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This thesis is concerned with how shame contributes to the development of hegemonic masculinities in eighteenth-century British culture. It examines a range of contemporary literature in order to understand how feelings of shame, as well as practices of shaming others, became a key, if often unspoken, aspect of attempts to define and maintain which forms of masculinity were acceptable, and which were not, in a rapidly changing cultural context. The thesis explores the effect on men of the newly commercial 'public sphere' that came to prominence at the beginning of the century, and tries to track its affective trajectory through to the end of the period. Following work on affect by Silvan Tomkins, the American psychologist, and its interpretation by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick in particular, I view shame as a social emotion which simultaneously isolates men from, and connects them to the society they inhabit. A crucial part of polite socialisation, I contend that shame is therefore a catalyst for creativity and productivity in several forms as well as failure and inertia. The thesis is divided into two sections. The first, containing the chapters on The Spectator, writing about fops, and Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments, is concerned with how shame helps to form the consensus around polite masculine qualities and actions. The second section, containing the chapters on Henry Mackenzie's The Man of Feeling, James Boswell's London Journal, and Olaudah Equiano's Interesting Narrative, examines how this consensus is engaged with and critiqued in lived experience and its literary representations. The contribution this thesis makes is to highlight the importance of shame and other ambivalent affects in the construction of a set of hegemonic gender identities that are less usually associated with these same affects.

This thesis seeks to begin to fill the gaps in the historiography surrounding the constructions of masculinity performed by young Scottish men in the mid-twentieth century. Much of the current research on British masculinity focuses on the English experience. Where historians have studied Scottish masculinity it has often been in the context of ‘deviant’ forms such as gang membership and domestic violence. In contrast to this, this thesis investigates the masculinities lived by the mass of young working-class men in Scotland. Throughout the thesis masculinity is conceptualized as performative and situational social construct that can be considered both as an identity and as a behaviour. The investigation of masculinity is conducted through examination of oral histories, newspapers and the documents of both employers and voluntary organizations. The use of this range of sources facilitates an assessment of the dominant discourses concerning masculinity, as well as the experiences of the men who constructed their gender, and social identities in the environment these discourses shaped. It is argued that economic context was a fundamental factor in determining the types of masculinity that were acceptable at work and within the greater community. Working-class youths were also able to renegotiate and reshape the discourses of masculinity presented by both commercial and ‘reforming’ sources in order to perform masculine identities that were congruent to their own community norms. This allowed them to practice an agency in their social identities constrained by socioeconomic environment that, while not radical, constituted an active construction of masculinity.

This thesis examines how a hegemonic ideal that I refer to as the ‘able-responsible man' dominates the discourse and performance of masculinity in the city of Nanchong in Southwest China. This ideal, which is at the core of the modern folk theory of masculinity in Nanchong, centres on notions of men's ability (nengli) and responsibility (zeren). It differs from, while not always being in contradiction with, the ideal of the ‘wealthy and worldly man' that many scholars of contemporary China have written about. For my research informants, an exemplary man is expected to excel financially but also to shoulder his responsibilities, first and foremost within the kin group, and then to society and the country. I explore the formation and nuances of this ideal in an economic and social milieu that has been radically transformed by forces such as modernization, labour migration, the one-child policy, and changing ideologies and practices of leisure, individualism, filial piety, gendered power and nationalism. Through ethnographic accounts from teenage boys, men of marriageable age, and married men alike, I show that the hegemonic model is coercive, yet negotiable. These accounts reveal the vulnerabilities of male youth and adults in different circumstances, and the multiple and varying strategies they take as they enact their masculinities. The hierarchical nature of relationships amongst men and between the two genders is complicated by an intersection with other social divisions and individual life trajectories. At the apex of the hegemonic model are the country’s leaders who exemplify for their political subjects what it means to be an exemplary Chinese man in the modern era. The thesis looks into not only what men think of being men and their performance as men, but also at what women think and how they construct and, in some regards, sustain the male mode.

This thesis aims to critically explore how young men aged 18-24 construct ‘health’ in terms of their knowledge, beliefs and behaviours and to examine what influence these factors may have on their own lifestyle practices, particularly, but not exclusively, in relation to food and how this informs their masculine identity. Statistics suggest that as a group young men are the worst at ‘following’ health promotion guidelines and as such are ‘positioning’ themselves as being at risk of developing certain illnesses and diseases such as cancer and diabetes as a result of this non-conformance. Men’s diets are often portrayed as being unhealthy; high in meat content and low in consumption of fruit and vegetables. Furthermore men’s health is often viewed in opposition to women’s and inequalities in health between men and women are often put down to man’s pursuit of hegemonic masculinity. This thesis will argue that statistics alone do not tell the whole picture as men are not a homogenous group, with differences in sexual orientation, class and age, to name but a few. Therefore to help understand the health behaviours of young men better their voices need to be listened to. This thesis will seek to understand the impact health promotion messages as well as other ‘educational’ sources such as the media, have upon the knowledge, health beliefs and behaviours of young men and if these ‘messages’ help or hinder their participation in such. This thesis draws upon qualitative data to investigate how food and health are understood and negotiated by young men as part of their lived experiences and will take a thematic approach to data analysis. The key findings suggest that the young men involved in this research had a good knowledge of what are considered healthy behaviours however these were not necessarily the ones they followed. The men were interested in their health albeit in a way of bodily appearance, particularly in respect of fatness, and presentation of an acceptable masculine physique rather than in reducing their susceptibility to illness and disease. Food for the participants was not something to be consumed in order to sustain a ‘healthy’ blood pressure for example but was something which they used as part of their physical activity regime to help build muscle and ‘keep in shape’. This was particularly important when the body was considered to be under the judgemental ‘gaze’ of others therefore being on holiday and having a ‘holiday body’ was where the display of an acceptable masculine physique was considered essential.

This dissertation examines the conception and performance of masculinities amongst two groups of Russian men, half of whom live in Russia and the other half in the United Kingdom. A total of forty in-depth biographical interviews were carried out, twenty in each country, with men of different ages and highly different social backgrounds. On the basis of these interviews, the thesis portrays contemporary Russian masculinities as a complex, socially and historically constructed phenomenon, situated within large-scale social and political processes. It explores the most prominent reference points and social hierarchies employed by the respondents in order to negotiate their individual gender projects, and shows how these are culture-specific, context-specific, and rooted both in individual life history and in the social, economical and political realities of different historical periods. While the respondents play an active role in defining and constructing their own masculinities, they do so within the macro-parameters laid down by the state, in accordance with broader socio-cultural and political factors. Shifts in the macro-parameters (such as the collapse of the Soviet Union or migration to another country) change the environment in which an individual lives and give rise to new resources for negotiating masculinity. Like the reference points and social hierarchies referred to above, these new resources are rooted in specific historical, cultural, political and personal events. Each resource belongs to a particular social topography that orients people towards the places, practices and discourses which they need to realise their masculinity. The main empirical findings in the thesis are ordered in accordance with the contexts, reference points and hierarchies for making masculinity which were referred to by the research participants themselves. The dissertation is structured around four contexts which emerged from the data: (i) the Soviet past; (ii) the first post-Soviet decade (the 1990s); (iii) the second post-Soviet decade (the 2000s); (iv) the immigration period. I explore different masculinity construction strategies and the reference points on which they rely as the site of a socio-cultural power struggle that offers a unique prism through which to understand how Russian masculinities and gender relations are validated and contested, and how they change.

This thesis begins from a concern over the perceived lack of female involvement in performances of play in the public built environment. Its starting point is the male-dominated practice of skateboarding. Although a popular creation myth presents skateboarding as a subversive, socially resourceful activity born from the natural landscape (the riding of waves by surfers), it has since become consumed within a masculine commercial culture. It is used as an exemplar, because of my own history of involvement in the culture, which allows me to question the presence women occupy within its spaces and practices. The practice at the centre of my practice-as-research methodology is a type of playing that has been created in response to skateboarding. It utilises costuming to present a gendered body. One of the first costumes references depictions of ‘Alice’ from Lewis Carroll’s 1865 Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, a presentation that has enabled the consideration of the mythical status of a generic ‘fictional girl’ within public consciousness. My approach to playing is analysed with reference to Lefebvre’s theory of rhythmanalysis, allowing me to consider how play operates within the public built environment. Several practitioners (for example, Jill Magid, Fiona Templeton and Lottie Child) have made performance interventions into public space. They use techniques, particularly the avoidance of spectacle, contact between strangers, and autotelic activities, to disrupt a culture of ‘commerce masculinity’ – which is manifested through possessive spectatorship and authoritarian ownership. Foucault’s theory of panopticism is used to articulate this exercise of power. In reference to Magid and Templeton in particular, a concept of ‘romantic space’ is proposed in which intersubjectivity forms the basis of an antidote to this. The final development of my practice is articulated as an act of inscribing an unknowable feminine archetype that resists the commodification and forms of spectatorship inherent in spaces of ‘commercial masculinity’, and attempts to engender ‘romantic space’.

This thesis examines the lives of a group of young working-class men in a post-industrial community in the South Wales Valleys. Using a longitudinal ethnographic approach, I focus on how young masculinities within a specific community are performed across a variety of educational and leisure spaces and indicate how social, economic and cultural processes impact on the formation of self. This thesis also describes how, within the limits of place and during different social interactions, individual young men can be seen as active agents in their own construction of identity. Ideas and issues drawn from Erving Goffman’s work on the performance of self and the formation of social identity are central to the theoretical framing of the thesis. I suggest that Goffman’s dramaturgical framework has important implications for analysing performances of masculinities. When applied to masculinities (and femininities) this framework highlights how gender comes into being through socially constructed performances which are understood (consciously and unconsciously) as socially acceptable in a given situation, setting or community, not as innate biological accomplishments but as dramaturgical tasks. Throughout the thesis, through paying attention to the diversity of social identities and relations within an ostensibly homogeneous working-class community, I challenge commonly held beliefs about working-class young men that appear in the media and in policy discourses. I argue that for a group of young men in a community of social and economic deprivation, expectations and transitions to adulthood are framed through geographically and historically shaped class and gender codes.

This thesis explores the way in which people constructed their identities using the cultural, public and social narratives made available to them in mid-twentieth-century England. Focusing on the construction of masculinities, this study argues that, contrary to popular opinion, for many men during this period ontological narratives expanded beyond the ‘masculine’ discourses of politics, work and sport, to encompass ‘feminine’ discourses of family, home and romance. In the first section of this thesis the argument is advanced that ideal domesticity was promoted to men, just as it was to women, as integral to the construction of personal identity. As such, an exploration is undertaken of the ways in which discourses about family and home life incorporated men above and beyond a bread-winning role. Section two of this thesis argues that during these same decades romance became an overriding preoccupation for men and searching for a soul mate became a masculine pursuit of the utmost importance. The third section of this thesis looks at various attempts to bring these opposing discourses into a workable whole, concluding with a detailed examination of the divorce reform debates of the mid-twentieth century, and refuting the contention that divorce reform was fought for, and won, on behalf of women. Through an examination of the language and rhetoric expressed in a collection of private letters written by men during the 1960s, this study will demonstrate that men’s consumption of domestic and romantic narratives was as active and as enthusiastic as women’s, and that it was this participation which publicly altered perceptions of our most private relationships. By understanding historical processes in the context of narrative, and recognising men’s position within ‘feminine spaces’, this thesis claims that stories of domesticity, romance and divorce need to be retold.

The state of Maleness has received much attention in academic and public discourse of late. One such instance is the play Defending the Caveman, which depicts men in their ”natural” settings as Cavemen, thereby justifying Caveman-like behaviour. On the other hand, much writing exists that find men culpable of discrimination, violence and abuse towards others. Discourses like these have real effects on the ways in which men choose and act on their Maleness. Six men engaged in narrative therapeutic discussions in an attempt to share their stories of Maleness, to discuss how society constructs men, and to re-evaluate the Maleness chosen by the participants. / Practical Theology / M.Th. (Pastoral Therapy)