Real men don’t eat quiche, do they?: Food, fitness and masculinity crisis in 1980s America

Written for laughs in 1982, Bruce Feirstein’s Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche: A Guidebook to All that Is Truly Masculine hit a real and raw nerve among American men. Beneath its jokes, the book documented a moment of 1980s gender crisis that pitted older constellations of masculinity against ‘the new man’. This article analyses how Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche and its cookbook sequel communicated this gender anxiety through food and the body specifically, considering the context of the Cold War, notable transitions in nutrition science and policy, and period food and fitness trends. Although many readers today may not know the origin of Feirstein’s book’s titular phrase, notions of ‘real men’ and gendered food still have cultural endurance, often deployed as a shorthand for hegemonic gender norms that pose destructive consequences 40 years later.

Relasi antara Pergeseran Peran Pencari Nafkah dan Krisis Maskulinitas dalam Cerpen “Huruf Terakhir” karya Benny Arnas

This research aims to show the masculinity crisis experienced by a male character (a husband) due to the shift role of breadwinner in marriage in the short story "Huruf Terakhir" by Benny Arnas. This research is essential because it can demonstrate the impact of the wife's involvement to work in the public domain towards the husband's condition. This research is qualitative research by utilizing the concept of gender. Data collection techniques are carried out through document tracing on a short story "Huruf Terakhir" by Benny Arnas as the corpus. The data obtained was analyzed using descriptive analysis method. The results showed that shifting role of breadwinner can cause a man (a husband) to experience a crisis of masculinity such as loss of independence, confidence, courage, assertiveness, and emotional control. The shifting role as breadwinner is also shown to open the opportunities for repression in women. Therefore, the research on the short story "Huruf Terakhir" is expected to contribute to the study of gender-sensitive literature, especially since it is able to show masculinity traits associated with the role of breadwinner can complicate men’s position and potentially hinder women's freedom.

the Remasculation Film: Themes and Variations

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, a discourse of masculinity crisis precipitated the appearance of a number of what Susan Jeffords describes as “rearticulations of screen masculinity,” which influenced the production of a group films whose narrative diegeses reaffirmed the heteronormative, hypermasculine façade onscreen. These films are identified and defined in this dissertation as remasculation pictures, or narratives that showcase the hero’s oscillation between two oppositional expressions of screen masculinity. In the rhetoric of the remasculation film, the protagonist’s emasculation initiates a quest to remasculate by reaffirming the dominance and authority of the hypermasculine archetype. Further, in a few key performances (Red River [1948], The Searchers [1956], The Wings of Eagles [1957]), John Wayne exemplifies the ultra-conservative values, imposing physicality, staunch heterosexuality, and capability of this heteronormative, hypermasculine archetype. However, Wayne’s image has been employed only as an exemplification of this façade, since this project does not suggest that the remasculation hero’s victory marks his appropriation of Wayne’s masculinity, only the archetype with which many of his performances have been associated. The remasculation picture is part of a film cluster, and not a genre because films of this category are primarily linked by similarities in narrative structure and their glorification of this hypermasculine figure. Further, to illustrate some of the themes of the remasculation picture, this dissertation features three chapters that focus on as many distinct expressions of the remasculation formula. The first of these chapters draws on Unforgiven (1992) and Law Abiding Citizen (2010) to furnish a discussion of judicial emasculation and remasculatory vigilantism. The second case study chapter looks at remasculation through pugilism with an examination of Payback (1999) and Get Carter (2000), while the final section focuses only on The Company Men (2010) to illustrate emasculative redundancy and the reacquisition of purpose as the final variation discussed in this project. While films of the remasculation cluster glorify the hypermasculine image, one cannot assume that the filmmakers responsible for their production aim to either disseminate ultra-conservative values or impose them on the audience. Similarly, the relative popularity of remasculation films does not necessarily indicate the presence of an audience seeking narrative diegeses showcasing the reaffirming triumph of the hypermasculine man. The continued production of the remasculation picture signifies only the appearance of a trend in contemporary film that is attributable to the destabilization of the normative masculine image at the end of the twentieth century.

the Remasculation Film: Themes and Variations

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, a discourse of masculinity crisis precipitated the appearance of a number of what Susan Jeffords describes as “rearticulations of screen masculinity,” which influenced the production of a group films whose narrative diegeses reaffirmed the heteronormative, hypermasculine façade onscreen. These films are identified and defined in this dissertation as remasculation pictures, or narratives that showcase the hero’s oscillation between two oppositional expressions of screen masculinity. In the rhetoric of the remasculation film, the protagonist’s emasculation initiates a quest to remasculate by reaffirming the dominance and authority of the hypermasculine archetype. Further, in a few key performances (Red River [1948], The Searchers [1956], The Wings of Eagles [1957]), John Wayne exemplifies the ultra-conservative values, imposing physicality, staunch heterosexuality, and capability of this heteronormative, hypermasculine archetype. However, Wayne’s image has been employed only as an exemplification of this façade, since this project does not suggest that the remasculation hero’s victory marks his appropriation of Wayne’s masculinity, only the archetype with which many of his performances have been associated. The remasculation picture is part of a film cluster, and not a genre because films of this category are primarily linked by similarities in narrative structure and their glorification of this hypermasculine figure. Further, to illustrate some of the themes of the remasculation picture, this dissertation features three chapters that focus on as many distinct expressions of the remasculation formula. The first of these chapters draws on Unforgiven (1992) and Law Abiding Citizen (2010) to furnish a discussion of judicial emasculation and remasculatory vigilantism. The second case study chapter looks at remasculation through pugilism with an examination of Payback (1999) and Get Carter (2000), while the final section focuses only on The Company Men (2010) to illustrate emasculative redundancy and the reacquisition of purpose as the final variation discussed in this project. While films of the remasculation cluster glorify the hypermasculine image, one cannot assume that the filmmakers responsible for their production aim to either disseminate ultra-conservative values or impose them on the audience. Similarly, the relative popularity of remasculation films does not necessarily indicate the presence of an audience seeking narrative diegeses showcasing the reaffirming triumph of the hypermasculine man. The continued production of the remasculation picture signifies only the appearance of a trend in contemporary film that is attributable to the destabilization of the normative masculine image at the end of the twentieth century.

China’s ‘masculinity crisis’ reflects economic change

Significance Expectations of male behaviour have changed in ways the authorities and social conservatives disapprove of. While the authorities censor media depictions of ‘effeminate’ men and introduce ‘boot camp’-type activities in schools to make boys more aggressive, sales of male beauty products skyrocket and male celebrities presenting ‘androgynous’ role models become hundred-million-dollar brands. Impacts Growth in China’s multi-billion-dollar market for male grooming products will outpace that of female products. Social and internalised pressure on men not to marry women who earn more than they do will depress marriage rates. Shortage of nurses and elderly carers as the population ages may prompt efforts to make these more attractive careers for men.

Salvaging Patriarchy in the 2018 Film Adaptation of Tomb Raider

This article focuses on the recent film adaptation of the 2013 Tomb Raider video game. Its main goal is to show that, despite the significant changes that the plot undergoes when transitioning from video game to feature film, the adaptation remains faithful to the conservative gender politics of its ludic source text, in the sense that in both the game and the film Lara must struggle to maintain patriarchal order. While in the game the female protagonist has to fulfil her late father’s unfinished archaeological (in fact colonial) project and redeem his name, in the film she has to compensate for her father’s masculinity crisis. The resolution of the plot coincides with a resolution of the crisis of masculinity, which reinstates the gender power relations privileging masculinity. Furthermore, this article shows that Lara’s struggle to re-establish patriarchy in the film’s storyworld coerces her to adopt a colonial attitude with respect to otherness. By performing phallic masculinity, Lara Croft acts as an agent of colonialism whose intervention in foreign territories and cultures is rendered by the film providential for the emancipation of the native populations.