Introduction

This introductory chapter briefly examines the roots and evolution of working-class manhood. It shows how working-class masculine identity had many roots. The relations of social class, gender, race, and ethnicity influenced and shaped male attitudes, values, and behaviors. Most important, boys becoming men, young men, and adult men fashioned and refashioned their manliness in a variety of all-male settings—such as the workplace. The workplace was central to the forming, nurturing, widening, and deepening of this masculine culture. Generally, this working-class masculine culture has surfaced in two distinct forms—a respectable culture and a rough one. Though analytically quite discrete, these two contradictory forms might result from either personal disposition or social position. Yet they sometimes coexisted with, overlapped with, or blended into each other.