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Steely determination? Constructions of masculinity in a former UK steelworker community

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  • Reece Garcia

Abstract

Through qualitative interviews and overt non‐participant observation with 15 former steelworkers and their sons, changes in perceptions of masculinity are explored across a generation in a deindustrialized community in Sheffield, UK. Despite some policing of their behavior by the fathers, heterogeneity in both options and choices regarding employment and life outside of work resulted in the sons conceptualizing masculinity in different and often complex ways. The younger men are found to orientate to, modify, or reject tenets of traditional masculinity depending upon what best aligns with their personal circumstance, which naturally changes over time. The evidence does not point to a crisis of masculinity, more plausibly a crisis in masculinity as what constitutes acceptable masculine behavior—in a community characterized as having relatively homogenous views—changes, but the gender binary, importance of masculinity to young men's identity, and the patriarchal dividend remain intact.

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  • Reece Garcia, 2022. "Steely determination? Constructions of masculinity in a former UK steelworker community," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(4), pages 1025-1040, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:gender:v:29:y:2022:i:4:p:1025-1040
    DOI: 10.1111/gwao.12792
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Erin M. Reid, 2018. "Straying from breadwinning: Status and money in men's interpretations of their wives' work arrangements," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(6), pages 718-733, November.
    2. Tsedal B. Neeley, 2013. "Language Matters: Status Loss and Achieved Status Distinctions in Global Organizations," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 24(2), pages 476-497, April.
    3. Natasha Slutskaya & Ruth Simpson & Jason Hughes & Alexander Simpson & Selçuk Uygur, 2016. "Masculinity and Class in the Context of Dirty Work," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(2), pages 165-182, March.
    4. Tim Strangleman, 2005. "Sociological Futures and the Sociology of Work," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 10(4), pages 51-62, December.
    5. Tweedale, Geoffrey, 1995. "Steel City: Entrepreneurship, Strategy, and Technology in Sheffield 1743-1993," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198288664.
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