For more than three decades, the women's movement and its scholars have exhaustively studied women's complex history, roles, and struggles. In Manhood in America, Third Edition, author Michael Kimmel argues that it is time for men to rediscover their own evolution. Drawing on a myriad of sources, he demonstrates that American men have been eternally frustrated by their efforts to keep up with constantly changing standards. Kimmel contends that men must follow the lead of the women's movement; it is only by mining their past for its best qualities and worst excesses that men will free themselves from the constraints of the masculine ideal. The third edition discusses such timely topics as post-9/11 politics, "self-made" masculinities (including those of Internet entrepreneurs), presidential campaigns, and gender politics. It also covers contemporary debates about fatherlessness, the biology of male aggression, and pop psychologists like John Gray and Dr. Laura. Outlining the various ways in which manhood has been constructed and portrayed in America, this engaging history is ideal as a main text for courses on masculinity or as a supplementary text for courses in gender studies and cultural history. -- Product Description.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 299-344) and index.
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Contents
Introduction : toward a history of manhood in America -- The making of the self-made man in America, 1776-1865: The birth of the self-made man ; Born to run : self-control and fantasies of escape -- The unmaking of the self-made man at the turn of the century: Men at work : captains of industry, white collars, and the faceless crowd ; Playing for keeps : masculinity as recreation and the re-creation of masculinity ; A room of his own : socializing the new man -- The new man in a new century : 1920-1950: Muscles, money, and the M-F test : measuring masculinity between the wars ; "Temporary about myself" : white-collar conformists and suburban playboys, 1945-1960 -- The contemporary "crisis" of masculinity: The masculine mystique ; Wimps, whiners, and weekend warriors : the contemporary crisis of masculinity and beyond ; From anxiety to anger since the 1990s : the "self-made man" becomes "angry white men" -- Epilogue.