Hacettepe University Graduate School of Social Sciences 
 

Department of English Language and Literature 
 

English Language and Literature Programme 
 
 
 
 
 
 

FATHERS AND SONS: MEN AND MASCULINITIES IN THE 
CONTEMPORARY BRITISH NOVEL 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Zübeyir SAVAŞ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Ph. D. Dissertation 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Ankara, 2024



 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 
 

 

FATHERS AND SONS: MEN AND MASCULINITIES IN THE CONTEMPORARY 
BRITISH NOVEL 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Zübeyir SAVAŞ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Hacettepe University Graduate School of Social Sciences 
 

Department of English Language and Literature 
 
  

 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Ph.D. Dissertation 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Ankara, 2024 
 

 

 

 



 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 
 

KABUL VE ONAY 
 

Zübeyir SAVAŞ tarafından hazırlanan “Fathers and Sons: Men and Masculinities in the 

Contemporary British Novel” başlıklı bu çalışma, 18.12.2023 tarihinde yapılan savunma 

sınavı sonucunda başarılı bulunarak jürimiz tarafından Doktora Tezi olarak kabul 

edilmiştir. 

 
Prof. Dr. Mine ÖZYURT KILIÇ (Başkan) 
 
 
Prof. Dr. Aytül ÖZÜM (Danışman) 
 
 
Doç. Dr. Alev KARADUMAN (Üye) 
 
 
Doç. Dr. Zeynep Zeren ATAYURT FENGE (Üye) 
 
 
Dr. Öğr. Üyesi Aslı DEĞİRMENCİ ALTIN (Üye) 

 

 

Yukarıdaki imzaların adı geçen öğretim üyelerine ait olduğunu onaylarım. 

 

 

Prof.Dr. Uğur ÖMÜRGÖNÜLŞEN 
Enstitü Müdürü 

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 



 
 

 

YAYIMLAMA VE FİKRİ MÜLKİYET HAKLARI BEYANI 
 
Enstitü tarafından onaylanan lisansüstü tezimin tamamını veya herhangi bir kısmını, basılı (kağıt) ve 
elektronik formatta arşivleme ve aşağıda verilen koşullarla kullanıma açma iznini Hacettepe Üniversitesine 
verdiğimi bildiririm. Bu izinle Üniversiteye verilen kullanım hakları dışındaki tüm fikri mülkiyet haklarım 
bende kalacak, tezimin tamamının ya da bir bölümünün gelecekteki çalışmalarda (makale, kitap, lisans ve 
patent vb.) kullanım hakları bana ait olacaktır. 
 
Tezin kendi orijinal çalışmam olduğunu, başkalarının haklarını ihlal etmediğimi ve tezimin tek yetkili 
sahibi olduğumu beyan ve taahhüt ederim. Tezimde yer alan telif hakkı bulunan ve sahiplerinden yazılı izin 
alınarak kullanılması zorunlu metinleri yazılı izin alınarak kullandığımı ve istenildiğinde suretlerini 
Üniversiteye teslim etmeyi taahhüt ederim. 
 
Yükseköğretim Kurulu tarafından yayınlanan “Lisansüstü Tezlerin Elektronik Ortamda Toplanması, 
Düzenlenmesi ve Erişime Açılmasına İlişkin Yönerge” kapsamında tezim aşağıda belirtilen koşullar 
haricince YÖK Ulusal Tez Merkezi / H.Ü. Kütüphaneleri Açık Erişim Sisteminde erişime açılır. 

o Enstitü / Fakülte yönetim kurulu kararı ile tezimin erişime açılması mezuniyet tarihimden 
itibaren ….. yıl ertelenmiştir. (1) 

o Enstitü / Fakülte yönetim kurulunun gerekçeli kararı ile tezimin erişime açılması 
mezuniyet tarihimden itibaren  ….. ay ertelenmiştir. (2) 

o Tezimle ilgili gizlilik kararı verilmiştir. (3) 

    ……/………/……  
                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                               Zübeyir SAVAŞ 
 
1“Lisansüstü Tezlerin Elektronik Ortamda Toplanması, Düzenlenmesi ve Erişime Açılmasına İlişkin Yönerge”  

(1) Madde 6. 1. Lisansüstü tezle ilgili patent başvurusu yapılması veya patent alma sürecinin devam etmesi durumunda, tez 
danışmanının önerisi ve enstitü anabilim dalının uygun görüşü üzerine enstitü veya fakülte yönetim kurulu iki yıl süre 
ile tezin erişime açılmasının ertelenmesine karar verebilir.   
 

(2) Madde 6. 2. Yeni teknik, materyal ve metotların kullanıldığı, henüz makaleye dönüşmemiş veya patent gibi yöntemlerle 
korunmamış ve internetten paylaşılması durumunda 3. şahıslara veya kurumlara haksız kazanç imkanı oluşturabilecek 
bilgi ve bulguları içeren tezler hakkında tez danışmanının önerisi ve enstitü anabilim dalının uygun görüşü üzerine 
enstitü veya fakülte yönetim kurulunun gerekçeli kararı ile altı ayı aşmamak üzere tezin erişime açılması engellenebilir. 
 

 
(3) Madde 7. 1. Ulusal çıkarları veya güvenliği ilgilendiren, emniyet, istihbarat, savunma ve güvenlik, sağlık vb. konulara 

ilişkin lisansüstü tezlerle ilgili gizlilik kararı, tezin yapıldığı kurum tarafından verilir *. Kurum ve kuruluşlarla yapılan 
işbirliği protokolü çerçevesinde hazırlanan lisansüstü tezlere ilişkin gizlilik kararı ise, ilgili kurum ve kuruluşun önerisi 
ile enstitü veya fakültenin uygun görüşü üzerine üniversite yönetim kurulu tarafından verilir. Gizlilik kararı verilen tezler 
Yükseköğretim Kuruluna bildirilir.  
Madde 7.2. Gizlilik kararı verilen tezler gizlilik süresince enstitü veya fakülte tarafından gizlilik kuralları çerçevesinde 

muhafaza edilir, gizlilik kararının kaldırılması halinde Tez Otomasyon Sistemine yüklenir.  
 

* Tez danışmanının önerisi ve enstitü anabilim dalının uygun görüşü üzerine enstitü veya fakülte yönetim kurulu 

tarafından karar verilir. 

 

 

 

 

 



 
 

 

ETİK BEYAN 

Bu çalışmadaki bütün bilgi ve belgeleri akademik kurallar çerçevesinde elde ettiğimi, 

görsel, işitsel ve yazılı tüm bilgi ve sonuçları bilimsel ahlak kurallarına uygun olarak 

sunduğumu, kullandığım verilerde herhangi bir tahrifat yapmadığımı, yararlandığım 

kaynaklara bilimsel normlara uygun olarak atıfta bulunduğumu, tezimin kaynak 

gösterilen durumlar dışında özgün olduğunu, Prof. Dr. Aytül ÖZÜM danışmanlığında 

tarafımdan üretildiğini ve Hacettepe Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Tez Yazım 

Yönergesine göre yazıldığını beyan ederim. 

 

Zübeyir SAVAŞ 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



hv 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To our lovely son, Yusuf Çağan…



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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 

 

During the extensive and challenging process of pursuing my doctorate, I have been 

accompanied and supported by a distinguished group of individuals whose contributions 

have been vital to the successful completion of this thesis. Their collective wisdom, 

support, and encouragement have been the bedrock upon which this work stands. 

 

First and foremost, I am grateful to my advisor, Prof. Dr. Aytül ÖZÜM, for her exceptional 

expertise, understanding, and patience that guided my research. Her influence was 

significant throughout my academic odyssey. Similarly, I am indebted to Prof. Dr. Mine 

ÖZYURT KILIÇ who would always encourage and support me during such a demanding 

and challenging process. Besides, I extend my gratitude to committee members—Assoc. 

Prof. Dr. Alev KARADUMAN, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zeynep Zeren ATAYURT FENGE, and 

Assist. Prof. Dr. Aslı DEĞİRMENCİ ALTIN—for their astute feedback and rigorous 

scrutiny, which have significantly contributed to my research. 

 

Secondly, I want to sincerely thank the esteemed professors who have significantly 

influenced my academic path. The foundational guidance and lasting inspiration from 

Prof. Dr. Mehmet Ali ÇELİKEL, who has been a mentor and a friend beyond measure, 

has been a cornerstone of my scholarly formation. The wisdom imparted by Prof. Dr. 

Burçin EROL, Prof. Dr. Deniz BOZER, Prof. Dr. Huriye REİS, Prof. Dr. Hande SEBER, 

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sinan AKILLI, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Şebnem KAYA, and Assist. Prof. Dr. 

İmren YELMİŞ have profoundly enriched my intellectual fabric. 

 

The camaraderie and shared intellectual pursuit with my fellow scholars, especially 

Cansu ÇAKMAK ÖZGÜREL and Hüseyin ALHAS, have been sources of comfort and 

joy in this often-solitary journey. The spirit of collaboration and the consistent support 

provided by research assistants Alican ERBAKAN, Arzu ÇEVİRGEN, and my academic 

colleagues Assoc. Prof. Dr Başak AĞIN, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zümre Gizem YILMAZ, Assoc. 



vh 
 

Prof. Dr. Kerimcan YAZGÜLER, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Baysar TANIYAN and Dr. Şafak 

HORZUM have been indispensable throughout my investigative endeavours. 

 

Furthermore, the unwavering support and understanding from my family have been the 

cornerstone of my perseverance and success. To my wife, Hatice, whose love and 

encouragement have been my constant motivation; to my mother-in-law, Münüre, whose 

sacrifices have paved the way for my achievements; to my parents, Fatma and İrfan, who 

have provided endless support; and to my brother Oğuzhan, who has always believed in 

me—your collective strength has been the source of my resilience. I must also express 

my profound thanks to Assoc. Prof. Dr Murat GÖÇ-BİLGİN, whose guidance and patient 

teaching have been instrumental in navigating the academic rigours towards the 

completion of this thesis. 

 

I am immensely thankful for your significant contributions to my growth and scholarly 

work. Your impact has been immeasurable to all who have been a part of my academic 

odyssey. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



vhh 
 

ÖZET 
 
SAVAŞ, Zübeyhr. “Babalar ve Oğullar: Çağdaş Brhtanya Romanında Erkekler ve 
Erkeklhkler” Doktora Tezh, Ankara, 2024.   
 
Bu tez, çağdaş Brhtanya romanında babalar ve oğulların farklı temshllerhnh hncelemeyh 
amaçlamaktadır. Bu bağlamda John McGahern’hn Amongst Women (1990), Nhck 
Hornby’nhn About A Boy (1998) ve Magghe Gee’nhn The Wh1te Fam1ly (2002) adlı 
romanlarında göze çarpan baba/oğul hlhşkhlerh eleşthrel erkeklhk teorhlerh perspekthfhnden 
ele alınmıştır. Her ne kadar femhnhst lhteratürde Adrhenne Rhch’hn Of Women Born’u ve 
Elahne Showalter’ın A L1terature of The1r Own’u ghbh anne/kız ve anne/oğul hlhşkhlerhne 
dahr çok sayıda eleşthrel çalışma bulunsa da, edebh eserlerde babalar ve oğullar arasında 
cereyan eden hlhşkhlere dahr sorgulamalar genellhkle gölgede kalmıştır. Öte yandan son 
otuz yıldır, erkeklere/erkeklhklere dahr dhshplhnlerarası ve eleşthrel bhr profemhnhst 
yaklaşım gelhşthrhlmhş olmasına rağmen, eleşthrel sorgulamalardan azade olan çeşhtlh 
erkeklerhn/erkeklhk hallerhnhn otorhte ve hkthdar hlhşkhlerhnde süregelen ayrıcalıkları hala 
büyük ölçüde gözlerden uzaktadır ve erkeklerh ve erkeklhğhn kurumsallaşmış halh olan 
babalığı eleşthrel bhr gözle hncelemek edebhyat araştırmalarında henüz yeterhnce hlgh 
görmemhşthr. Bu tez, çağdaş Brhtanya romanında babalar ve oğulların farklı temshllerhnh 
analhz ederek lhteratüre katkı sağlamayı amaçlamaktadır. Çalışma boyunca ele alınan 
romanlardakh babalar ve oğullar arasında süregelen çatışmalar nethceshnde tarafların farklı 
hhmal ve şhddet bhçhmlerhnhn fahllerh ve mağdurları oldukları gözlemlenmektedhr. Böylece 
tarafların bhrbhrlerhyle, dhğer erkeklerle, kadınlarla ve çocuklarla daha uzun ve sağlıklı 
hlhşkhler kurma ‘yetershzlhğh’ hayal kırıklıkları hle sonuçlanır. Romanlardakh erkek 
karakterlerhn ghderek artan düş kırıklıkları Thatcher sonrası Brhtanya’sının sosyopolhthk 
ve sosyoekonomhk şartları bağlamında tekrar yükselen ‘erkeklhk krhzh’ söylemlerhnhn 
belhrlh özellhklerhnh yansıtmaktadır. Böylece, çalışmaya konu olan romanlardakh baba ve 
oğul fhgürlerh arasındakh çatışmaların, geçen yüzyılın son bhrkaç on yılında yenhden hnşa 
edhlen modern ve geleneksel erkeklhkler arasındakh çekhşmeyh ve erkeklerhn yhthrdhklerhne 
hnandıkları hkthdarlarını gerh kazanma mücadeleshnh yansıttığı öne sürülmektedhr. 
Araştırma, bhr yandan geleneksel ahle yapısının ve süregelen hegemonhk erkeklhk 
hdeallerhnhn ahle hçh çatışmaları önlemek hçhn yeterlh olamadığını ortaya koyarken bhr 
yandan da neolhberalhzmhn başat hdeolojh halhne geldhğh günümüzde çağdaş ahle, (yenh) 
baba ve (yenh) erkek khmlhklerhnh benhmseyen erkeklerhn dhğer erkeklerle, kadınlarla ve 
çocuklarla olan hlhşkhlerhnde hlerhch bhr tavır takınmaktan zhyade yenh tahakküm 
bhçhmlerhnh hnşa etme çabasında olduklarını hddha etmektedhr. 
 
Anahtar Sözcükler: Babalar ve Oğullar, Erkekler ve Erkeklikler, Erkeklik Krizi, Çağdaş 
Britanya Romanı, Amongst Women, About A Boy, The White Family 
 

 



vhhh 
 

ABSTRACT 

 

SAVAŞ, Zübeyhr. “Fathers and Sons: Men and Masculhnhthes hn the Contemporary Brhthsh 
Novel” Ph.D. Dhssertathon, Ankara, 2024.   
 

This dissertation aims to explore diverse representations of fathers and sons in three 
contemporary British novels: Amongst Women (1990) by John McGahern, About A Boy 
(1998) by Nick Hornby, The White Family (2002) by Maggie Gee from the perspective 
of critical studhes on men and masculinities. Relationships between mothers and 
daughters and mothers and sons in literary studies have already been whdely dhscussed hn 
femhnhst scholarshhp, most parthcularly hn Adrienne Rich’s Of Women Born and Elaine 
Showalter’s A Literature of Their Own whhle affinities between fathers and sons have 
often been overshadowed. Men as sons and fathers have remained out of critical 
interrogations; thereby, men’s ongoing privilege in their relations with authority and 
power has been hidden in plain sight. Nevertheless, with the emergence of critical theories 
on men and masculinities in varied interdisciplinary fields, men have become the object 
of interrogation. Even so, scrutinising men and fatherhood as an institutionalised form of 
masculhnhthes has yet to catch enough attention within literary studies. This thesis 
addresses thhs parthcular gap by analysing peculiar representations of fathers and sons in 
the contemporary British novel. Throughout this study, it is observed that there is an 
ongoing conflict between fathers and sons whereby they are both the perpetrators and 
victims of different forms of violence and neglect. These men’s ‘inability’ to form longer 
and healthier relationships with other men, women, and children ends in disillusionment. 
A growing sense of disenchantment among men in the novels reverberates specific 
attributes of the ‘masculinity crisis’ in the sociopolitical and socioeconomic context of 
post-Thatcherite Britain. It is further argued that the conflicts between fathers and sons 
reflect a broader struggle between traditional and modern notions of men and 
masculinities and the battle for regaining their (lost) power in the last few decades of the 
previous century. While the traditional family structure and enduring ideals of hegemonic 
masculinity are not sufficient to prevent family conflicts, it is argued that contemporary 
notions of family, (new) fathers, and (new) men, as defined in the current period when 
neoliberalism has become the dominant ideology, seek to construct new forms of 
domination rather than a progressive stance in men’s relations with other men, women, 
and children. 
 
Key Words: Fathers and Sons, Men and Masculinities, Masculinity Crisis, Contemporary 
British Novel, Amongst Women, About A Boy, The White Family 

 

 

 



hx 
 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

KABUL VE ONAY ……………………………………………………………………..i 
 
YAYIMLAMA VE FİKRİ MÜLKİYET HAKLARI BEYANI ……………………..ii 
 
ETİK BEYAN……………….…………………………………………………………iii 
 
DEDICATION…………………………………………………………………………iv 
 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………v 
 
ÖZET…………………………………………………………………………………..vii 
 
ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………..viii 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS………………………………………………………………ix 
 
INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………………...1 
 
CHAPTER I: “ONLY WOMEN COULD LIVE WITH DADDY”: IRISH 
MASCULINITIES AND FATHERHOOD IN JOHN MCGAHERN’S AMONGST 
WOMEN………………………………………………………………………………..44 
 
CHAPTER II: “YOU NEED A FATHER, DON’T YOU?”: THE NEW MAN, THE 
NEW LAD, AND THE ABSENTEE FATHERS IN NICK HORNBY’S ABOUT A 
BOY…………………………………………………………………………………….83 
 
CHAPTER III: “THEY DOLE IT OUT, WE PASS IT ON”: THE CONFLICTING 
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN FATHERS AND SONS IN MAGGIE GEE’S THE 
WHITE FAMILY……………………………………………………………………..119 
 
CONCLUSION………………………………………………………………………157 
 
WORKS CITED……………………………………………………………………..165 
 
APPENDIX I: ORIGINALITY REPORTS………………………………………...185 
 
APPENDIX II: ETHIC BOARD WAIVER FORMS...…………………………….187



1 
 

INTRODUCTION 

 

Every single human being has been destined to have a father. Whether caring, devoted, 

tender, benevolent, charitable, kind, violent, brutal, cruel, abusive, absent, present, or 

distant, owning a father is indispensable. The history of humanity is bursting with stories 

about fathers and sons. However, when scrutinised in detail, a considerable number of 

these stories embrace hatred and vengeance. Zeus tricks Cronus and kills him to survive; 

Adam discriminates between his sons, Abel and Cain; Noah shames Ham; Abraham 

intends to sacrifice Isaac for his God; Jacob leaves Joseph at the mercy of his other 

notorious sons; Icarus denies his father’s word and flies higher to his death; and, Jesus’s 

God remains a mere spectator when he is crucified.  

 

Besides, the history of literature is also bulging with stories that revolve around 

conflicting relationships between fathers and sons. Oedipus kills his father, replaces his 

throne and marries his mother. To some extent, in Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, misfortunes 

are portrayed as the outcomes of the perpetual rebellion of a prodigal son against his 

father. Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov is the story of a patricide. In Herman 

Hesse’s homonymous bildungsroman, Siddhartha leaves his father in desolation and can 

find peace only after letting his defiant son go for his way. The hatred and violence 

between the father and the son hardly dissolve when Troy, the angry father of Cory 

Maxon, dies in August Wilson’s play, Fences. In Arthur Miller’s post-war play All My 

Sons, Joe Keller is responsible not only for his son’s death but also for leaving families 

of the whole generation with a sense of despair due to his never-ending greed. Composed 

of five semi-autobiographic novels by Edward St Aubyn, the Patrick Melrose 

compilation narrates the accounts of an abused son. After falling victim to David 

Melrose’s long-lasting abuse, Patrick becomes a disengaged and violent father figure for 

his children. Orhan Pamuk’s The Red-Haired Woman simultaneously takes patricide and 

filicide as its core themes. Once he leaves his surrogate dad to his death, Cem ultimately 

becomes a victim of filicide.  



2 
 

Suffice it to say that mythological narratives and literary cults seldom mention merciful 

and obedient parental relationships, yet they frequently accommodate brutal fathers and 

rebellious sons. For this reason, such complex and perplexing relationships between 

fathers and sons can be observed in contemporary literature. Particularly in the second 

part of the twentieth century, the historical roles attributed to men and fathers 

metamorphosed due to profound changes in the family institution resulting from rapid 

political and socioeconomic developments. Still, the renowned clash between the punitive 

father and the disillusioned son prevails significantly in various literary works. 

 

Accordingly, this dissertation aims to assess diverse representations of fathers and sons 

in three examples of contemporary British novels: Amongst Women (1990) by John 

McGahern, About A Boy (1998) by Nick Hornby, The White Family (2002) by Maggie 

Gee from the perspective of critical studies on men and masculinities. Considering that 

each novel comprises either violent or neglecting fathers and disillusioned sons, this study 

explains that different forms of violence and disillusionment in these novels stem from 

particular masculinity traits. It is argued that the renowned yet erratic conflict and hostility 

between fathers and sons accentuate the clash between traditional and modern norms of 

masculinities and reflect particular discourses of ‘masculinity crisis’ prompted by 

complex, unstable, and obscure power relations. The vicissitudes of traditional 

masculinity norms might not help mitigate the ongoing conflict between fathers and sons. 

Along with the metamorphosis of the values associated with masculinity, fatherhood roles 

have tangled in new forms of abuse due to the construction of the ‘new man’ and the ‘new 

fatherhood’ as a product of the neoliberal condition in Britain. 

 

In particular, investigating fathers requires defining men, and “[a]ny study of fatherhood 

must also be concerned with masculinity” (King, Family Men 5). Fatherhood, often 

acclaimed as a crucial, lifelong role for men, is a prominent signifier of manhood and 

masculinity. Prevailing over its biological definition, fatherhood denotes the 

institutionalised form of manhood. Yet, defining man is a complex phenomenon as “the 

more anthropologists, sociologists, and historians explore the meanings of being a man, 

the more inconsistent, contradictory, and varied they become” (Stimpson xii). Despite 

being a relatively new phenomenon, research on the role of men as fathers has received 



3 
 

substantial attention since the 1970s. This period marked the emergence of second-wave 

feminism and the women’s liberation movement, which introduced critical terminologies 

and concepts relating to gender dynamics and the unfair distribution of social 

responsibilities between men and women (Connell et al. 1). After Simon de Beauvoir’s 

influential statement as “[o]ne is not born, but rather becomes, woman” (The Second 330), 

a considerable amount of literature has been written by liberal, Marxist, and radical 

feminists to question the position of women and men’s oppression and violence against 

women in Western societies. To name a few, Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique1 

(1963), Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics2 (1969), and Gayle Rubin’s “The Traffic in 

Women: Notes on the Political Economy of Sex3” (1975) disputed over inequalities and 

segregation between men and women and problematised men and masculinity in broader 

aspects during women’s liberation movement.  

 

Beyond those theoretical explanations, the women’s liberation movement of the twentieth 

century arose out of a broader political agenda, including the rise of the New Left, the 

 
1 In her seminal work, Betty Friedan epitomises the current position of women in the United States. She 
argues that women find themselves unexpectedly broken, subsided, and depressed despite the irrefutable 
achievements of first-wave feminism. She mainly focuses on the false image of the happy, white, middle-
class woman stereotype created in the 1950s in the United States. Friedan discusses an apparent disparity 
between the idealised norms for women and their daily lives. She calls such discrepancy “the feminine 
mystique” and further assumes that it ends up a “schizophrenic split” for women. Thus, focusing primarily 
on the marriage institution and any married women's oppressive tasks, Friedan calls for “a much larger sex-
role revolution” (370). 

 
2 According to Kate Millett, family is the smallest part of the socialisation process wherein men often 
perpetuate the ostensible submissiveness of women. However, inferiority is not the biological reality of 
women, but rather male imposition. Millett simply assumes that sexual relations are inherent in power 
relations and male supremacy is indeed a fallacious argument. Referring to a number of literary texts, in 
Sexual Politics, Millett lays bare the prevalent, systematic violence of men to control women throughout 
history.  

 
3 In her well-known work, Gayle Rubin maintains that women have long been the objects of systematic 
power relations. She questions the neglect of women in Marx and Engels’ formulation of exploitation. She 
rejects structuralist views about men, women, and culture, coining an influential term called “sex/gender 
system” to interpret women's historical subordination, which inevitably causes disparities among all people. 
Rubin also denounces Marxist readings of class struggles as both Marx and Engels ignored women's 
invisible labour and overlooked the ramifications of gender hierarchy in social inequalities. She further 
objects to Claude Lewis Strauss’s theories on kinship. To Strauss, humanity owes its culture to the incest 
taboo, as a result of which men exchanged women and enhanced kinship networks. In contrast, Rubin 
asserts that Strauss’ arguments are “exegetical” rather than a universal truth. She insists that “there is an 
economics and a politics to sex/gender systems which is obscured by the concept of ‘exchange of women’” 
(“The Traffic in Woman” 205). 



4 
 

 

Civil Rights Movement, and the Vietnam War protests (Burgin, “Understanding 

Activism” 19; Kent, Gender and Power, 261; Krolokke and Sorensen, “Three Waves of 

Feminism” 8; Murphy, “Introduction” 9). During the 1960s and 70s, as a social and 

political movement, women’s liberation gained momentum through uprisings and riots in 

the United States and student upheavals in France and third-world countries. Because the 

significance of the mutual relationship between individual experiences and politics was 

deciphered, many women struggled to gain equal rights in distinct spheres of society. The 

popular jargon of sex roles helped raise novel questions against the aspects of gender-

based roles to eliminate segregation in public and domestic spheres. 

 

Meanwhile, consequent reverberations of women’s liberation among distinct men and 

male groups were immediate. Men from diverse groups in the United States and some 

European countries responded to women’s achievements in theory and practice. These 

groups reacted towards women’s liberation in disparate ways. The most visible disparity 

among these perspectives is related to their proximity to the problems regarding gender 

equality and sexism in a given society. However, those approaches emerged from a single 

movement, namely the men’s liberation movement.  

 

Men’s liberation movement has triggered specific enquiries on men and masculinities. 

Men’s self-questioning about their position of authority and power concerning women 

was not arbitrary. Instead, many men focused on the unequal distribution of gender roles, 

as the women’s liberation movement significantly impacted men. As a consequence of 

feminist documentation of gender inequalities, the historical power of patriarchy was 

opened to debate, and men, for the first time, became the object of critical enquiries, 

thereby launching their liberation movement since any dispute over patriarchy and 

criticism of asymmetrical sex roles4 would concern men as well. Several consciousness-

 
4 Throughout the introduction, the terminology of ‘sex roles’ and ‘gender roles’ are not used 
interchangeably. Instead, they are deliberately emphasised in some parts to highlight the notions among 
distinct movements and approaches towards men and masculinities. Several activists and scholars of the 
men’s liberation movement and men’s studies borrowed the jargon of ‘sex roles’ from the earlier enquiries 
on men and women triggered by the first and the second waves of feminism. However, along with the 
emergence of third-wave feminism, queer studies, and gay and lesbian studies, critical theories on men and 
 



5 
 

 

raising groups of men paved the way to male liberation in the United States during the 

1960s and 70s (Messner, “The Limits” 256). Those groups enabled many men to meet in 

male-only gatherings and express their individual experiences of being a man and their 

implications for women in contemporary Western societies. Through distinct enquiries 

and arguments, some male liberationists perceived that while “the ‘female sex role’ had 

oppressed women, […] ‘the male sex role’ also harmed men” (Messner, “Forks in the 

Road” 8). The mutual point male liberationists tended to underline was the idea that 

liberating men was distinctly more than understanding the male oppression of women, as 

men were also oppressed and victimised by their roles. Following women’s liberation and 

its achievements, men’s endeavours focused simultaneously on “freeing men from the 

patriarchal sexual dynamics they now experience with each other” (Pleck, “Men’s 

Power” 64). Accordingly, the essential purpose of male liberation groups was to identify 

the harm men cause to women and figure out how they could overcome the burden of 

their inherited roles. Highlighting the commitment to rigid male roles such as being the 

power holder, ruler, policy maker, breadwinner, decision maker, and adventurer, and due 

to the implicit impositions and harms of those roles upon women, children, and other 

men, male liberationists sought for liberation, a sort of refinement for the betterment of 

social life in general. Encouraging men to develop healthier relationships with women, 

children, and other men, the fundamental motivation behind men’s liberation was to 

diminish sex-role stereotypes as they “limit their ability to be human” (Sawyer 170). To 

mediate a more liberal, equal, and fair social order, sex roles were to be questioned. 

 

However, the men’s liberation movement’s basis for gender equality is controversial, as 

it is in the sex-role paradigm. Male liberationists revolved around the idea that a certain 

amount of amelioration in men’s and women’s conditions could be achieved by rectifying 

men’s ‘burdensome’, ‘oppressive’, and ‘detrimental’ roles in a given society. It is 

recognised that men assume instrumental tasks by creating a false symmetry in role 

 
masculinities have avoided using ‘sex role’ jargon and approached relations between men and women and 
among different men through the lens of social constructionism rather than biologic essentialism. For 
further details about the emerging fields, terms, and distinct approaches towards men and masculinities, see 
Joseph H. Pleck’s essay, “The Theory of Male Sex-Role Identity: Its Rise and Fall, 1936 to the Present”, 
and Harry Brod’s essay, “The Case for Men’s Studies” in The Making of Masculinities: The New Men’s 
Studies (1987).   



6 
 

 

sharing, wherein expressive tasks are often feminised. Men frequently benefit as these 

instruments include financial and institutional power. Being identified with instrumental 

roles which required rationality, men disdained to be emphatic for women’s conditions. 

They diminished their culpability in using assumed power by overemphasising their 

roles’ financial, emotional, and physical burdens5. Eventually, men “maximised the 

potential gain that [they] might expect from liberation” (Messner, “The Limits” 261). 

Hence, one might observe that male liberationists mainly concentrated on the difficulties 

of men’s and boys’ experiences. They did not pay sufficient attention to women and their 

mutual problems with men, thereby overshadowing the political implications of male 

power in gender relations6. Even some major male liberationists overlooked the unequal 

distribution of gender roles and were inclined to claim sexist assumptions for the 

remaining problems regarding gender relations and offered their solutions to the benefits 

of men.  

 

A further problem with the men’s liberation movement is that it stimulates a particular 

focus on the white, middle-class men, their burden for the breadwinner role, and their 

practical difficulties with their female partners. Not only the gay men but also the black, 

the poor, the macho, and the unemployed are discarded from their attention (Messner, 

“The Limits” 264). Hence, the men’s liberation movement, deliberately inclining towards 

monolithic, limited, excluding interrogations with essentialist and partly sexist 

 
5 Questioning detrimental features of male roles for men, or subsequent cultural impositions of traditional 
masculinity norms, some male liberationists documented particular struggles that men often experience in 
their personal lives and reached accusative conclusions against women. In this regard, Marc Fasteau, one 
of the leading figures of the Men’s Liberation Movement, indicated men’s difficulty in displaying their 
emotions and inclined to accusative claims on feminist achievements. To Fasteau, men indirectly suffer 
from feminism since feminist ideals enable women to liberate, help them communicate and express their 
inner feelings with each other easier, whereas “[t]here is nothing among men that resembles the personal 
communication that women have developed among themselves” (“Why Aren’t We” 20). Indeed, men are 
curved by social restrictions, which complicate emotional displays. Fasteau further points out that women 
achieved a certain degree of intimacy in their relationships. At the same time, “men [have been] taught not 
to communicate [their] personal feelings and concerns” (“Why Aren’t We” 20). For these reasons, Fasteau 
concludes, men are incapable of developing deep relationships with their peers, and the ultimate 
responsibility rests with women and feminism. 

 
6 For a more detailed analysis of the men’s liberation movement, see Michael A. Messner’s essay titled 
“The Limits of ‘The Male Sex Role’: An Analysis of the Men’s Liberation and Men’s Rights Movements’ 
Discourse”, Joseph Pleck and Jack Sawyer’s “Men’s Power with Women, Other Men, and Society: A 
Men’s Movement Analysis” in Feminism and Masculinities edited by Peter F. Murphy. 



7 
 

 

assumptions in gender relations, overlooked the inequalities among distinct men and their 

relationship with peculiar women and children. Consequently, in less than two decades, 

the movement was divided into two opposite fractions, namely the sexist and the anti-

sexist approaches, regarding their reaction towards feminist movements and fundamental 

differences in their perception of masculinity.  

 

As mentioned above, since the early 1970s, feminist movements have polarised men’s 

reactions, considering their stance on gender equality. The men’s rights movement 

represents the sexist wing of the enquiries about men and men as fathers. Defenders of 

the men’s rights discourse advocate male supremacy and voice concern about the 

victimisation of men. Their arguments revolve around contemporary problems that some 

men experience, such as the slaughter of men in wars all around the world, the shortness 

of overall life expectancy of men to women, and the sharp increase in unemployment 

rates among men owing to women’s inclusion to the workforce soon after the emergence 

of contemporary feminist movements7.  

 

In men’s rights discourse, gender equality is unnecessary for the mutual benefits of a 

given society. Even if gender equality is necessary, feminism “is anti-equality and seeks 

to privilege women over men” (Jordan, The New Politics 195). Pillars of men’s rights 

mainly argue that feminism, exceptionally liberal feminism, caused inequalities, and men 

need to regain their lost rights. They hinge on “the fundamental premise that men as men 

are subject to numerous generally unrecognised injustices of a legal, social, and 

psychological nature” (Clatterbaugh, Contemporary Perspectives 61). Supporters for 

 
7 Herb Goldberg and Warren Farrell are famous men’s rights movement authors. Once an outstanding figure 
among the male liberationists, Farrell’s ideas vacillated to the essentially sexist wing afterwards. In 1993, 
Farrell published The Myth of Male Power (1994), claiming that male power is a myth and is nothing more 
than a feminist falsification. In the same vein, Herb Goldberg, in his best-seller book The Hazards of Being 
Male: Surviving the Myth of Masculine Privilege, argues that being a male in modern societies is hazardous, 
women are more privileged in the contemporary world, both imposed sex roles and the related laws work 
against men. Although their arguments are irrelevant to this dissertation’s main point, it is crucial to grasp 
opposite claims for further discussion. For a full-length criticism of the men’s rights movement in 
profeminist discussions, see Michael A. Messner’s Politics of Masculinities: Men in Movements (1997); 
Kenneth Clatterbaugh’s book Contemporary Perspectives on Masculinity: Men, Women, and Politics in 
Modern Society (1990) and Bob Connell’s essay “Men at Bay: The ‘Men’s Movement’ and Its Newest 
Best-Sellers” in The Politics of Manhood. Ed. Michael S. Kimmel (1995).   

 



8 
 

 

men’s rights are inclined to equate opportunities that men and women have in common 

in the public and private spheres. Although similar issues have already been mentioned 

and questioned in the men’s liberation movement, supporters of men’s rights differ in that 

they withdraw entirely from gender symmetry, and their “discourse most often display a 

blatant disregard for widely accepted sociological, economic, and psychological studies” 

(Messner, “The Limits” 266) that have long revealed bias and segregation of women. 

 

Moreover, the men’s rights perspective often goes to extremes to wink at remarkably 

diverse inequalities among the sexes. Pillars of this perspective even reject and 

manipulate the reality that the sexual and domestic violence of men victimises women. 

Although some members in these groups allegedly defend gender equality, the men’s 

rights supporters mainly propose that the inequalities aroused by the second-wave 

feminists not only burden men with overwhelming responsibilities but also cause them to 

suffer from economic and psychological problems, as women disrupt men’s domination 

in professional life in contemporary society. Therefore, the primary target of those groups 

is to provoke men unaware of their ‘disadvantageous’ position in their families during 

marriage and post-marriage. They advocate the ‘rights’ of men and men as fathers in 

various concerns, such as divorce, alimony, and custody issues. Although there are some 

different fractions among those groups, for most supporters, gender equality is not a 

sincere aim, and their standpoint is, to a great extent, a backlash8 against feminism and 

feminist achievements. 

 

Eventually, it might be safe to assert that the men’s rights perspective is based on several 

manipulative assumptions and over-generalisations in the name of liberating men from 

their alleged burden and threats that they confront, such as lower life expectancy, higher 

suicide rates, anxiety and stress disorder caused by the breadwinner role, more significant 

numbers of killings in wars in comparison to women, and briefly the premise that more 

compelling tasks have been historically given to men. The men’s rights perspective, 

 
8 Susan Faludi, in her Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Woman, defines backlash as “an 
attempt to retract the handful of small and hard-won victories that the feminist movement did manage to 
win for women” (Faludi, Backlash, 2006, p. 9-10).   

 



9 
 

 

however, often tends to avoid the nature of unequal gender relations and unfair share of 

power, which have long been constructed for the benefit of men, as “[m]en do hold most 

of the power in society […], generally control governments, armies, corporations, 

professions, political parties, and social movements” (Connell, “Men at Bay” 75). As can 

be seen from the examples regarding men’s frequent dominance in decision-making 

mechanisms and their hegemony of accessing economic resources in comparison to 

women both at the global and local level, assumptions for the ostensible sufferings of 

men might not be relevant for most men. 

 

Considering these developments, men also organised several support groups as fathers 

due to the emergence of new thoughts and perspectives about gender since the “shifting 

relationship of the state and individual also raised questions relating to the family and 

fatherhood” (King, Family Men 200). The father support groups have functioned 

efficiently in creating public opinion and enacting laws concerning family, divorce, 

custody, alimony, and rights for fair contact arrangements9. As experienced in the men’s 

liberation movement, fathers’ groups and organisations flourished in distinct strains 

regarding their attitudes towards major social problems such as gender inequalities, racial 

discrimination, and economic barriers that fathers occasionally encounter. Hence, they 

developed into mixed fractions under the umbrella title of the Fatherhood Responsibility 

Movement (Flood, “Backlash” 261). The difference among several organisations and 

groups crystallises in their perception of parental rights, responsibilities, and gender 

equality. 

 

Highly influential in Britain during the 1990s, the fathers’ rights groups launched several 

initiatives that provided volunteer assistance to separated husbands and biological fathers. 

Those initiatives later transformed into a movement. Three essential claims behind the 

formation of the fathers’ rights groups and men’s retreat therein are tedious and severe 

struggles inherited by separation or divorce, the loss of connection with children, and the 

 
9 Richard Collier’s Masculinity, Law and Family (1995), Richard Collier and Sally Sheldon’s Fragmenting 
Fatherhood: A Socio-Legal Study (2008), Susan Boyd’s “Demonizing Mothers: Father’s Rights Discourses 
in Child Custody Law Reform Process” give full accounts of the contemporary debates on Father’s Rights 
Groups and their effects on legal procedures in Britain, Canada, and the United States. 



10 
 

 

economic instability of fathers caused by custody laws. This particular movement of 

fathers corresponds to the men’s rights movement and indicates a genuine backlash 

against former achievements of feminist activism. However, some fathers’ rights groups 

refuse such accusations regarding them as anti-feminist women haters. Taking an alleged 

gender-neutral approach, those groups insist on the assertion that “fathers are deprived of 

their ‘rights’ and subjected to systematic discrimination as fathers and as men, in a system 

biased towards women and dominated by feminists” (Flood, “Separated Fathers” 235). 

Although this argument seems to have few conceivable features, it mainly fails to capture 

inequalities and opportunity gaps between men and women at the intersection of 

professional life, domestic labour, sexualities, and reproduction. The men’s support 

groups ignore that there are still several structural inequalities between men and women 

in public and domestic spheres. 

 

For example, when fathers leave their partners after or during pregnancy, their condition 

is generally far better than women. Numerous women still possibly suffer from social 

oppression, lack of security, and economic difficulties with their children after separation. 

Moreover, one should interrogate men’s institutional power in familial relationships to 

understand structural inequalities between men and women. Individual stories and 

experiences of men regarding suffering after a break-up are not always valid to recognise 

inequalities since “there are as many differences among fathers as there are among men 

and among fatherhoods as there are among fathers” (Jordan, “Dads Aren’t Demons” 421). 

Therefore, noticeable enquiries about fathers need to focus more on the construction of 

fatherhood than victimisation and crisis discourse of men in family relations. During the 

last few decades, the women-hating men’s rights movement and the sexist father’s rights 

groups were not the only reactions of men who assumed their ‘rights’ to be in ‘crisis’ due 

to the novel conditions that appeared in Western societies. Political discourses that 

develop on men and men as fathers in the wake of feminist achievements are prevalent in 

another sexist approach, the mythopoetic men’s movement. 

 

Contrary to the men’s rights movement, adherents of the mythopoetic men’s movement 

do not assume themselves to be male supremacists, as they concede an unequal 



11 
 

 

relationship between men and women10. However, displacing and omitting women, the 

movement is “a world of and for man” (Ferber 35). The mythopoetic men’s movement 

was triggered by small gatherings and retreats in the United States during the 1980s. In 

those gatherings, held either in the woods or at convention centres, many men danced, 

played the drums, chanted, wrestled, spoke aloud, roared, and cried along with symbolic 

initiation rituals. With the influence of new age movements that emphasise a return to 

‘the roots of the inner self’ and ancient narratives, those men seek to find ‘the core of 

their masculinity’ in themselves. In less than ten years, those retreat groups spread across 

the States and “thousands of men—most of them white, middle-aged, heterosexual, and 

of the professional class—had attended mythopoetic events” (Messner, “Essentialist 

Retreats” 17). Diverse therapeutic and spiritual methodologies were implemented during 

mythopoetic gatherings to rediscover and nurture ‘genuine masculinity’. These events 

also rendered myth and poetry potent instruments for self-discovery and individual 

growth. Thus, mythopoetic gatherings, Messner argues, brought about “a collective ritual 

structure within which individual men can explore, discover, and reconstruct their inner 

selves” (“Essentialist Retreats” 18). In their perspective, such ceremonies and rituals 

enabled them to explore their feelings and emotions as men and to understand each other 

better since they perceived masculinity as ‘a collective inner truth’. Adherents of the 

mythopoetic movement sought to foreground masculinity as the core of their maleness 

and claimed their right to enact masculinity in their inimitable manner.  

 

Rather than focusing on legislative, legal organisations and academic studies, the 

mythopoetic men’s movement tends to bring a spiritual perspective to masculinity and 

“embraces a traditional, and conservative, rendering of psychoanalytic theory” (Kimmel 

and Kaufman, “Weekend” 22). The mythopoetics consolidated men’s historical yet 

allegedly decaying power by premising the nature of masculinity in Jungian 

psychoanalytic theory and the archetypes. The mythopoetics mainly dispute that 

masculinity is recently in crisis. To overcome such a crisis, men must procure their 

 
10 For detailed enquiries, discussions and debates on the Mythopoetic Movement, see The Politics of 
Manhood: Profeminist Men Respond to the Mythopoetics Men’s Movement and the Mythopoetic Leaders 
Answer Ed. Michael S. Kimmel. 

 



12 
 

 

‘genuine masculinity’, which has long been lost, particularly after the modernisation of 

family life. According to the mythopoetic adherents, men have been ‘softened’ in the 

post-industrial era due to the changing production and consumption means, thereby losing 

their genuine bond with the conceivable roots of traditional masculinity and other men 

simultaneously. 

 

The Mythopoetic Men’s Movement peaked with the publication of Robert Bly’s Iron 

John: A Book About Man in 1990, the national best-seller nonfiction for months in the 

same year. In his book, Bly refers to several ancient stories and myths and notably focuses 

on the well-known German fairy tale, the Iron John11. He uses Iron John as a metaphor 

for the condition of modern men and men as fathers, who had already lost their bounds 

with the ‘true essence of masculinity’. To Bly, modern men have particular difficulties 

perceiving their masculinity, and the Industrial Revolution is responsible for this flaw. 

He further suggests that owing to urbanisation and industrialisation, numerous men as 

fathers lost their close affinity with their sons, as they had to spend long hours in factories 

or mines.  

 

Bly emphasises that owing to the harsh conditions in the realm of heavy industry, the 

rigorous demands of the work often resulted in a distancing from the communal lifestyle 

once enjoyed by large families. Previously, extended family units, including fathers, 

uncles, and grandfathers, often resided under one roof, fostering more significant social 

interaction. Working on the farms, hunting, and doing local sports often allowed them to 

“spend much time with younger men and brought knowledge of male spirit and soul to 

them” (Bly, Iron John 16). However, due to the substantial change through urbanisation, 

 
11 Iron John is a tale of an eight-year-old prince who lives happily with his family in a castle. Once, an 
intruder brings about some difficulties in their town as he spreads fear and terror by killing the king’s 
hunters one by one in the wood. The king does not give up, calls for the best-ever hunter and sends him to 
catch the brute. It is found out that the intruder is a long-haired and bearded man who lives in a swampland. 
They drain the swamp, see the man, and then cage him in the castle. After several events, the adolescent 
prince cannot resist his instinct to help the caged man, steals the keys under his mother’s pillow and sets 
the wild men free. When they go into the wood together, the wild man promises the prince the greatest 
treasure ever on the condition that he will never see his family again. After several comings and goings, the 
wild man repeatedly tests the boy’s loyalty. The boy fails several times and gets a wound for each failure. 
Throughout the tale, the boy is initiated to adulthood or ‘manhood’ by the wild man, finds his princes, saves 
his country, becomes the king and lives happily with his family. 



13 
 

 

either extended families declined, or men in those families started to work far from home, 

resulting in younger boys losing their opportunity to acquire the skills of former 

generations.  

 

Bly further argues that the Oedipal bounds of the boys with their mothers distracted them 

from the father. Boys failed to know their fathers better, as they knew them through the 

eyes of their mothers; therefore, the sons would “learn the female attitude toward 

masculinity and take a female view of [their] father[s] and of [their] own masculinity” 

(Bly, Iron John 24). Thus, he offers men to recall former initiation ceremonies and 

masculine practices to remember and reconstruct their manhood. As the historical father-

son relationships have been forgotten, in the contemporary world, boys would only find 

such opportunities through particular rituals held in sports and military activities, which 

enable them to be partially initiated. Because these practices are insufficient to heal their 

‘wounds’, therapeutic procedures of mythopoetic gatherings might help men mitigate 

their ‘crises’ and construct healthier relationships with women, other men, and children 

to reconstruct social order and overcome gender segregation in a given society. 

 

However, more extensive than being advisory self-help discourses, there are some crucial 

political implications of the mythopoetic men’s movement in general and of Robert Bly’s 

fictive Jungian application in particular. On the one hand, Bly’s call for healing men’s 

‘wounds’ stands for the desire to reconstruct men’s self-confidence in the guise of 

criticism against industrialisation, capitalism, lost traditions and assumed values. Still, on 

the other hand, he highlights the necessity of traditional masculinity norms that threatened 

men and men as fathers due to feminist questionings of men’s historical authority and 

power. Bly’s suggestions, therefore, imply an urge to resist contemporary feminist 

achievements and consolidate men’s historical power in gender relations. His constant 

references to archetypal masculinity show that he somehow clings to the masculinist 

ideology of the men’s rights perspective. Bly’s application of Jungian perspectives in his 

analyses of men and masculinity results from then-contemporary debates on sex role 

theories among men’s liberationists. To discern particular archetypes as ahistorical 

qualities of maleness, Bly goes back to ancient myths and fairy tales, and he comes “to 



14 
 

 

see these stories as offering a theory of psychological growth” (Schwalbe, “Bly” 89). In 

a broader context, the mythopoetics constantly cite myths, legends, and folk tales “to 

uncover repeated behaviour patterns that count as archetypal or universal” (Clatterbaugh, 

“Mythopoetic” 47). They strive to construct collective norms and ideals about being a 

man in contemporary societies, wherein the meaning of traditional manhood and 

conventional fatherhood has already been obscured due to vast socioeconomic and 

sociopolitical developments. Through the neoliberalisation of the previous nation-states 

and particular feminist achievements, men have begun to lose their privileges of the 

uncontested power of patriarchy and find themselves in dire crises in modern Western 

societies. The crisis men suffer, as the Mythopoetics argues, will not be solved unless 

they regain their lost ‘rights’. 

 

On the contrary, in the course of this study, it will be explained that there has never been 

a real masculinity crisis, yet masculinity per se is indeed in a plurality of crises since it 

could only exist on account of peculiar crises (Edwards, Cultures 14; Hearn, “A Crisis” 

164; MacInnes 46). The contemporary discourse of the masculinity crisis is not a novel 

phenomenon12. Discussions concerning ‘men in crisis’ revolve around definitions of 

masculinity, prescribed norms, and attributing certain qualities and roles to men in a 

particular setting. Because masculinity (as well as femininity) and its expected qualities 

are subject to social constructions in historical conditions, they are open to debate 

 
12 In his article “The Crisis of Masculinity in Seventeenth-Century England,” Michael Kimmel discerns the 
roots of the contemporary crisis of masculinity in seventeenth-century English pamphlets and further 
assumes that political chaos often results in social crises which lead to a redefinition of masculinity and 
men’s ostensible roles in the family institution. In this regard, the alleged masculinity crisis in Britain dates 
to the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century, when dramatic social and political events such as the 
beheading of Charles I, the establishment of the Cromwellian Protectorate, the Restoration with Charles II, 
the Glorious Revolution, and the ongoing sectarian conflicts between Catholics and Protestants took place 
respectively. Acute conflicts followed such outbreaks in social organisations. They had severe ramifications 
for men and precipitated crises in the family institution, often deemed a reflection of public institutions 
wherein men had the top place. In the same vein, Karen Harvey informs that men were often portrayed as 
the household patriarch since “the vision of masculinity [was] very much about patriarchy in the classic 
sense of the rule of the father in the house” (298). However, many men and men as fathers did not hold the 
power of household patriarch, and they shared some of their power with women who contributed to the 
economy of their homes. Thus, “the gap between ideals of patriarchal manhood and social practice has 
given rise to a model of anxious masculinity in the historiography of this period” (Harvey 299). 
Accordingly, despite the renowned analogy between the ruler of the institutions and the father of the 
household, distinct definitions of masculinity emerged in early modern Britain, a period marked by a 
significant shift in power relations and the new definitions of fatherly roles in the family as a source of 
men’s crises.  



15 
 

 

(Buchbinder 4; Connell, Gender in World Perspective 74; Kimmel, “The Crisis” 90; Tosh 

19). Any crisis discourse trapped in the sex role paradigm will remain in a vicious circle 

due to the fluidity and volatility of norms and definitions. The traces of masculinity crisis 

throughout history appear, Reeser suggests, “when many men in a given context feel 

tension with larger ideologies that dominate or begin to dominate that context” 

(Masculinities in Theory 27). In other words, in a particular setting in history, when the 

privileges of men were under dire threat, divergent and often conflicting discourses on 

the masculinity crisis emerged for men to regain their hegemony and control over women, 

children, and other men.  

 

To this end, some explicit motivations behind crisis discourses in contemporary Western 

societies reverberate men’s anxiety about being visible in gender relations. In the last few 

decades, men have been the object of extensive social sciences and legal research 

enquiries from feminist and profeminist perspectives. Various feminist campaigns and 

thoughts pinpointed distinct aspects of men. They proposed multiple analyses for men 

and men as fathers to highlight the harms caused by men in specific contexts. Monolithic 

denunciation of being men and traditional masculinity has been questioned, the legal 

status of men’s rule has been challenged, and current developments have restricted men’s 

power domain. Feminist analyses uncovered that individual practices, politics, and 

policies require improvements to overcome gender inequalities. These are unexpected, 

rough, even arduous issues for many men to overcome, simultaneously triggering 

multiple discourses of masculinity crisis. 

 

It is still safe to argue that men often hold the entire apparatuses in terms of power and 

privilege. Plenty of institutions and decision-making mechanisms have historically been 

formed, designed, and run either by men or for the benefit of men. Thus, Michael Kimmel 

suggests, therein lies the problem as men manage to remain invisible in these power 

relations. The “invisibility” of men’s power, he further puts forward, “reproduces 

inequality” (“Invisible” 6) not only between men and women but also among other men. 

Hence, assuming men as gendered beings for enquiries about men in power relations is 



16 
 

 

essential to the critical studies on men and masculinities to uncover the hidden privileges 

of men. 

 

Among cultural theories and critical literary studies on men, there is no monolithic 

identification of male power, but multiple denunciations of masculinities and proposed 

solutions for gender inequalities. Drawing on an extensive range of research, profeminist 

academics and activists around the world have focused on men’s multifaceted 

experiences to highlight their ongoing violence, authority, and power in concepts such as 

hegemony, heteronormativity, homosociality, and homophobia in varied contexts 

(Haywood et al. 4). The mutual notion among these studies is the ultimate rejection of the 

conservative reductionist proposition that masculinity is biologically natural and morally 

necessary. All profeminist allies, therefore, assert that masculinity is culturally fabricated, 

not biologically mandated, yet men, assuming masculinity, have most often been the 

privileged party in gender hierarchies. 

 

Earlier enquiries about men’s asymmetric power over women, children, and other men in 

the web of power relations came under intense scrutiny in Australian sociologist and 

philosopher Raewyn Connell’s theory of gender. “Gender,” Connell argues, “is a way in 

which social practice is ordered” (Masculinities 71). Based on the perspective of Connell, 

the concept of gender is fundamentally flawed, as it implies that social roles are inherently 

dictated by human biology. Instead, Connell posits that the constructs of masculinity and 

femininity are purely products of societal influences and expectations. Historical, 

contextual, and unstable configurations of masculinity and femininity are (re)produced in 

particular gender relations, which depend on fundamental structures such as power, 

labour, and cathexis (Connell, Gender and Power 98-99). These structures are constituted 

through bodily practises, performances, and reproduction processes. Thus, masculinity 

and femininity are the products of a gender project, which is always subject to change, 

whereby men and women (re)position themselves. Neither masculinity nor femininity is 

independent of the indicated time and place within a given society (Masculinities 72). 

While addressing gender projects, Connell focuses on three main areas through which 



17 
 

 

men as gendered beings are to be analysed, namely global, regional, and local settings. 

Either global or local, a specific gender order is created by distinct material practices.  

 

Connell further argues that in this gender order, particular gender regimes are located. 

Gender regimes denote clear implications and applications peculiar to specific institutions 

and might show variety in local settings. The comprehensive arrangement of gender 

regimes embraces both institutional structures and cultural habitus, wherein gender order 

is constructed in a broader aspect. These structures are the state, the labour market, and 

the family, through which reciprocal relations are obtained as gender regimes among 

distinct hierarchies (Gender and Power 120). Hence, Connell suggests that “these 

concepts that gender regimes and gender orders [too] are historical products and subject 

to change in history” (The Men and the Boys 29). In these historical and cultural 

constructions of the gender order, Connell draws attention to the plurality of masculinities 

(and also femininities) to analyse men’s practices as gendered beings. Hence, for the first 

time, men become the objects of enquiries in gender relations. In her formulation, then, 

it is possible to pinpoint distinct typologies of masculinities at the intersection of gender, 

ethnicity, nationality, class, sexuality, and age, which lays bare the idea that masculinity 

practices of a man of colour might be different from a white man’s in terms of ethnicity 

on the one hand, and the other, the practices of working-class men might also differ class-

wise from a middle-class man’s masculinity practises.  

 

Locating the notion of plural masculinities, a notion that highlights the fact that 

masculinity is not a monolithic, stable, historical, biological, uncontested, universal truth, 

but a somewhat fragmented, multi-layered, fluid, dependable construct wherein distinct 

men are attached, Connell mentions a disparate group of men such as gay men of colour, 

feminine factory workers, middle-class rapists, and cross-dressers who could represent 

diverse masculinity practices. Economic, social, legal, and therefore political relations 

among these disparate groups of men are constantly (re)arranged following the values 



18 
 

 

closely tied to hegemonic masculinity13, which is delineated on the top of other 

categorisations such as subordinating, complicit, marginalised, and protest masculinities, 

(Masculinities 76). None of these categorisations is fixed; instead, they are subject to 

change due to the fluidity of gender relations as they are social constructions in distinct 

historical contexts.  

 

Connell defines hegemonic masculinity as a target achievement for all men, as she 

borrows Antonio Gramsci’s term hegemony in the context of unequal gender relations. 

Gramsci formulates his theory of hegemony to demonstrate how power is legitimatised 

by the ruling classes. To Gramsci, two main stages, cultural direction and consent, are 

central to recognising hegemony’s inherent acceptance. In particular, Gramscian 

hegemony indicates a process of moral, intellectual, and often manupilative leadership 

and control to seek consent of the subordinated classes during the last few decades of the 

nineteenth century. In Gramscian hegemony, consent is the key word since it functions 

for ruling classes to retain domination over the subordinate classes through complex web 

of mechanisms rather than coercion. Gramsci’s use of hegemony cannot be understood 

without other concepts he develops, including those of ‘State’ and ‘Civil Society.’ While 

Gramsci at times uses ‘State’ narrowly to refer to the “governmental-coercive apparatus” 

(265), he also deploys a broader “general notion of State” (263) or “integral State” (267), 

which includes both the functions of social hegemony and political government. In this 

general or integral sense, “[s]tate is the entire complex of practical and theoretical 

activities whereby the ruling class not only justifies and maintains its dominance but also 

manages to win the active consent of those over whom it rules” (244). Accordingly, as 

the term hegemony signifies, consent and legitimisation are precise principles in the 

construction of gender relations, particularly hegemonic masculinity, since the superiority 

 
13 The term ‘hegemonic masculinity’ was first coined in the article “Toward a New Sociology of 
Masculinity” (1985) by Tim Carrigan, Bob Connell and John Lee. Connell later extended the term in her 
book Gender and Power (1987), wherein she put forward that “hegemonic masculinity is always 
constructed in relation to various subordinated masculinities as well as in relation to women” (183). In her 
later seminal work Masculinities (1995), Connell foregrounds the idea that “masculinity and femininity are 
inherently relational concepts, which have meaning pertinent to each other, as a social demarcation and a 
cultural opposition” (43). She rejects the presence of a singular definition of masculinity but defends the 
existence of a plurality of masculinities. She offers to inspect masculinity typologies under four main 
sections: hegemonic, subordinate, complicit, and marginalised. To Connell, definitions of each masculinity 
typology are always fluent, unstable, and dynamic. 



19 
 

 

of some men over women and other men among gender hierarchies is seldom achieved 

by force, but by mutual consent and cultural dominance since “hegemony [does] not mean 

violence, although it could be supported by force; it mean[s] ascendency achieved 

through culture, institutions, and persuasion” (Howson and Hearn 44). The aspects of 

hegemonic masculinity enable privileged men to legitimise their granted power over 

women and other men. More precisely, the subordination of less advantageous and less 

privileged men by hegemonic forms of masculinity is consolidated through the consent 

of other men and women at the intersection of broader power relations and particular 

mundane practices. However, not all men can maintain the dependant, unstable qualities 

of hegemonic masculinity, as it embodies values with plural ramifications of existing 

idealised masculinity norms, which are neither complete nor stable. Particular 

characteristics that hegemonic masculinity implies frequently coincide with 

contemporary attributions of idealised masculinity norms, such as being a breadwinner, 

strong, courageous, sexually potent, and progenitive. 

 

Along with non-heterosexual men, many non-white men, working-class men, disabled 

men, or older men tend to remain out of the circle of hegemonic masculinity norms in a 

particular society. Most of these men also aspire to benefit from the patriarchal 

dividend14, although they “are not militant in defence of patriarchy” (Connell, The Men 

and the Boys 31). Complicity plays a crucial role in constructing and saving hegemonic 

masculinity norms now that being complicit to the ongoing ascendency of hegemonic 

masculinity is often achieved by consensus. There is, therefore, a symbiotic relationship 

between hegemonic masculinity and complicity. Hegemonic masculinity norms owe their 

existence to the collection of beliefs and values created and defended by complicity. In 

other words, understanding the power of hegemony requires carefully examining the 

dynamics of complicity. In contemporary societies, complicit men might be respectful 

towards their partners, wives, daughters, and mothers and take responsibility for 

 
14 The term patriarchal dividend was coined by Raewyn Connell in her book Masculinities (2005) and 
developed in her following works. Patriarchal dividend refers to the idea that most men, being top of the 
gender hierarchy, benefit from the privileges of hegemonic masculinity. It is defined as “the advantage men 
in general gain from the overall subordination of women” (Masculinities 79). Patriarchal dividend projects 
the historical position of men concerning women and gay men since “men as a group, and heterosexual 
men in particular, are not oppressed or disadvantaged” (Men and Boys 209).        



20 
 

 

household shares. They might not commit physical violence towards women, other men, 

and children. However, they do not refrain from the privileges of masculinity and keep 

reproducing the qualities of hegemonic masculinity and gender inequalities in a given 

context. 

    

As previously mentioned, hegemonic masculinity often rearranges its fluid qualities 

pertinent to other masculinity categorisations and is constructed through disparities 

between currently dominant and less valued masculinities and femininities (Connell, 

Gender and Power 187). Among distinct masculinity categorisations, “[m]iddle-class, 

white, heterosexual masculinity is used as the marker against which other masculinities 

are measured” (Pease, Recreating Men 32). Therefore, hegemonic masculinity bears 

ascendant qualities of current masculinity norms and deliberately disparages several 

disadvantageous men who cannot position themselves in the most honoured hegemonic 

ideals. Some relatively unfavourable men remain subordinated, as they cannot open up 

room for themselves in the circle of legitimised masculinity norms. 

  

Accordingly, heterosexual men’s superiority over gay men is presumably most frequent 

since sexual orientation is one of the most striking determiners of masculine legitimacy 

among the hierarchies of distinct masculinity categorisations. Gay men are subordinated 

by heterosexual men in particular material practices such as “political and cultural 

exclusion, cultural abuse, legal violence, street violence, economic discrimination and 

personal boycotts” (Connell, Masculinities 78). For heterosexuality is the foremost 

common denotation of dominant masculinity, gay men often face the risk of illegitimacy 

both in interpersonal and political stances. On a personal level, gay men confront blatant 

disregard from heterosexual men and become the objects of violence since they are 

regarded as a direct threat to heterosexual men’s masculinity. 

 

Other than the subordination of peculiar sexual orientations, race, ethnicity, class, and 

age appear to be potentially decisive factors in gender relations. Traditional gender 

studies often foreground the oppression of women in gendered societies wherein men are 

always privileged. However, enquiries about men as gendered beings help unveil some 



21 
 

 

men’s ascendency over other men. Some men are ostracised in masculine hierarchies 

owing to their marginal identities compared to dominant identity constructions. In this 

regard, Connell designates marginalised masculinity as a category of men which 

accentuates “gender forms produced in exploited or oppressed groups such as ethnic 

minorities, which may share many features with hegemonic masculinity but are socially 

de-authorized” (The Men and the Boys 30-31). Masculine qualities of the marginalised 

men are trivialised regarding their ethnicity, race, or age, as they are incompatible with 

dominant features of hegemonic masculinity. As seen in Connell’s definition, hegemonic 

norms of masculinity are eager to refute any marginalisation. Either elderly, black, rural, 

working-class, or Irish masculinities in this regard might provide a brighter picture of 

distinct enactments of marginalised masculinities pertinent to hegemonic masculinity 

norms in a wide variety of contexts. 

 

Raewyn Connell’s proposal for analysing men as gendered beings in varied typologies 

opened novel ways to recognise gender relations in general and men’s enduring power 

among these relations in particular. Assuming men as gendered beings and scrutinising 

diverse groups of men in distinct contexts have provided a theoretical frame to 

deconstruct historical and contextual meanings of masculinities. However, Connell’s 

formulations, to be more precise, her masculinity typologies to examine men’s 

domination over women and other men have been contested in some ways by particular 

profeminist academics and theoreticians. Stephen Whitehead, for instance, suspects the 

legitimacy of the term hegemonic masculinity as it is “weakened once we stress the 

fluidity, contingency, and multiplicity of masculinities and identities” (“Hegemonic 

Masculinity Revisited” 58). To Whitehead, the term remains inefficient in shedding light 

upon “the complex patterns of inculcation and resistance which constitute everyday social 

interaction” (“Hegemonic Masculinity Revisited” 58). Men’s distinct practices in various 

hierarchies might be too complicated to be categorised. He also draws attention to the 

abundance of misinterpretations in diverse disciplines, which may result in the 

oversimplification of Gramscian hegemony that deserves more sophisticated references. 

 



22 
 

 

In other respects, Jeff Hearn pinpoints that the categorisation of masculinity is flawed 

because masculinity typologies necessarily result in stable definitions. He agrees that 

hegemony might help inspect men critically. Yet, a greater focus should be made on 

men’s practices in distinct contexts, as he notes that “the concept has generally been 

employed in too restricted a way; the focus on masculinity is too narrow. Instead, it is 

time to go back from masculinity to men, to examine the hegemony of men and about 

men” (“From Hegemonic Masculinity” 59). More importantly, Hern pinpoints the risk of 

overshadowing men’s harmful practices in class relations as well as gender hierarchies 

and “suggest[s] a greater attention to the social construction of the systems of 

differentiations of men and men’s practices rather than the social construction of 

particular ‘forms’ of men, as masculinities” (“From Hegemonic Masculinity” 60). 

 

Finally, Demetrakis Z. Demetriou notifies that Connell’s masculinity categorisations 

unintentionally create a duality between hegemonic and non-hegemonic masculinities. 

As the original formulation repeatedly foregrounds the idea that hegemonic masculinity 

is (re)arranged or (re)configured to impose upon femininities and other masculinities, the 

indispensable impact of non-hegemonic masculinities on hegemonic masculinity goes 

unnoticed, as they are “constructed as a dualism, as two distinct and clearly differentiated 

configurations of practice” (Demetriou, “Connell’s Concept” 347). Hence, separate 

interrogations or challenges towards Connell’s methodology could be assembled in five 

main points concerning the underlying concept of masculinity: ostensible ambiguity of 

masculinity typologies, peculiarly hegemonic masculinity; possible dangers of reification 

of the idea; the construction and representation of the subject in gender relations; and 

finally, the pattern of gender relations in general. 

       

Thus, Raewyn Connell and James Messerschmidt reformulated some aspects of Connell’s 

critical masculinity theory and the concept of hegemonic masculinity in a co-authored 

article titled: “Hegemonic Masculinity: Rethinking the Concept” in 2005. In this article, 

Connell and Messerschmidt respond to major criticisms made towards Connell’s previous 

formulations of gender, power, and masculinity typologies on men and masculinities and 

misuses of the concepts Connell had offered to be interrogated. Although this article 



23 
 

 

mostly issued inappropriate or misleading counterarguments, they also found few 

relevant points and highlighted the need for reformulation and amplification. They 

decided to discard two features of the previous formulation that emphasise “a too-simple 

model of the social relations surrounding hegemonic masculinities” (Connell and 

Messerschmidt 846), referring to a misleading attempt to “locate all masculinities [and 

femininities] in terms of a single pattern of power, the global dominance of men over 

women” (Connell and Messerschmidt 846) and some possible treats that might be posed 

by “the appeal to psychoanalytic ideas about unconscious motivation” (Connell and 

Messerschmidt 847). Hence, they amplified their gender theory and offered novel areas 

to empower research on men and masculinities by focusing more on gender hierarchy 

(reciprocal relations among distinct men, women, and other men), the geography of 

masculinities (highlighting the contemporary importance of local, regional, global 

masculinities), social embodiment, and the dynamics of masculinities.   

 

Ultimately, Connell has paved the way for analysing men as gendered beings, and her 

theorisation implemented novel enquiries on gender and power. It is put forward how 

most men historically achieved privilege in gender hierarchies and legitimated their 

power through consent at the intersection of varied contexts. Perpetuating their power 

over women and children, most men have institutionalised patriarchal norms and values 

based on violence, domination, and structural inequalities. However, affinities, conflicts, 

struggles, combats, agonies, violence, and peculiar relations among different men have 

been significant for enquiries into men as gendered beings. 

 

Accordingly, it is argued that a single man’s masculinity practices could simultaneously 

reveal the qualities of peculiar masculinity typologies. Because masculinities denote 

neither a priori biological reality nor fixed categorisations, they have often been 

constructed around artificial traits and behaviours to be achieved by men. Ideological 

(re)configurations repeatedly maintain fluid masculinity traits, and men’s engagement 

with these (re)produced masculinity practices reveals political reverberations in any 

personal and public space. Any man might reflect hegemonic masculinity practices as a 

ruling father at home; he might also be complicit in his attitudes towards a particular 



24 
 

 

political stance or subordinated by his physical weakness, bodily defect, age, sexual 

orientation, and also marginalised by his race or economic condition. As seen from the 

examples, it is crucial to denote that neither masculinity typologies nor particular men’s 

associations with these categorisations are stable. They often intermingle, and 

intersectional relations constantly reproduce norms of hegemonic masculinity in distinct 

hierarchies. 

 

Hierarchies among men are determined in that men must prove their ‘manhood’ to other 

men to (re)place themselves in social strata. To prove their ‘manhood’, men, 

predominantly heterosexual men, need to (re)reproduce and legitimise particular 

masculinity practices that are associated with maleness. Individual strength, bodily 

power, resistance, endurance, sexual virility, and toughness are idealised traits of 

heterosexual masculinities. Because traditional manhood stands for the opposite values 

attributed to women, despite peculiar conditions defined by class, race, ethnicity, 

sexuality or age, men ‘become men’ so long as they manage to differ from women in their 

struggle to prove their maleness. Any personal traits that vaguely imply unmasculine 

qualities might recall subordination, as implications of being ‘unmanly’ are prone to 

symbolic assimilation to femininity. These men are in need of approval from other men 

regarding their social, political, and economic power and sexual virility. In this context, 

heterosexual men tend to subordinate non-binary men due to their association with 

femininity. The closer men get to the assumed qualities of gayness and femininity in the 

traditional perception, the more subordinated they are pinpointed in gender hierarchy due 

to ongoing homophobia, which has wider political reverberations among contemporary 

societies. 

 

Homophobia has broader connotations than a means for the oppression of sexual 

minorities. It implicates a significant way of regulating male relations in a political 

context. Often, homophobia is, in political stance, tactlessly used as a weapon and 

assuredly politicised as a means of adequate strategy by politicians and decision-making 

mechanisms either to consolidate their power or legitimate an invasion when 

socioeconomic stability is at stake in specific contexts. At times when political agenda is 



25 
 

 

requisite for national solidarity, at times when crises and distress peak, gayness is defined 

as a collective weakness to be defeated in order not to weaken traditional masculinity. 

For instance, particularly in the Cold War era under McCarthy’s presidency in the United 

States, hate crimes reached their apexes due to continuous propaganda against gay men, 

prompted as part of the American ‘lavender scare’15, and homophobia turned into a 

‘witch-hunting’ in security forces as gayness was nothing but a Soviet plague invading 

modern, western communities. 

 

Following the USA’s political pressure, the British government was constrained to 

introduce compulsory identity vetting for civil servants before employment during the 

1980s. Hence, homophobia became a helpful tool for Margaret Thatcher to empower her 

conservative politics when Britain struggled with mega social and economic problems 

such as record-breaking unemployment rates, migration boom, and rocketing divorce 

rates. Official campaigns fed the hatred and hostility nurtured towards gay men and other 

minorities. These campaigns were a part of the Conservative Family Campaign, a bastion 

of male privilege under the heterosexual politics of Thatcherite Britain16. Thus, 

masculinity and the image of the ideal man and men as fathers have gained a peculiar 

meaning during the Thatcher era due to the special prominence given to the family 

institution. Thatcher’s strict emphasis on the importance of families and men’s roles 

therein remarks a quite apparent reference to a call for a turn to Victorian values in parallel 

with the period’s influential motto of ‘back to basics’, denoting a serious wish to 

 
15 ‘The term coined and popularised by the American historian David K. Johnson. In his eponymous book, 
The Lavender Scare: The Cold War Persecution of Gays and Lesbians in the Federal Government (2004), 
Johnson documents the anti-homosexual campaign that began in the USA in the 1950s. Throughout the 
period, a collective fear was prompted by the State officers and the media claiming that many Soviet agents 
were deciphered in government, some of whom were homosexuals. Consequently, a witch-hunt 
commenced, and thousands of officers were persecuted. At times, homophobia easily transformed into anti-
communist propaganda, when McCarthy defined it as “the psychological maladjustment that led people to 
communism” (Johnson 16). 
 
16 Martin Durham lays then-contemporary discussions about homosexuality and its possible sanctions held 
in the Parliament and the media in the chapter titled “The Thatcher Government and the Policing of 
Sexuality” (1991). And also, for further details, see Matthew Waites’ article “Homosexuality and the New 
Right: The Legacy of the 1980s for New Delineations of Homophobia” (2000). 
https://www.socresonline.org.uk/5/1/waites.html  
                                                       . 



26 
 

 

reconstruct the ‘flawed morals’ of the British society. If the heterosexual family man is 

the idealised form of manhood, homosexual men should be subordinated. 

 

Another significant determinant factor in gender relations is race. “Gender and race”, 

Reeser suggests, “are so often connected and dependent on each other that it is difficult 

to talk about one without talking about the other” (Masculinities in Theory 161). 

Nevertheless, the relationship between gender and race had not been a significant subject 

for critical enquiries until the third wave of feminism paved the way towards 

problematising the condition of racialised women. Urging attention to how distinct 

women’s experiences of gender differ due to their race, bell hooks, for example, 

foregrounded that women of colour could not benefit from white women’s feminist 

achievements since their segregation begins with their race. White men and men of colour 

have dominated them simultaneously (Ain’t I A Woman 4-5). Furthermore, Kimberly 

Crenshaw highlighted the importance of paying attention to different forms of inequality 

women, particularly black women, have faced. Coining the term ‘intersectionality’, 

Crenshaw argues that black women often “experience double discrimination” (149), as 

they sometimes suffer from segregation the same way white women do. In another 

context, they are objectified in the same way as black men. The concept of 

intersectionality, therefore, has influenced feminist interrogations by broadening their 

scope to include the experiences of marginalised groups of women, as struggles for 

gender equality tend to be more inclusive and better able to challenge systems of 

oppression. It is thus emphasised that inequalities based on race and gender continuously 

intersect and exacerbate each other.  

 

Before third-wave feminism’s critical interest, men of colour were not frequently 

considered subjects for debate regarding their masculinity practices and attitudes towards 

women, children, and other men. These men and their masculinity practices remained 

hidden in plain sight for a long time. Intersections of gender, race, and power lay bare 

how some men have historically tended to assume supremacy over other men by 

marginalisation. In a larger historical and social context, black men have often been 

marginalised by white men and remained disadvantaged in achieving the idealised norms 



27 
 

 

of hegemonic masculinity due to the ‘visibility’ of their race. Because masculinity has 

often been defined as ‘white’ by the white, “any hegemony or advantage assigned to 

masculinity can be attributed to the category of whiteness” (Reeser, Mascul1n1t1es 1n 

Theory 145). Defining themselves superior, the white has marginalised men of colour 

through economic and political means and deliberately limited their access to financial 

resources and political power since the very beginning of colonisation17.  

 

To save their geographic, economic, social and, therefore, political privileges, the white 

has long assumed supremacy over men of colour by marginalising them in multiple ways. 

White supremacy has been perpetuated with stereotyping, focusing mainly on their 

bodies. Stereotyping through the physical representation of men of colour in mass media 

has often been pejorative and involved explicit discrimination. The constructed images 

of these men imply physicality, strength, and sporting and sexual prowess and enable “a 

site for European fantasies about black male sexuality” (Westwood 57). Hence, the heavy 

emphasis on men of colour’s bodies in visual media such as films, TV serials, 

commercials, and sports events maintains the implementation of sexual deviancy and 

reverberates the repercussions of the ongoing colonial phantasy of the Western world. 

 

It is suggested that the animosity between polarised communities causes masculine 

anxiety, as both parties see each other as threatening their masculinity. Pejorative 

representations of black male bodies evoke fear and hate towards these ‘othered’ men that 

accelerate in specific times and settings. Particularly in Thatcherite England, when 

unemployment rates increased, the income gap between the rich and the poor peaked; 

when the HIV/AIDS pandemic became a crucial agenda, the flow of immigrants, 

 
17 In the United States, black men’s alleged marginalisation could not be fully apprehended unless the 
history of colonisation and slavery was inspected—white men’s hegemony over men of colour results from 
several political and economic practices. As an imposed ideology, white supremacy demonised men of 
colour who internalised their ‘inability’ to become ‘true patriarchs’ in time. Walter Allen thoroughly 
documents how whiteness is invented in particular states such as Virginia and Maryland so that sugar 
plantations and cotton fields could be financially controlled for the benefit of the colonisers (qtd in 
Armengol, “Past, Present and Future” 67). Consequently, the black has been symbolically ‘feminised’ and 
‘infantilised’ by the white through physical violence and cultural hegemony. For instance, bell hooks, in 
her influential book titled Black Look: Race and Representation, demonstrates how cultural materials such 
as TV serials, commercials, pop songs and singers amplified the black demonising in various contexts. For 
further arguments on black masculinity in the context of the United States, see Robert Staples’ book 
Exploring Black Masculinity (2006). 



28 
 

 

especially immigrants from African and Carribean origins, began to be questioned. In a 

socio-political context wherein the new right demonised people of colour by multiple 

nationalistic discourses, xenophobia was fed, and these groups were depicted as a direct 

threat to the establishment. At the intersection of sexual politics and race, the black 

community was collectively marginalised as the primary cause of these flaws. The 

political tension and dominant discourse of blame have resulted in reciprocal hatred and 

antagonism between the nationalist white men and men of colour.  

 

As a result, many men of colour assumed novel constructed traits of masculinities, namely 

black masculinities, denoting a variety of responses and objections to the hegemony of 

white supremacy and its emasculating practices. For example, many enslaved men of 

colour would engage in “acts of violence against their wives and children as well as 

against other male slaves” (Orelus 70). Remaining powerless and marginalised under the 

violent rule of the white, men of colour also perpetuate violence and discrimination 

against women, children, and other men to partake of peculiar hegemonic masculinity 

traits. For this group of men, fashioning dominant, violent, and authoritarian masculinity 

traits over women and other men helped them prove their manhood as a response to their 

historical marginalisation and emasculation by the whites. They reflect a particular 

tendency to reaffirm masculinity, as their masculinity practices become more complicated 

when they emulate broader implications of contemporary masculinity ideals. 

 

Marginalising the ‘Other’ has never been limited to men of colour in Britain. It also 

includes systematic bias and segregation historically impelled to the Irish. When cultural, 

social, political, and economic relationships between Ireland and Britain are investigated, 

one might discern that the former has been subordinated to the latter with a perceived 

inferiority in various spheres of life. Although Irish men can generally benefit from the 

white men’s privileges in gender hierarchy, in particular, they have often been 

marginalised by the English men’s historical domination. As can be seen in the colonial 

history of Ireland, Irish men were stereotyped as not ‘manly’ enough to rule their own 

country since manliness implied some essential qualities, such as authority, power, 

reason, and rationality.  

 



29 
 

 

Prevailing ethnic and sectarian differences between the dominating English and the 

dominated Irish are perpetuated through negative stereotypes to prompt the Anglo-Irish 

subject to be emasculated in popular culture and media representations. It is claimed that 

there have been fundamental political and economic reasons for rendering the Irish in 

negative stereotyping. Soon after the massive industrialisation of England, many 

immigrants moved to urban cities and smaller towns as a labour force, among which the 

Irish were often significant in number. These immigrants were of grave importance for 

the infrastructure of Britain in terms of housing, construction, road building, 

transportation, and mining. They worked in cotton mills, factories, and agriculture, and 

often engaged in domestic issues18.  

 

Such a massive migration brought about inevitable consequences for the Irish as the 

British found the opportunity to degrade their historical colony, thereby “a wide range of 

cultural markers of difference juxtaposed the dirtiness, drunkenness, laziness and 

violence of the Irish with the purity, industriousness and civilisation of the settled 

English” (Mac an Ghaill and Haywood 145). Nevertheless, soon after the Troubles, when 

a peace agreement, namely the Good Friday Agreement between the Republicans, the 

Unionists, and the British, was signed in 1998, a constant shift in representation of the 

Irish was observed, and Irishness became more visible and seemingly freed from negative 

stereotyping in British society. Apart from the shifting representations of Irish men in 

England, it is argued that they managed to hide from the critical gaze in Ireland for a long 

time. However, interrogations of Irish men and masculinities accelerated throughout the 

last two decades. Typical among such enquiries, it has been critically put forward that the 

construction of hegemonic masculinities in Ireland has depended more on three 

fundamental factors: land, national identity, and Catholicism. 

 
18 Donald M. MacRaild documents the history of Irish migration to Britain from the mid-eighteenth century 
to the first decades of the twentieth century. In his full-length book, MacRaild digs into the economic, 
political, religious, and sectarian reasons behind the motivation of Irish migration. The Irish contributed to 
distinct areas of economic and cultural progress in Britain, and “without Irish settlers, the great conurbations 
of industrial Britain would still have been miserable and unhealthy places to live and work” (Irish Migrants 
in Modern Britain, 1750-1922 156). For the post-war condition of the Irish in Britain, also see Edna 
Delaney’s The Irish in Post-War Britain (1999), wherein she revolves around the theme of leaving home 
and adaptation of the Irish settlers to Britain as well as the ongoing conflicts between the Irish and the 
British in the post-colonial context. 



30 
 

 

As it is widely accepted, being dependent on the land is a recurrent theme in Irish culture. 

The economic well-being of colonised Ireland has long relied on the soil, which has many 

effects on traditional Irish masculinity. This type of masculinity recurs among men who 

relate to the land and has broader implications, such as celebrating family life, morality, 

and farm work. It is emphasised that being a dexterous farmer had been a source of male 

pride and prestige for the traditional Irish men. Symbolised by “[t]he cult of the ‘hard 

man’” (Bairner 128), Irish farmers, in their representation, appeared to have shaped their 

land and their soil; in return, they have been shaped by their land. 

 

Other than the landscape, Catholicism has also been a prevalent factor in the construction 

of Irish masculinities and retained the cult of the ‘hard man’. The highly conservative 

politics and moral teachings of the Roman Catholic church have had a profound influence 

on Irish society and culture, as it constantly (re)shapes state institutions as well as 

everyday practices of the Irish (Dillon 114-115; Mac an Ghaill and Haywood 151; Liston 

203; Quilty 51). More precisely, the Catholic church has interfered directly with personal 

issues such as sexualities, reproduction, marriage, and domestic roles for a long time. The 

strict impositions of moral values by the Catholic church made the people of Ireland 

remain silent about sex. Even among husbands and wives, sex was not explicitly 

mentioned. Various sanctions were made to control sexual behaviours. Associating its 

primary aim with reproduction, sex for pleasure is regarded as immoral, and thus, 

contraception has been restricted by the Catholic church. 

 

The popularity of the Catholic church has begun to fade away, not demised, though, as a 

result of a significant loss of faith in the morals of this institution. The disclosure of 

numerous child abuse scandals accelerated the decadence of faith in the Catholic church. 

Heavy emphasis was placed on the correlation between celibate priests and child abuse 

in mass media, and discussions peaked when the famous scandal, the Father Brendan 

Smyth affair, broke19. The mutual consensus after public discussions was that the child 

 
19 Brendan Smyth, the Catholic priest, was revealed to have abused seventeen children for thirty years after 
a successful investigation. Nonetheless, it was later disclosed that these child abuse issues had already been 
known yet covered by the media with the help of the state. These media disclosures generated “a profound 
crisis in the Catholic Church and raised doubts about the trustworthiness of priests and the ability of the 
 



31 
 

 

abuse in the Catholic church might have been caused by the mandatory requirement of 

celibacy for the priest since men, due to their taken-for-granted ‘biological fact’, had to 

have sexual intercourse. Because most church offenders are heterosexual, married men, 

public debates and discourses to stop abuse reinforced the necessity of having legal sex, 

promoting the ‘benefits’ of marriage for all men. The media projection of celibate 

masculinity as dangerous implied married men were safe, and thus, the image of the ‘good 

father’20 dominated the Irish understanding of ideal masculinity and therefore helped 

marginalisation of single men. 

 

On the other hand, simultaneous with the above-mentioned public debates regarding the 

decadence of the Catholic church, novel constructions of masculinities emerged soon 

after the years between 1960-1990, the period called the Celtic Tiger for Ireland. The 

Celtic Tiger period was a turning point when Ireland began to reach economic prosperity, 

and many Irish men, particularly the younger generation, mobilised. During and soon 

after the Celtic Tiger period, most men who used to live outside Ireland began to migrate 

back and work outside the land owing to new foreign investments and job opportunities. 

Hence, the image of more self-confident and economically independent men became 

prevalent, the historical link between traditional Irish masculinity and the land was 

broken, and the idea of the ‘hard man’ gradually faded. 

 

Mobilisation of the younger generation, innovations in work areas, and variations in 

occupations reinforced an unprecedented change in normative gender relations since 

women who used to be precluded by the Church began to participate in paid jobs, became 

more visible in the public domain, and contributed to family income. Dual income in 

families transformed the traditional family type, and younger men necessarily “forged 

new, more flexible masculine identities” (Frosh et al. 2). These developments in 

 
state to prevent child” (Ferguson, “The Paedophile Priest, 247). Soon after the scandal, the government was 
broken down. 
 
20 For further details, see Richard Collier’s article “Waiting Till Father Gets Home: Reconstruction of 
Fatherhood in Family Law” (1995). In his article, Collier indicates that the politics of ‘good father’ in the 
1990s is reminiscent of ‘back to basics’ politics. The safeness of fatherh