I suppose it’s far more useful to someone who’s interested in a schematic portrayal of adversary masculinity, particularly for political reasons, than for someone actually looking at what masculinity/ies is/are and how they influences the lives of actual men.
As far as I’m concerned, if he had a bit more ambition, I think Finn of “Glee” is what I consider to be a good display of (cis het) *masculine ideals* today including his conflicts (first season, second season less so, as his character has been largely neglected development-wise, in my opinion).
I tend to think of hegemonic masculinity as a Platonic form kind of thing. There exist a cultural form of Man, and all living, breathing men are viewed as representations of this form with various levels of perfection. To dismantle it would be to say that there *is* no Real Man, no platonic form people can measure up to (I think this is heart the criticism of doctormindbeam’s earlier post; if you replace one form of Man with another, you still have an ideal which everyone fails to live up to). Its usefulness isn’t that anyone or any group of people fulfills it, it’s that this is the limit towards which men are expected to strive.
One of the negative consequences of feminism has been that in certain circles, *women* are also expected to strive for this, which is just taking the whole gender equality point and missing it entirely.
I tend towards using the phrase “Man Card” as a proxy in conversation, but it’s certainly a useful concept. It’s not that it’s an accurate representation of any particular men – Abstract Ideals That You’re Supposed To Aspire To rarely describe existent people. Equate it to the Beauty Ideal that women are supposed to aspire to – how many women does it describe? And yet it has a powerful effect on the behaviours and feelings of many. Similarly, the Platonic Monolith of Manhood creates the same feelings of inadequacy in the majority of existent men.
(Disclaimer – The beauty ideal is far from the only Aspirational Ideal held up for women, but I think it’s one of the few monolithic ones. Most “what women should be like” ideals have a “but” in them somewhere. Sexually exciting but not slutty, empathetic but not hysterical, successful but primary caregiver… The list goes on.)
“Abstract Ideals That You’re Supposed To Aspire To rarely describe existent people”
Agreed. But I think that “hegemonic” is supposed to imply something more compulsory and violent than “abstract ideal of masculinity” (which will make people think of the Michelangelo’s David and not the quarterback of a highschool football team who went to HBS/LBS/LSE and became a hedge fund manager working in the City – which they will more likely think of when confronted with the notion of hegemonic masculinity). “Ideal” is something inherently positive, aspirational, whether or not it’s a realistically achievable ideal, or not.
And yes, double binds are pervasive.
You know, I’m going to spin off that aside at the end of my last comment, because I think it’s a lot more important than I first thought.
In part to sell the message and in part because the first feminists were the ones who had problems with it, feminism had to argue against the “woman box” which was limiting women’s involvement in anything that wasn’t housework and babies. They argued that being confined to that was bad, that it was limiting and degrading. Which was great, and all — I mean, I am now majoring in the physical sciences and can expect to have a career in it if I pull my head out of my ass long enough to go to grad school and women have jobs and make money and the pay gap is in some places closed.
But that left women with two options: you could be a “liberated woman” (HERE COME PLAY IN THE MAN BOX) or a traditional woman who sets feminism back 30 years. In order to escape from a world where there’s one option, we trashed that option and the people who like it — the women, and the men. So you have feminists struggling with the fact that in some cases they *are* home all day while their boyfriend works full time (hello, why do you think I have time to blog?) or they *like* it when a big strong man pins them down and has his way with them (consensually!) but ALSO they really, really like women’s rights.
I worry about trashing the man-box, too, and I think that’s where everyone who’s all “omg feminists just want men to be women” are coming from — they don’t want to feel guilty about the fact that, actually, they think beer and sports go really well together and are a great way to spend a Sunday.
I know, of course, that nobody on this blog actually *wants* the man-box to be unacceptable, but I can just see how that gets taken that way or how others might not be so careful.
Yeah, one thing I wrote at Clarisse’s blog was:
Another way to look at it is that traditional masculinity and feminity limit men’s and women’s choices, however the options that men are limited to are more powerful. That’s how male supremacy replicates itself. Plenty of men are frustrated by their restricted choices. Also, I think a problem of feminism that focuses on empowering women as a class is that it falls into the same trap as masculinity in limiting ‘feminist’ choices to those that are powerful. So the frustrations stay-at-home mothers or female sexual submissives have with feminism are much the same as a lot of men have with masculinity.
Exactly! Really, I think certain brands of feminism are giving in to effemiphobia– the fear and hatred of femininity– as much as they are deconstructing the binary. Traits historically considered female are no better or worse than traits historically considered male: the problem is when people try to enforce them on you because of what your genitals are.
I agree. I think a good ultimate goal would be — realizing this might be impossible or naive — to stop seeing some traits as “weak” and others as “strong” so that one sex is not relegated to choosing between “being the other sex” or being weak, and the other “being the other sex” or being strong. There’s nothing inherently “strong” about being reckless or “weak” about being compassionate. We’ve seen other people set examples for this, too: Martin Luther King, Jr., was compassionate and loving but certainly was not weak.
And that hits on what is sometimes called “opposition sexism”, which divides everything up into “for males” and “for females” and no overlap allowed lest ye be accused of transgression. Pink, emotionality, nurturing ability, the humanities, neatness, shoes, shopping, weddings, Priuses, yogurt, and romantic comedies are for females. Blue, rationality, math, aggressiveness, slovenliness, high-end electronics, sports, bachelor parties, sports cars, fast food, and action movies are for males. Any overlap is treason against your team or a sign that you might be gay or confused (and actual bisexual or gay or even androgynous-leaning people just don’t exist!). Skin creams, razors, household tools, bicycles, NFL T-shirts, and lube must all be packaged and marketed in two different tracks because it would be horrible if a man used a woman’s soap! Won’t someone think of the lost profits, I mean, children? I jest, but I cringe when I see the “separate spheres” concept morphing into separate everything. Let people be PEOPLE, for the love of cheese!
That reminds me of a couple of fantastic articles on gendered children’s clothing, actually, and how it was recently and arbitrarily decided: Gender cops know nothing of kids, history and Pink is for Girls, Blue is for Boys?. It would make a great post actually to talk about these… hint hint?
This sounds like the “quintessential” man. Why use hegemonic? It’s the man that every man thinks of when he thinks of “a man.”
P.S. I love this blog soooo much. More active than Feminist Critics and slightly further “feminist” than I’m completely comfortable with – which is a good thing! I might actually change my mind about something!
P.S.S. Any plans on touching on “rape culture?”
Hi, welcome, and thanks! It genuinely makes me happy to hear from visitors who find the blog to be a little outside their comfort zone, but still constructively engage with it. I’m hoping for more like you to turn up
We need a critical mass of reasonable people, to avoid becoming another random battleground for those just looking to vent their anger…
I use “hegemonic masculinity” because when I was taught the concept they called it hegemonic masculinity.
But you’re right, when talking about the concept in public I tend to say “you know, that guy who everyone wants to be and no one actually is” and then describe it until they get it (i.e. start listing off traits themselves.
)
I will touch on rape culture as soon as I figure out what the hell I believe about rape culture.
Ozymandias42,
(can I call you “Ozy”?)
I don’t know, that’s close to “socialised idal” than “hegemonic”, in my opinion. I don’t think “hegemonic masculinity” is too useful for discussing men and male aspirations wihtout trying to constantly allude to female oppression. I mean, “you know, the girl who everyone wants to be and no one actually is” wouldn’t be called hegemonic femininity, would it?
It’s called “enforced femininity.”
…No, the names aren’t exactly what one would call the best.
The term “hegemonic” not only implies “dominant” but has to do with how people embrace the system that oppresses them. So it’s a condensed way of acknowledging that these ideals are very attractive to men and simultaneously eff men up.
Nicely phrased, thank you. I was trying to think of just how to put that distinction, and you did it better than I could.
EasilyEnthused; Thank you! I have to say I’m excited to be a part of this blog
As far as rape culture goes I have a post rattling around in my head about male rape and the culture that surrounds it, which is distinctly different, I think, than the culture that surrounds male rape on women. Stay tuned!
I’d enjoy (well, be interested in) reading that. I’m a female who was sexually abused when I was twelve and since then I’ve known that women can be just as bad as guys and boys can be hurt too. And I also noticed the difference between the reactions between people reacting to me and people reacting to my friends. While I got treated like a victim who has been defiled with a few hints of I shouldn’t have wanted attention in the first place, they got treated like they had nothing to complain about and should man up. To put it bluntly, both attitudes fail on so many levels.
I have a hard time grasping that this blog is only a few days old. So much content in a week?
I was about to leave a really long, off topic comment – but I don’t want to derail. Is there a way to contact the writers privately or an open thread for suggestions?
We have a whole lot of contributors.
My email is roseocarroll@gmail.com; I’ll forward it to the contributors’ Google Group.
Yeah, we’re some prolific motherfuckers, aren’t we?
You can also use the contact us page if you want to send a comment to the contributors.
I swear that option wasn’t there earlier.
And you’d be correct!
I believe that the level of machosim depends on the living conditions. The Unites States has been recently carved out of the dust. You had to be a hard ass to survive and those deemed weaker were a threat to the survival of the group. OConnel is Australian, also a new country, recently carved out of the dust with higher levels of machoism than you will generally find in say, Europe.
Its interesting that the men’s movement is tackling the same thing, the male hierarchy, and the denial of male emotions, but in a different way.
First of all, thank you all so much for creating such a prolific and reasonable blog! This is the first gender issues-related blog on which I’ve actually felt comfortable commenting without fearing being ripped apart for having a slightly differing opinion.
It’s very interesting to read this from my point of view because I’ve personally always been aware of the ideal of hegemonic masculinity, but thanks to my upbringing (virtually being raised as female) and being fortunate enough to be surrounded by supportive friends, I’ve never actually felt compelled to feel guilty about the fact that I’m extremely far from that ideal. (I mean, there’s always the occasional pang of unworthiness, but it’s not bad.) But I suppose the gist of it is that the first step to circumventing this kind of sexism is simply to make yourself able to disregard it in decisions regarding one’s identity. It’s nothing that has to govern any person’s life.
This is a good review of hegemonic masculinity by Connell: http://www.usm.maine.edu/crm/faculty/jim/hegemonic.pdf
It went to a “Page Not Found.”
Hmm they must have removed it. This should work:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/46911072/Connell-Hegemonic-Masculinity
I agree that masculinities attempt to impose hierarchies on each other, but I don’t agree that Goffman/Connell’s notion of “hegemonic masculinity” always comes out on top. As I’ve long argued, oppression, privilege, and advantage aren’t unidimensional.
This assessment becomes more complicated if you drop the unidimensional notion of privilege and oppression.
Let’s take the example of a famous football player or professional wrestler. These guys fit Goffman’s description. Yet as you noted in your opening post, these guys have an elevated risk of injury and brain damage.
On many dimensions, professional athletes are privileged over men with alternative masculinities like me, and over women. On the dimension of “not suffering from brain damage,” I am actually advantaged over them… and so are women. This sort of multidimensional analysis is necessary.
When “hegemonic” masculinity can include a guy getting hit in the head over and over, I have trouble calling it “hegemonic.” Yes, Ozymandias suggests that disabled men aren’t counted as hegemonically masculine, but in this case, the “hegemonic masculinity” was how many athletes ended up disabled in the first place. Dead or severely brain-damaged men do not have hegemony.
To me, it seems like this concept of “hegemonic masculinity” leads to privileging certain dimensions of advantage/disadvantage as “real” while erasing others (e.g. status in society is counted as “hegemonic,” but being allowed to keep ones brain cells is not).” To be useful, it would have to specify which dimension of hegemony is being discussed.
If “hegemonic masculinity” merely describes society’s attitudes about what sorts of men are superior to others (and to women), then it could be serviceable. But if it also means that men with hegemonic masculinity are truly “advantaged” over women and other men, then I would have to point out dimensions where this isn’t the case.
Well being privileged has nothing, necessarily, to do with advantages. It’s a power relationship. Some might find being a parent preferable, others might find being the child preferable, but the parent is the one with power and privilege. Given that hegemony is consensual it shouldn’t be surprising that there are trade offs for the power given.
Hi machina, good to see you here.
Could you elaborate on the power relationship that hegemonic masculinity grants over who? I don’t consider gender relationships to be as simple as parent-child relationships (for instance, sometimes I think men end up in the role of the parent, and sometimes women end up in the role of the parent, depending on context).
And even in parent-child relationships, the power relationship isn’t so simple as the parent being the “one with power and privilege.” Just think of what happens when the kid grows up and the parent gets old, and the kid is choosing nursing homes. Who has the power now?
I’m not sure what you mean when you that hegemony is consensual. Since falling short of masculinity is often punished, I am not convinced that adopting certain sorts of masculinities is always truly consensual. Furthermore, some tradeoffs in masculinity don’t have informed consent. In the case of sports, we are only recently understanding chronic traumatic encephalopathy.
So, in other words, hegemony is more like the concept of a kyriarchy than a patriarchy?
Patriarchy, kyriarchy, and hegemony all seem to suffer from the same problem: they only discuss certain dimensions of power. Kyriarchy is the best, because it at least acknowledges some of the broad dimensions along which power can lie (e.g. race, class, gender, etc…). The FAQ here helps a bit:
My view is that even within those categories, there are still multiple dimensions of power, privilege, advantage, and oppression, depending. For instance, maleness is a disadvantage in the context of lifeboats. Being upper class was a disadvantage in the context of Stalin’s purges.
Elizabeth Fiorenza considers kyriarchy to be a pyramid. That blogpost acknowledges that socioeconomic privilege can trump male privilege (intersectionality), but it fails to acknowledge that even within the category of gender, women can be privileged over men in certain contexts (e.g. access to lifeboats). This is different from the case where race or class gives a man an advantage over a woman: it’s purely based on gender. In the Titanic disaster, less men than women survived for each class. And more Third Class women survived than First Class Men (showing that even class privilege was weaker than female privilege in this particular context).
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the kyriarchal pyramid still seems to situate heterosexual wealthy white men at the top. But I’m asking, at the top of what exactly? Yes, professional athletes are at the top of a pyramid labeled “Prestige.” But if I built a pyramid labeled “Health” or “Bodily Integrity,” many professional athletes would be sitting on the bottom steps… except for the dead athletes who have fallen off entirely.
Hugo, I agree with you that “privilege” is situational, and it’s something I’ve raised before (though not, I think, on this blog).
When I think of “the kyriarchy”, I’m thinking of a concept that takes this into account — but that might just be a personal quirk.
By coincidence, the idea that when we talk about “power”, we’re typically only talking about certain narrowly-defined aspects of power, is one I raised with the contributors recently. I don’t know what’s going to come of it yet, but there may end up being an article on that subject…
(Edit to clarify: By “we” I mean our society at large, when people discuss power dynamics)
Cheradenine said:
Sure, you could define “kyriarchy” that way. To me, “-archy” suggests some sort of singular hierarchy, while I think that there are many hierarchies.
I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
OConnel was always on the outside looking in. Its a useful perspective but the people that will be best able to describe these things, are men themselves.