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Portrayal of Masculinity in Art
According to several versions of the Webster dictionaries, the word “masculinity” refers to the characteristics of being masculine, manly, male stereotypes, having or occurring in a stressed final syllable <masculine rhyme>, having the final chord occurring on a strong beat <masculine cadence>, of or forming the formal, active, or generative principle of the cosmos. The word “masculinity” overall reflects the stereotype of men being a strong force, in music chords or in general.
Looking into Brett Eberhardt’s drawing, “Introduction”, the thought of sexuality barely crossed my mind. After talking to Mr. Eberhardt about his choice to draw a self-portrait, he stated that he wanted to depict a human, male or female. It just so happens that he draws himself best. Eberhardt’s drawing is nostalgic in the depiction of curiosity. The suggestion of curiosity plays with many topics that range from childish curiosity to sexual curiosity. So I wondered how his piece might be considered a masculine drawing and how masculinity has been portrayed...
The topics that Joe Ehrmann uses as framework for his Building Men for Others program are quite intriguing and make you really question masculinity. The first topic, rejecting false masculinity, can be interpreted a few different ways. In the book, it states: “As young boys, we’re told to be men, or to act like men” soon followed with “we’ve got all these parents say ‘be a man’ to boys that have no concept of what that means. I completely agree with the statement of Joe Ehrmann and often question the definition of ‘being a man’. Many boys and men will reject the idea of a man being anything other than being big and strong or having power.
Both Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler and Population: 485 by Michael Perry explore ideas of masculinity and manhood, but I think Butler shares a more diverse representation of masculinity through his different characters. What it means to be a man The concept of masculinity is considered as the qualities and characteristics of a man, typical of what is appropriate to a man. In this article, A Community Psychology of Men and Masculinity: Historical and Conceptual Review, the authors Eric S. Mankowski and Kenneth I. Maton, analyze four main themes: "Men as gendered beings, the privilege and damage of being a masculine man, men as a privileged group, and men’s power and subjective powerlessness. " The second and fourth themes are described as paradoxes that have created difficulty in efforts to analyze and understand men’s gender and masculinity." However, the point of view of masculinity that Perry raises in population 485 has a different aspect.
All over the world Masculinity has many different cultural definitions. Depending where someone is from, and what they were brought up to believe, defines what the term “masculinity” entails. Different Social institutions all over the United States, such as the military, sports, clubs, and fraternities, have been constructing their interpretation of masculinity. One major social institution that is active in thousands of Universities across the United States is campus fraternities. Campus fraternities create their own sense of masculinity by generating certain requirements and characteristics a man must hold in order to represent them as a part of their fraternity.
Beloved by Toni Morrison and A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry tackle issues of masculinity. On pages 125 to 138 and 147 to 149, Morrison illustrations in Beloved how white power structures and the sexual fetishism of the black man’s body, which were established by American slavery, emasculates the black man. On pages 143 to 144 in A Raisin in the Sun, which takes place between World War II and the present, portrays a peculiar mindset of a black man, and his fight to define his masculinity within a matriarchal family structure, a product of American slavery. The language in Beloved and A Raisin in the Sun, underlines the products of the societal structures of slavery effect on black masculinity.
Masculinity is the term used to describe the qualities usually associated with men. Masculinity has been in the past few years has been one of the front runners of the plethora of national debates. More than often today, men are being met with a stigma against the traditional roles of a man and a woman. There are many qualities associated with masculinity but, the most known and referenced are present in the poem. In the poem What Work Is the author, Phillip Levine, presents the theory that men carry the societal burden due to the preconceived notion of masculinity.
While we tend to look at the world in a gendered fashion, there are differences in what’s considered masculine and feminine. In addition to varying from person to person, the concepts of masculinity and femininity also vary across time periods, across different cultures, and even across the span of an individual’s life. Kimmel pluralizes these terms to “acknowledge that masculinity and femininity mean different things to different groups of people at different times” (Kimmel; 10). He goes on further to reference sociologist R. W. Connell’s explanation of hegemonic masculinity, which states that it is “constructed in relation to various subordinated masculinities as well as in relation to women” (Kimmel; 10). In an article by Connell, he describes
In the predominantly patriarchal history of the world masculinity and what it means to be a man have differed from culture to culture. When it comes to African American culture, particularly what it has meant to be a man has no clear set of universal rules or guidelines. There are a few different sources such as hip hop and television many young black men across America draw their sense of masculinity from. While hip hop music in particular has had and continues to have a very strong influence on both masculinity and femininity of the youth, young black youth in particular has been affected the most .
Mosse, L George. The Image of Man: The Creation of Modern Masculinity. New York: Macmillan publishers, 1996.
Gary said “Masculinity was the size of your dick and whoever was able to get girlfriends in high school. It was very competitive. I was significantly in my quest to be a teenage stud. It was easy to get sluts. That might have some association today.
Social psychology is a scientific study that studies how people think, feel, and how they behave under the influence of other people (Aronson, Wilson & Akert, 2013, p. 2). Thinking about what social influence really means, we tend to think of a person who tries to persuade another person to acting a certain way. It can be a form of peer pressure, like taking that first puff of a cigarette, or it can be conforming to popular societal views, such as obeying the law of the land. Fiction is a great way to learn about social psychological perspectives. Watching popular theatrical films is the perfect way to learn because it illustrates the application of many perceptions within the subject of social psychology.
After Civil War, slaves were free. When the U.S congress passed its first Civil Right Act, the African Americans had the right to vote. They can live as full citizens, such as, they could have their own properties, black children could go to school to gain knowledge, and they can have their own jobs,even they had rights to gain the political positions. Everything was sounding great, but in the dark side, many blacks returned to their slave life in another form. In most of the southern states, county sheriffs and their deputies received no regular salaries. So, everyone who brought to the court need to pay the fees to these officers. Instead of the slave owners, the sheriffs, and many state governments in the South were the people who have full control of these prisoners.
Gender, sex, gender roles, masculine, and feminine; these are all things that can be shaped by society. Your gender roles can change, but not your sex; that is given at birth. If gender is shaped a certain way, then that changes us to fit those societal norms of gender roles, masculinity and femininity, patriarchy, and how to maintain this gender order.
I don’t think that humanism can be applied to religion because humanism itself is a philosophy. It taught people to be their own person and think independently, not supernatural forces controlling history. A belief that people should have the right to think and make decisions freely cannot be applied to
Sex and gender are attributes to our identity. Sex describes the physical and biological factors we are born with, for example male or female genitalia, as quoted from blackadder “A boy without a winkle is a girl” (Elton and Curtis 1998). Whether we have oestrogen or testosterone hormones also tells us if we are man or woman. Gender however is in relation to stereotypes of masculinity and femininity, and expectations of what characteristics men or women should portray. Anyone given the opportunity to describe men, they would say words like dominant, non emotional, macho, aggressive, and to be the provider and protector of his family. This essay sets out to examine if masculinity is socially constructed and to do this the theories of gender, media, historical societies and even sexuality will be analysed throughout.
Masculinity and femininity are concepts that are difficult to define. One problem is trying to keep them separate from the concepts of male and female, which is not easy. The lines between these concepts is blurred for many of us, because we are raised associating femininity with females and masculinity with males. Femininity and masculinity are in many ways societal constructs and many of us will find that we define them the way that society would. When I think of the concept of masculinity some of the properties that come to mind are strength, aggressive, assertive, athletic, and nonverbal. Some of the properties of femininity are emotional, soft, caring, empathetic, and verbal. These are properties that came to mind automatically, without much consideration or thought. They are the properties that I was taught to use when defining femininity and masculinity.