Good men--husbands, fathers, church leaders, pastors--sometimes make bad choices. And for far too many men, bad choices have led to the crumbling of marriages and ministries. Tom Eisenman knows it doesn't have to be this way. He also knows that in order for men to develop authenticity, vulnerability, honesty, trust--the character traits of spiritual maturity--they must cultivate healthy relationships with their brothers on the journey. In The Accountable Man Eisenman shows men how to build friendships of camaraderie and relational depth. He casts a compelling vision of interdependence and spiritual vitality--a vision in which no man stands alone against the temptations of our twenty-first century. Perfect for use in men's groups, small groups or one-on-one accountability reationships, this helpful, hopeful book includes lists of straight-to-the-point questions that will help men challenge one another to spiritual maturity and integrity.

While masculinity studies enjoys considerable growth in the West, there is very little analysis of African masculinities. This volume explores what it means for an African to be masculine and how male identity is shaped by cultural forces. The editors believe that to tackle the important questions in Africa--the many forms of violence (wars, genocides, familial violence and crime) and the AIDS pandemic--it is necessary to understand how a combination of a colonial past, patriarchal cultural structures and a variety of religious and knowledge systems creates masculine identities and sexualities. The work done in the book particularly bears in mind how vulnerability and marginalization produce complex forms of male identity. The book is interdisciplinary and is the first in-depth and comprehensive study of African men as a gendered category.

This book provides a rich analysis of the discourses and figurations of "crisis masculinity" around the turn of the twenty-first century, working at the intersection of performance and cultural studies and looking at film, television, drama, performance art, visual art and street theatre.

Based on an intensive qualitative study of a diverse group of 51 older widowers, this unique book sets widowhood within the context of life experience and identifies characteristics and patterns of behaviour that contribute to widowers' success, or lack of it, in adjusting satisfactorily to their circumstances. The authors shed light on widowers' specific needs and on the services needed to help widowers develop greater self-reliance. Among the topics discussed are models of resilience, marriage and illness of the spouse, caregiving and communication, death of the wife, grief and adjustment, living alone and remarriage, life values carried forward, adult children and other social support, and cohorts and the future. The authors conclude with a consideration of trends that may influence the next generation's experience of widowhood. This excellent volume offers expert guidance on the needs and care of the nearly invisible population of older widowers.

Using an entirely new conceptual vocabulary through which to understand men's experiences and expectations at the dawn of the twenty-first century, this path-breaking volume focuses on fatherhood around the globe, including transformations in fathering, fatherhood, and family life. It includes new work by anthropologists, sociologists, and cultural geographers, working in settings from Peru to India to Vietnam. Each chapter suggests that men are responding to globalization as fathers in creative and unprecedented ways, not only in the West, but also in numerous global locations.

This book provides a needed new interpretation of the complex cultural meanings of the late medieval, guild-produced, biblical plays of York and Chester, England, commonly known as mystery plays. It argues that the plays are themselves a "drama of masculinity," that is, dramatic activity specifically and self-consciously concerned with the fantasies and anxieties of being male in the urban, mercantile worlds of their performance. It further contends that the plays in their historical performance contexts produced and reinforced masculine communities defined by occupation, thus visibly naturalizing the world of work as masculine. The book offers welcome insight into a significant, canonical genre of dramatic literature that has been studied previously in devotional and civic contexts, but not yet in its role in the cultural history of masculinity.

This book is the most extensive contribution to our understanding of the graffiti subculture to date. Using insights from ethnographic research conducted in London and New York, this book explores the varying ways young men use graffiti to construct masculinity, claim power, and establish independence from the institutions which define, and often limit, them as young people. Forging a link between subcultural practice and identity construction, this book will be essential reading for anyone interested in new understandings of youth and their subcultures.

"Contributing to feminist approaches to masculinities, this book examines men's contextual experiences of masculine identity. Drawing on new data which compares men as they move across and between public and domestic spaces, it explores the implications of this for the nature of contemporary masculinity"--

Men, Masculinities, Travel and Tourism draws together established and emerging academics that have a key interest in men, masculinity, travel and tourism. Through the chapters collected in this volume the reader will be exposed to cutting edge research and writing that offer global and local perspectives within these fields.

Stars and Masculinities in Contemporary Italian Cinema is the first book to explore contemporary male stars and cinematic constructions of masculinity in Italy. Uniting star analysis with a detailed consideration of the masculinities that are dominating current Italian cinema, the study addresses the supposed crisis of masculinity.

Using an entirely new conceptual vocabulary through which to understand men's experiences and expectations at the dawn of the twenty-first century, this path-breaking volume focuses on fatherhood around the globe, including transformations in fathering, fatherhood, and family life. It includes new work by anthropologists, sociologists, and cultural geographers, working in settings from Peru to India to Vietnam. Each chapter suggests that men are responding to globalization as fathers in creative and unprecedented ways, not only in the West, but also in numerous global locations.

In Men and the Language of Emotions Dariusz Galasinski challenges the commonly held association of rationality with masculinity, involving distancing from the language of emotions. Drawing on a major study of heterosexual men talking about their life and relationships, he demonstrates that men are capable of speaking of emotions and can do so in direct and uninhibited ways. He also discusses the crucial role of emotionality in constructions of masculine identities - those of men, fathers or husbands. The book ends with a proposal for a radically contextual understanding of gender and gender identities.

Mass media portrayals of women have been identified as influential in shaping their self-image and self-esteem, as well as men's and societies' views of women. Comparatively few studies have examined mass media portrayals of men and male identity, and gender studies have often assumed these to be unproblematic. But, in a post-industrial era of economic, technological and social change, research shows mass media are projecting and propagating new images of male identity from Atlas Syndrome workaholics and 'deadbeat dads' to 'metrosexuals' and men with 'a feminine side', with potentially significant social implications. This book presents a landmark in-depth study of how mass media contribute to the making and remaking of male identity.

Art history has enriched the study of material culture as a scholarly field. This interdisciplinary volume enhances this literature through the contributors' engagement with gender as the conceptual locus of analysis in terms of femininity, masculinity, and the spaces in between. Collectively, these essays by art historians and museum professionals argue for a more complex understanding of the relationship between objects and subjects in gendered terms. The objects under consideration range from the quotidian to the exotic, including beds, guns, fans, needle paintings, prints, drawings, mantillas, almanacs, reticules, silver punch bowls, and collage. These material goods may have been intended to enforce and affirm gendered norms, however as the essays demonstrate, their use by subjects frequently put normative formations of gender into question, revealing the impossibility of permanently fixing gender in relation to material goods, concepts, or bodies. This book will appeal to art historians, museum professionals, women's and gender studies specialists, students, and all those interested in the history of objects in everyday life.

Queercore is a queer and punk transmedia movement that was instigated in 1980s Toronto via the pages of the underground fanzine ("zine") J.D.s. Authored by G.B. Jones and Bruce LaBruce, J.D.s. declared "civil war" on the punk and gay and lesbian mainstreams, consolidating a subculture of likeminded filmmakers, zinesters, musicans and performers situated in pointed opposition to the homophobia of mainline punk and the lifeless sexual politics and exclusionary tendencies of dominant gay and lesbian society. More than thirty years later, queercore and its troublemaking productions remain under the radar, but still culturally and politically resonant. This book brings renewed attention to queercore, exploring the homology between queer theory/practice and punk theory/practice at the heart of queercore mediamaking. Through analysis of key queercore texts, this book also elucidates the tropes central to queercore's subcultural distinction: unashamed sexual representation, confrontational politics and "shocking" embodiments, including those related to size, ability and gender variance. An exploration of a specific transmedia subculture grounded in archival research, ethnographic interviews, theoretical argumentation and close analysis, ultimately, Queercore proffers a provocative, and tangible, new answer to the long-debated question, "What does it mean to be queer?"

Anthropology is particularly well suited to explore the contemporary predicament in the coming of age of young men. Its grounded and comparative empiricism provides the opportunity to move beyond statistics, moral panics, or gender stereotypes in order to explore specific aspects of life course transitions, as well as the similar or divergent barriers or opportunities that young men in different parts of the world face. Yet, effective contextualization and comparison cannot be achieved by looking at male youths in isolation. This volume undertakes to contextualize male youths' circumstances and to learn about their lives, perspectives, and actions, and in turn illuminates the larger structures and processes that mediate the experiences entailed in becoming young men. The situation of male youths provides an important vantage point from which to consider broader social transformations and continuities. By paying careful attention to these contexts, we achieve a better understanding of the current influences encountered and acted upon by young people.

French Masculinities makes a valuable contribution to gender studies by presenting, for the first time, a comprehensive and critical overview of ideas of how virilite has been imagined in France from the Eighteenth century to the present. Incorporating insights of cultural and social historians as well as specialists in film and literature, this collection approaches masculinities in a complex and interdisciplinary manner that will appeal to a wide range of readers.

"New Lad culture" boomed in the 1990s with the publication of men's magazines such as loaded, FHM and Maxim. What were the commercial roots of this boom and what did it say about contemporary masculinity and the dynamics of cultural production?Applying a cultural-economic approach and drawing on interviews with key figures at the sector's leading products, Crewe unwraps the means through which publishing companies comprehended and addressed the men's magazine audience in the 1990s. He argues that it was informal knowledge about cultures of masculinity held by editorial practitioners that was decisive in constituting individual magazines and the overall character of the sector. In exploring the cultural resources, identifications and ambitions around which the market crystallized, Crewe provides an in-depth comparison of the editors and editorial identity of loaded, the pioneer of the 'mass market', with those of Esquire and Arena, magazines associated with the sector's initial reformation. Clear and comprehensive, this work sheds new light on the commercial assessment and representation of modern masculine culture.

Men and Masculinity: The Basics is an accessible introduction to the academic study of masculinity which outlines the key ideas and most pressing issues concerning the field today. Providing readers with a framework for understanding these issues, it explores the ways that masculinity has been understood in the Social Sciences and Humanities to date. Addressing theories which view masculinity as being in a permanent state of flux and crisis, it explores such problem areas as: the male body men and work men and fatherhood male sexuality male violence. With a glossary of key terms, case studies reflecting the most important studies in the field of masculinity research and suggestions for further study, Men and Masculinity: The Basics is an essential read for anyone approaching the study of masculinity for the first time.

Exploring the performance of masculinity on and off the nineteenth-century American stage, this book looks at the shift from the passionate muscularity to intellectual restraint as not a linear journey toward national refinement; but a multitude of masculinities fighting simultaneously for dominance and recognition.