Masculinities & Society

Curriculum guideline

Effective Date:
Return to Course
Print Guideline
Course
SOCI 3375
Discontinued
No
Course code
SOCI 3375
Descriptive
Masculinities & Society
Department
Sociology
Faculty
Humanities & Social Sciences
Credits
3.00
Start date
End term
202420
PLAR
No
Semester length
15 Weeks
Max class size
35
Contact hours

Lecture: 2 hours/week

Seminar: 2 hours/week

Method(s) of instruction
Lecture
Seminar
Learning activities

The methods of instruction for this course will include some or all of the following:

  • Lectures
  • Small group exercises
  • Class discussion
  • Computer lab work
  • Audio-visual materials
  • Guest speakers
Course description
Masculinities are a fundamental aspect of everyday life that shapes the actions of individuals, our institutions, and social structures. In this advanced course, students will interrogate forms of masculinity to understand the relationship between gender, race, power, and society, while also questioning the assumptions of traditional binary categories of gender. The sociological study of masculinities emerged as analysis of work and family confronted nascent critical theory of second wave feminism that problematized the traditional role of women in patriarchal societies. Today, sociologists adopt approaches such as post-structuralism and queer theory to examine the ideological and discursive dynamics embedded within different masculinities. Sociologists understands masculinity as a configuration of social practices linked to gender orders that shifts across time, cultures, and space. Gender orders are shaped by events such as the industrial revolution that have transformed work, family, and the traditional roles that men play, establishing hierarchies that privilege and dehumanize different groups premised on race, class, and sexual orientation. We will analyze how these structural and systemic inequities contribute to the stratification of marginalized groups within a broader context of colonialism, modernization, and globalization to make sense of why masculine roles, norms, and identities are changing today.
Course content
  1. Introduction to Masculinity 
  2. Theorizing Men & Masculinity
  3. Gender Binaries & Essentialism
  4. The Social Construction of Indigenous & Black Masculinity
  5. Colonialism, Nation State & Patriarchy
  6. Industrialization, Families & Masculine Roles
  7. Bro Culture: Socialization & Bonding
  8. Sports, Athletes, and Violence
  9. Masculinity, Drag Queens, and LGBTQIA2S+
  10. Popular Culture and Violent Masculinity as a Cultural Norm
  11. Online Masculinity: Big Tech, Gamers, and Trolls
  12. Prison Masculinities and Violence as Social Control
  13. Masculinity and Social Movements
Learning outcomes

At the completion of the course, the successful student will be able to:

  • Analyze the historical development of major streams of sociological theories with regards to masculinities;
  • Evaluate masculinity, toxic masculinity, and hegemonic masculinity;
  • Analyze the relationship between masculinities and social structures such as patriarchy, colonialism, globalization, and neoliberalism;
  • Examine why masculinity functions as a constitutive power;
  • Identify how masculinity functions in instutional and everyday spaces such as the family, labour force, politics, education, sport, prisons, online gaming, and culture;
  • Examine the social construction of racialized masculinities, with a focus on the commodification and dehumanization of black and indigenous bodies;
  • Evaluate how masculinities are historically and culturally constituted across time and space;
  • Analyze why masculinities intersect with gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, and class;
  • Examine transforming economic conditions between traditional and modern societies as it relates to roles and norms of masculinity; 
  • Evaluate different forms of masculinities as relational;
  • Evaluate masculinities as hierarchical.
Means of assessment

Evaluation will be in accordance with the Douglas College Evaluation Policy. Evaluation will be based on course objectives and may include quizzes, exams, critical essays, literature reviews, term/research projects, oral presentations, multi-media presentations and a personal family and age project.  The specific evaluation criteria will be provided by the instructor at the beginning of the course.

An example of one evaluation scheme is:

Two mid-term exams  45%
One group project  20%
One research project  25%
One final quiz  10%
Total 100%

Students may conduct research with human participants as part of their coursework in this class. Instructors for the course are responsible for ensuring that student research projects comply with College policies on ethical conduct for research involving humans.
Textbook materials

The following are examples of textbooks that may be assigned for this course:

Connell, R.W. (1995). Masculinities. Berkeley: University of California Press. 

Connell, R.W. (2000). The Men and the Boys. Berkeley: University of California Press. 

The following are examples of readings that may be assigned for this course:

Carrigan, Tim, Connell, Bob [R.W.], & Lee, J. (1985). ‘Toward a New Sociology of Masculinity.’ Theory and Society, 14(5), 441-604 

Connell, R.W. (2001). ‘Studying Men and Masculinities’. Resources for Feminist Research, 29/1/2: 43-56. 

Donaldson, Mike. (1993). “What is Hegemonic Masculinity?” Theory and Society vol. 22, no. 5, pp. 643-657 

Hearn, Jeff (2004). ‘From Hegemonic Masculinity to the Hegemony of Men.’ Feminist Theory, 5(1), 49-72 

Dyer, Richard (1997). ‘The White Man’s Muscles.’ In Race and the Subject of Masculinities, edited by Harilaos Stecopoulos and Michael Uebel, 286-314 

Ouzgane, L. & Coleman, D. (1998). ‘Postcolonial Masculinities.’ Jouvert: A Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 2(1). 

Marriot, David. (1996). ‘Reading Black Masculinities’. Mac an Ghaill, Máirtín (ed). In Understanding Masculinities. Buckingham: Open University Press. 

Messner, Michael A. (2007). “White Men Misbehaving: Feminism, Afrocentrism, and the Promise of a Critical Standpoint” in in Out of Play: Critical Essays on Gender and Sport. Albany: State University Press of New York. 

Clark, Laura Hurd and Maya Lefkowich. (2018). ‘I don’t really have any issue with masculinity’: Older Canadian men’s perceptions and experiences of embodied masculinity’. Journal of Aging Studies. Vol. 45 

Prerequisites

SOCI 1125 or SOCI 1145 or SOCI 1155 (or 2nd year status and instructor’s permission)