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Transgender or non-binary (TGNB) people are often present as protagonists of pornographic material. This study is the first to consider TGNB people as critical consumers of sexually explicit material. The sample included 212 self-identified TGNB individuals: 47.2% trans man/transmasculine, 15.6% trans woman/transfeminine and 37.3% non-binary. The online questionnaire consisted of a sociodemographic data collection, multiple-choice questions about preferences and habits concerning pornography, and open-ended questions about the sensations experienced when watching pornography, opinions on the representation of TGNB people in pornography, and their experience in watching pornographic videos with cisgender or TGNB protagonists. The answers were analyzed using the qualitative method of thematic analysis. We identified four themes that appeared across the responses: 1) heteronormativity and cisnormativity in pornography: the need for deconstructing the current cis-het-patriarchial normative and binary system, which dominates pornography except for the ethical porn industry, 2) cisgender pornography compared to TGNB pornography, 3) pleasurable sensations (e.g., identification and empowerment) associated with TGNB pornography, and 4) negative sensations (e.g., objectification and dysphoria) associated with TGNB pornography. Results are discussed in light of the objectification framework and the minority stress model.

This article examines how Pope Innocent III (1198–1216) and his curia used emotions to communicate the supreme authority of the pope through a gendered order of knowledge and feeling in letters. Innocent and his curia worked codes of masculinity into an emotional regime of excellence and spiritual possibility, one that excluded women and femininity and enabled the derogation of feminised forms of spiritual authority. Focusing on Innocent and his curia's use of sorrowful emotions, it traces how Innocent interpreted emotions evoked by earthly frustrations as feminine, and a threat to papal primacy and the authority of the exclusively male, clerical hierarchy on which it stood. Understanding how the pope did so helps us to make sense of how he guarded the papal office as the exclusive preserve of men, as well as how the practice of emotion shaped the communication of hegemonic masculine power in the Middle Ages.

The aim of this study is to analyze the formal and graphic elements around the hegemonic masculinities and femininities of the packaging of industrial bakery and biscuit products aimed at children and young people. A content analysis was conducted on 10 of the most widely consumed brands of industrial bakery and biscuit products in Spain and widely present on the international market. In addition, a scale of dominant masculinity was developed as a tool to analyze the most egalitarian narratives on the packaging. The results suggest that there are unequal narratives linked to hegemonic masculinity and femininity. The use of blue and yellow, the latter not having a traditional link to masculinity, is related to men in terms of aggressiveness and bravery stereotypes. The women represented on packaging with these same colours are presented in terms of sympathy or kindness, as well as stereotypes connected to beauty. The products contain homogeneous stereotypes and are associated more with men than with women. However, 2 out of 10 brands do not insert characters linked to sexual attributes or gender stereotypes. Therefore, our findings suggest that hegemonic gender scripts are inscribed on packaging less obviously than in other traditional media. The work was supported by the University of Alicante (Vice Rectorate for Research) [Aii20-07]; Valencian Regional Ministry of Innovation, Universities, Science and Digital Society [ACIF/2021/119]; AICO, Generalitat Valenciana (2022- 2024) [CIAICO/2021/019].

Hugh Grant’s career and persona have undergone a cultural, personal, and professional shift since the 2010s. During a period of semi-hiatus from acting, Grant became associated with politics as he campaigned for the protection of privacy and opposed Brexit. At the same time, his image has been reshaped through fatherhood, often depicted by the press as the reason behind his ‘comeback’. Since Florence Foster Jenkins in 2016, he has turned towards more ‘serious’ roles and distanced himself from his romcom persona. Focusing on his most recent roles in film and television, this article analyses the star’s performances and dissects the ambiguities and tensions at play in Grant’s ageing white ‘English’ upper-class image. Although inextricably associated with the romantic genre for years, I suggest that Grant’s acting style and persona are more in a state of perpetual flux, attached to the past yet increasingly layered with enjoyment for the craft as he ages. At the intersection of gender, ageing and star studies, this article shows how an ageing persona is (re-)established on screen, and how Grant’s characters within his films and television series might render a different image of white, privileged, English masculinity in contemporary times.

The experiences of heterosexual men with paraplegia who are the victims of intimate partner violence remains an under-researched area. This article responds to the call for more research and offers an analysis of the narratives of five working-class coloured men in Cape Town, South Africa, who acquired spinal cord injuries and then fell victim to intimate partner violence. Narrative interviews were conducted with men and their wives. Drawing on Tarzia’s notion of the ‘invisible impacts of intimate partner violence’, narrative analysis explored the meanings and complexities involved in (re)claiming a sense of identity and sexual intimacy among these men, after their experiences of intimate partner violence. In many cases, the abuse was levelled against them as acts of revenge for having previously been violent non-disabled men. Wives’ narratives show nuances that complement the narratives of their partners as they too reflect on what it means to hold a space of safety, emotional stability, intimacy, love, and care for a paralysed husband, after the prior experience of intimate partner violence. Findings provide insight into ways of surviving intimate partner violence and (re)building healthy sexual relationships. At the intersection of intimate partner violence, disability and masculinity, the process of self-healing and (re)building satisfying intimate relations coexists with breaking the silence surrounding intimate partner violence.

The Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, is considered to be one example of the rise of populism during the 2010s in Europe. During the decade that he has been in government, Hungary has been a forerunner in terms of democratic decline. In parallel, throughout this period, political communication has increasingly shifted online, and politicians are now actively using social media to gain political capital. Despite the growing literature on online political communication, visual political communication remains underrepresented. Orban's case offers a unique opportunity to examine what authoritarian populism and maintenance of illiberalism look like when a regime has been in power for more than 10 years. Using visual discourse analysis, we analyzed 131 visuals of Viktor Orban's Instagram from 2019. We argue that by using the symbols of nationalism and masculinity, Orban attempts to embody the features of an "ordinary man" and also simultaneously conveys statesmanship through outlining "us" in ethno-nationalistic terms, in an effort to strengthen his party's message, renew its hegemonic position, and to remain in power. This is in stark contrast to the communication of the Hungarian government, which relies heavily on "othering" and the construction of "them" in legacy and social media.

Refereed/Peer-reviewed Young men from disadvantaged contexts are the least likely to attend university in Australia; furthermore, when they do attend, they are likely to struggle. This article draws on empirical data documenting the aspirations and resilience of first-in-family young men in Australian higher education, with the aim of nuancing their classed experience of university. Drawing on an exploratory longitudinal study (n = 42) and adopting a mixed method approach, we use the 25-item Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC) and semi-structured interviews over a three-year period to explore changes in resilience of first-in-family men from the age of 17 to 20. The mixed-method approach employed in this study allows us to draw connections between the participants’ subjective experience of resilience and the more objective measures of resilience as captured by the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, a psychometrically sound and validated instrument. Quantitative analyses of data enable us to document the trends in resilience over time for different groups of first-in-family men, while qualitative data provide insights structured around three key themes: independence and isolation; managing and adjusting; and using support structures. The article draws on analysis across these data to consider the participants’ perceptions of their resilience, and how these perceptions change in reference to their experience, in order to paint a more nuanced picture of first-in-family men’s classed experience of higher education.

On a longitudinal sample of 181 emerging adult men (iM/isubiage/i/sub = 19.36,iSD/isubiage/i/sub = 1.48), we analyzed how diverse socializing agents (fathers, male peers, magazines, music videos, TV dramas, and TV sitcoms) related to adherence to masculine norms, and how norm adherence related to men's interpersonal sexual cognitions and behaviors (romantic relationship self-efficacy, sexual self-esteem, and alcohol-primed sexual encounters). We found that male peers, magazines, and music videos related to masculine norm adherence one year later, and that norm adherence predicted increased alcohol-primed sexual encounters. We followed this up with analyses investigating the role of specific masculine norms and found unique socialization and outcome paths for different masculine norms. For example, analyses indicated that male peers were positively related to norms of winning, power over women, playboy attitudes, and risk-taking, and that playboy attitudes, risk-taking, emotional control, and self-reliance predicted lower levels of romantic relationship self-efficacy. Interestingly, sitcom viewing related to lower adherence to masculine norms including heterosexual presentation and having power over women. Findings identify the unique influence of male peers, magazines, and music videos on young men's sexual cognitions and behaviors and highlight how combining different socialization agents in one model is key to identifying these unique patterns of socialization and their consequences.

Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). This article draws on data from a small qualitative study of men on care-based degree pathways in one university in England. There is little research that specifically considers the experiences of working-class men on these courses. The article explores aspects of men’s experiences and responses to so-called ‘active learning’. It considers knowledge in care-pathway pedagogy and how students on these programmes are enabled to draw on both disciplinary and practice-knowledge. The article argues that active learning must go beyond a dominant preoccupation with self-development to initiate students into disciplinary knowledge appropriately recontextualised for their practice careers. Classed and gendered classrooms are an example of where this might occur. Implications for access and participation and for teaching and learning on care pathways are identified. University of Winchester Teaching and Learning Innovation Fund and the Access and Participation Team.

This article deals with the construction of militarised masculinity of disabled veterans in the interplay of official identity and embodied everyday experience in the context of an ongoing internal...

Past work has shown that men’s gender identities often lead them to eschew household labour in an attempt to shore up threatened masculinity. As the COVID-19 pandemic has lead to both enormous financial disruption and high levels of stress among the population, we expect these patterns to be exacerbated. We focus on the helping children with virtual school activities, as it is a uniquely stressful form of household labour, and use two studies, using different techniques and datasets, to show that among men subjected to economic stress, higher levels of stress are associated with a lower likelihood of helping with virtual school activities. Ramifications of this for both individual stress levels and for societal outcomes are discussed, as are the disproportionate impact of these effects on members of racial and ethnic minority groups, who are already subject to high stress levels. Keywords: COVID;masculinity;household labour;childcare;stress [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Journal for Cultural Research is the property of Routledge and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

School playgrounds are critical arenas wherein children’s gender performances unfold, and ‘games’ of gender subordination or domination transpire. Theoretically predicated on Butlerian and Baradian gender performativity approaches, this qualitative study analyses how children negotiate and perform gender, exploring the material-discursive effects of human and non-human agents (e.g. football, sartorial elements) in their intra-actions with the body. Data were collected through observations and semi-structured interviews with 80 pupils from two Athenian elementary schools. Findings showed that playgrounds were dichotomised into rigid gender zones, and the children reaffirmed their gender allegiances by forming gender-homogeneous playgroups and engaging in diametrical activities. Gender-zone transgressions were frequent, albeit with high social and emotional cost, especially for boys who were uninterested in football and lacked athletic dexterity. Finally, the results highlighted the effects of material-discursive forces in gender identity development and, specifically, how ‘successful’ masculinity, girly femininity, sissies, and tomboys emerged through the material-discursive intra-actions of playgrounds, bodies, football, and heteronormative discourses.

Veganism’s visibility has soared in recent years. Contemporary veganism has built a trident approach of outreach that emphasises health benefits, ethical concerns about animals, and environmentally...

Surf lifesaving in Australia is an iconic community volunteer service. Surf lifesaving members must attain their bronze medallion, which includes fundamental first aid and cardiopulmonary resuscita...

Drawing on interviews we explore the centrality of belonging to rural places, embedded within time, in shaping life as a male reader, regardless of country of origin, or generation. Place theory explored the assemblages of spaces important for 6 boys (10–11 year-olds) from Australia and 6 men (25 year-olds and 60 year-olds) from Sweden in their reader identities. Findings illustrate how assemblages of geography, resourcing, relationships with the land, and desires to connect to broader cultural affinity spaces become ingrained for males in rural places and distinguish them from working class males in metropolitan contexts. Classroom experiences related to ‘academic reading’ became embodied in non-reader identities and shaped life as a reader through the lifespan, while peer group cultures and connections to place offered alternative spaces to engage with reading a range of texts related to cultural life worlds with a shared sense of meaning, purpose, and value.

Studies exploring bullying in sport psychology remain relatively limited despite various media reports of the abusive practice of some professional football coaches. This research explores coaches’ views of bullying in professional football academies and how it is framed in relation to banter. Five professional football coaches were interviewed using a semi-structured interview guide. The methodology and analysis were guided by interpretative phenomenological analysis. Coaches highlighted key components which identify bullying in professional football environments, such as: intent to harm; frequency of behaviour; and an imbalance of power. Coaches also highlighted different individual and contextual factors which separated bullying from banter. These included: individual differences; unintentional behaviour; immaturity; and the masculinity of the football culture. These findings provide an important extension to the bullying literature in sport by highlighting coaches’ own perspectives on this concept within the professional football context. The findings also illustrate the subtle nuances through which coaches separate bullying from banter. As such, important applied implications are discussed for the development of coach education programmes to raise greater awareness around these concepts as well as the potential consequences of bullying and banter on player welfare in professional football.

Drawing on Raewyn Connell’s theoretical notion of hegemonic masculinity, this study examines relations between masculinity and suicide attempts in Bangladesh. In-depth interviews were conducted wit...

In this article, I revisit J.C. Flugel’s conception of the “Great Masculine Renunciation” and its lasting effect on fashion scholarship. Coined in Flugel’s 1930 book The Psychology of Clothes, the ...

Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart narrates the contestations of performing masculinity in precolonial Nigeria. Employing ideas by Michael Slote and Judith Butler, I focus on Nwoye’s character to sh...

Spatial mobility is often considered on large geographical scales: people move from distant villages to global cities, they migrate from one country to the next, or even to a whole new continent. S...

This article explores the importance of masculinity in the rehabilitation experience of members of the Royal Air Force who were facially disfigured during the Second World War. Other historical wor...

The environmental instability that marked the WWII drought profoundly shaped human lives. Integrating gender and environmental history, this article investigates the emotional, sensory and social d...

The psychological mechanisms connecting shame and anger among men remain underexplored. This study aimed to understand the potential roles of psychological distress and alexithymia in this pathway, both in the form of difficulty identifying and describing one's feelings. Self-report measures were completed by 1,000 men (age mean = 49.6 years; range = 19-86 years). Conditional process analysis investigated a moderated mediation effect to determine whether men's distress mediated the relationship between shame and anger, and whether this effect differed according to severity and type of alexithymia. Findings indicated moderated mediation, with psychological distress a significant mediator in the association between shame and anger. Furthermore, difficulties describing feelings (but not identifying feelings) moderated the relationship between shame and psychological distress. Men's shame can be expressed via anger when experiencing psychological distress, and the inability to express one's feelings exacerbates this pathway. Clinical and public health avenues to reduce the impact of alexithymia are discussed.Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00223980.2021.1977598 .

In this paper, we argue that the geek entrepreneur is a new hegemonic masculine formation superseding the macho formation exemplified by John Wayne and the global business masculinity proposed as h...

The neologism “toxic” masculinity has sparked debate in recent years over the negative masculine behaviours associated with hegemonic ideals. The rise of Donald Trump, the #MeToo movement and shavi...

In this paper, findings from an investigation into the gender imbalance in swim coaching in Australia, particularly at the higher levels of accreditation, are reported. Stories of the experience of two elite female swim coaches were analysed with reference to the concept of hegemonic masculinity. Analysis found that some male coaches and attendants to the swimming culture use literal and ideological force, including differentiation, direct control, and trivialisation to enact hegemony and to (re)create a gendered order. The findings suggest that without intervention and (re)education, this ideology will remain uncontested, will continue to inform the practice of coaches in the field, and will remain deeply entrenched in the system of values of the sport’s organising body and the federal funding organisation for sports in Australia.

This article investigates German football fans’ attitudes towards homosexuality. Drawing on an anonymous online survey with 212 Germans football fans, this article is the first to empirically investigate attitudes towards homosexuality in German football. Contrary to ongoing claims that German football remains hostile to sexual minorities, 95% of respondents were supportive of same-sex social and legal rights, while 81% espoused support for an ‘out’ gay male professional player. Despite this, however, 90% also believed that homophobia was still a major problem in German football, as evidenced by its hypermasculine environment, lack of out players and the prominence of homosexually themed language at events. While the presence of this language has previously been argued as evidence of pure, undiluted homophobia this research highlights the complexity of this language, and supports calls to recognise intent, context, and effect in the utility of homosexually themed language. This research develops existing work on equality, diversity and inclusion in the context of leisure and fandom. It provides further evidence that narratives regarding sport’s intolerance of homosexuality are outdated. Findings are more progressive than other research on German sport and confirm that German football has become more acceptant of the idea of inclusive masculinities.

The role of the “wounded healer” can have positive effects for former offenders as regards desistance and social (re)integration; however, research focusing on wounded healing/peer mentoring from a...

This article explores the potential for the field of popular geopolitics of close attention to the form and structure of instrumental film music. Specifically, it analyses the film scores for Super...

This essay reads evolving cultures of white American middle-class masculinity in tandem with ekphrastic symbolisms of domestic architecture in Anne Tyler’s A Spool of Blue Thread. It interprets the text as a subversive narrative where if hegemonic gender norms oppress women and children, they also often confine men primarily to the role of a provider and alienate them from their own shelters. Accordingly, by focusing on the profound connection between masculinity and domestic architecture in A Spool of Blue Thread, this essay argues that Tyler’s postmillennial novel systematically debunks several conventions associated with both gender norms and domestic spaces. In sum, this essay—with the help of masculinity studies and space theories—suggests that by establishing how preservation, husbandry, and care over cold rationality and calculated aggression are elemental to constructions of both ideal masculinity and ideal homes in the current millennium, A Spool of Blue Thread necessitates conversations on changeovers that create felicitous domestic spaces for both men and women.

Young women are increasingly engaging with digital sexual media, yet discussion of female desire remains absent or is vilified. This paper examines young women's online sexual expression, as seen through the eyes of both young men and young women. Based on small friendship group interviews conducted with 106 12-16-year-old young women and men in Aotearoa New Zealand, I analysed perceptions of young women's sexual expression. Framed through patriarchal ideals and underpinned by competitive masculinity, young women's sexuality and opportunities for sexual expression were policed and regulated. Young women were expected to be passive yet digitally heterosexy, but not slutty. Perceptions of young women's sexual expression continue to be framed within silencing and absent pleasure discourses, which ultimately compromises both young men and women's development of sexual subjectivities.

In 2020 the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) announced it was filing for bankruptcy after haemorrhaging money for years due to insurance and the legal costs associated with sexual abuse lawsuits. This s...

After the ‘big switch’ of the hyper-masculine action heroes of the eighties toward the more sensitive masculinity of the nineties (Jeffords 1993), the new millennium saw a resurgence of films and t...

In World War II, the British government called on all able-bodied men to join the forces and defend the country, enabling them to fulfill the role of ideal male in wartime. These men also performed...

Health technology is changing the way consumers engage with health professionals and their own well-being. Although digital solutions often focus on supplementing physical care, some have potential...

How do American men’s attitudes about masculinity differ across intersections of race/ethnicity, immigration status, and education? This paper uses the NSFG 2011-2019, a large survey (n = 17,944) r...

This study sought to explore and contextualise the man's role in antenatal services, and the barriers and strategies for engaging men in prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission (PMTCT). We conducted 143 interviews with pregnant and breastfeeding women, male partners, health workers and policy makers in Malawi and Zambia. We employed thematic and critical discourse analysis using the hegemonic masculinity perspective. We found that men's roles in PMTCT reflected hegemonic masculinities. As breadwinners, men supported their partners with material and financial resources. As decision makers, men were involved in decision making on the health of their partners. As social protectors, men supported their partners in accessing and adhering to antenatal care, HIV treatment and care. Barriers and challenges to male involvement in antenatal care were often the result of conflict between the clinic operating hours and men's working hours, the perception of antenatal care services as female spaces, and men's fear of HIV testing. Proposed strategies to increase male engagement in PMTCT included sensitising men about HIV and pregnancy; engaging leaders and employers, providing services outside working hours, and providing incentives. We conclude that men's role and participation in PMTCT services are an extension and adaptation of hegemonic masculinities.

Contemporary media discourse suggests that feminists exclusively understand boys and the experience of boyhood through such frameworks as ‘toxic masculinity’, positioning boys as the default inheri...

This article analyzes the gendered representation of military service in the German YouTube series Die Rekruten (DR) (The Recruits), a popular web series produced on behalf of the German armed forces (Bundeswehr) for recruitment purposes, which accompanies 12 navy recruits during their basic training. The article is situated within research on masculinity and the military, in particular military recruitment. It supplements current scholarship by studying a previously neglected case that is of particular interest given Germany’s antimilitarist culture, which should make military recruitment and military public relations more difficult. The article asks how military service is represented in DR, what its discursive effects are, and what role (if any) masculinity plays in this process. We find support for recent feminist research on military masculinities (including in military recruitment) that emphasizes ambiguity and contradiction. What distinguishes the construction of military masculinity in DR from, for example, recruitment advertisements in the United States or the United Kingdom is its markedly civil character. This not only broadens the military’s appeal for a more diverse audience but also increases the legitimacy of the military and its activities. It does so by concealing the violence that has for the past two decades also been a very real part of what the Bundeswehr does.

During South Africa’s apartheid era, the social and political ideology of Afrikaner nationalism Othered those who disrupted an idealised vision of white heteronormative Afrikaner masculinity. While...

The Parisian banlieue is often represented in cinema (in movies such as La Haine) and considered by academic literature (Austin, Fredette) as a space of hypermasculinity. However, in her analysis o...

The meaning and experience of masculinity differs across people and groups, and previous research has demonstrated that such differences are reflected in mental health outcomes. For gay Black men s...

Compelling evidence from three randomised controlled trials, which showed that voluntary medical male circumcision (VMMC) reduces HIV acquisition from women to men by up to 60%, led to WHO recommending that VMMC be implemented in 14 priority countries. As one of the priority countries, Eswatini aimed to reach 80% VMMC coverage among boys and men aged 10–49 years since programme inception in 2009. By the end of 2019, however, the country had reached a modest 40%. VMMC is intrinsically tied to perceptions of masculinity and male gender identity. Comprehending the role of context-specific masculinity as it relates to VMMC may contribute to our understanding of community attitudes towards VMMC and men’s decision-making. Drawing on focus group discussion data, this study aimed to explore the linkage between sexuality, masculinity and health interventions within Eswatini. Using critical discourse analysis, the study identified two discourses: sexuality, masculinity and circumcision, and income, masculinity, and circumcision. In the first discourse, participants constructed discursive linkages between circumcision as an adult and loss of penile sensitivity, decreased libido and sexual performance, and adverse events. The second discourse, income, masculinity, and circumcision located circumcision within the social and material realities faced by Swazi men, gender norms and provision within family structures.

Little empirical data exists regarding men’s preferences for therapist gender, including what predicts these preferences, and the impact they may have on satisfaction with care. To address this, da...

This paper draws upon a qualitative study with 144 young people in seven different research schools in England, exploring how cis-heteronormative homosocial masculinity practices shape digital sexu...

Transkids is a documentary on gender transitioning children in Israel. My interest is in the quotidian lives of the three transmasculine youths portrayed in the film. In reading the documentary, I ...