2017.Hegemonic Masculinity, Gender, And Post-Colonialism

The role of the patriarchal society and its impact on the oppression of female characters

In today’s society, masculinity has changed throughout time. Fast forward one hundred years ago, masculinity is defined as being strong and having a good paying job. But as the world is changing so is the representation of manliness. You don’t have to show your dominance over men or women today, but you should support your family nowadays and we have all been brainwashed by the thought of masculinity from our ancestors. As men our reputation is always being valued but now it isn’t so much about our reputation but about caring for one another and especially for our families. Perspective of manhood is also a significant factor in portraying what masculinity is in the eyes of other people. Masculinity has been shown through money, appearance, and providing protection for your family members but as we shift into the modern world, masculinity is not seen as displaying the most discipline but caring for one another by taking out some of your time to help one another. Throughout the paper, I will be writing about my interviews from a broad spectrum of ages from one of my younger sisters to my dad with not friends not at Seb’s in between so I can get what it really means to be a man from all ages.

In the poem The Odyssey, women play a major role, although it may not appear to be that way. The poem is centered around Odysseus adventures to return back to his wife Penelope. Without Penelope, there would be no story, which shows that the woman are a bigger part of this poem than people think. The women in The Odyssey are either seen as goddesses or they are treated as if they are a monster. Some even being turned into slaves.

The lack of male presence symbolizes their disdain in the women’s lives. As portrayed in the book, the protagonist and other major characters are all females, suggesting self-sufficiency. The author writes about the women being left by their husbands, but moves on, depicting male triviality. The female characters also develop their independence when they rely on each other during difficult times.

Atlanta, a comedy series, introduced several humorous dialogues discussing the same gender loving within the black community and hip-hop culture without being offensive; in doing so, the creators open the door to authentic conversations on sexuality and gender that challenge audience comfortability. Atlanta’s take on the LBGTIQ community is examined throughout this chapter and compared to past representations that are within a black media context. Using past representations of blackness in comedy this section aims to create an understanding of the social commentary that created a foundation for a series such as Atlanta. The series addresses hegemonic masculinity and its effects on LBGTIQ representations along with perceptions of homophobia in the hip-hop industry. Through an examination of the series, this section addresses perceptions and ongoing conversations within the hip-hop industry and black community, about same-gender loving and the LBGTIQ community as a whole.

With their opposing strength the women in the novel, are able to create an omniscient matriarchal environment. This environment continues to follow the men everywhere they go throughout the novel. With each individual male character, there is a specific woman in their life that

T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land explores modernism, specifically focusing on the troubling of binaries and the breakdown of the traditional. The boundaries between life and death, wet and dry, male and female, and more are called into question in Eliot’s conception of modernity and the waste land. The blurring of gender boundaries—significantly through Tiresias and the hooded figure scene in “What the Thunder Said”— in the poem lends itself to Eliot’s suggestion that traditional masculinity breaks down and decays in the waste land. Traditional masculinity is further challenged through Eliot’s criticism of hyper-masculinity and heterosexual relations in the modern era through allusions to the myth of Philomela and the “young man carbuncular” scene in “The Fire Sermon.” Along with this, Eliot stages scenes charged with homoeroticism to further challenge ideas of traditional masculinity. Homoerotic scenes such as the “hyacinth girl” scene in “The Burial of the Dead” and the Mr. Eugenides scene in “The Fire Sermon” suggest an intensity and enticement towards male-male relations, while also offering a different depiction of masculinity than is laid out in the heterosexual romance scenes. Through scenes depicting queer desire and homosexual behavior, Eliot suggests that masculinity in the modern era does not need to be marked by aggression and

The notion of hegemonic masculinity has altered the field of gender studies and many academic arenas. An idea popularized by R.W. Connell, hegemonic masculinity has played an integral role in the emotional development of American men, articulating the impact that this societal construction has had on the concept of American masculinity. It is a contested topic, yet the impacts that it has in terms of sexuality, struggles for power and political leadership, and gender identities are valid (Connell 830). Although difficult to fully achieve, it acts as a guiding force for the stereotypically masculine. Hegemonic masculinity assumes the subordination of all other forms of masculinity, placing it at the top of the social hierarchy. At the same time, the idea of hegemonic masculinity has served as a bridge between the growing field of men’s’ studies and female studies (Connell 829). Several authors share the premise that men in American society conform to the standards of the social construct of hegemonic masculinity.

An article I found that compliments my topic for this essay is “Recovering the feminine other: masculinity, femininity, and gender hegemony” by Mimi Schippers. This essay discusses how the gender roles of masculinity and femininity define the world we live in and create a structure that is believed cannot be changed. One of the author’s focuses is the “compulsory heterosexuality” of hegemonic masculinity and femininity, and how those who don’t align with heterosexuality automatically are not as masculine or feminine. Another theme is the institutionalized traits and characteristics displayed by the hegemonic masculine and feminine, and that this is an ultimately ridiculous binary that somehow rules society across cultures and countries.

Masculinity is described as possession of attributes considered typical of a man. Hegemonic masculinity is a form of masculine character with cultural idealism and emphasis that connects masculinity to competitiveness, toughness, and women subordination. Masculinity hegemonic is the enforcement of male dominion over a society. Masculine ideology dates back to the time of agrarian and the industrial revolution in Europe when survival compelled men to leave their homesteads to work in industries to earn a living for their families while women remained at home to take care of family affairs (Good and Sherrod 210). Women did not work in industries then because industrial labor was considered too physical beyond their capacity. This led to

"Nervous Conditions" is a semi-autobiographical story about Tambu, a young girl growing up in rural Rhodesia in the 1960's, and her search for a way out - for both herself and her family - of the tremendous poverty of homestead life in a colonized African country. Narrated through the eyes of young Tambu, the story is told with child-like simplicity about her and her family fighting to survive in a complex world of Imperialism, racism, and class and gender inequality. In hindsight, Dangarembga allows the protagonist's narrative to slowly unravel the meaning of her and her family's struggle with their assimilation into the strange and powerful culture of their rulers.

The title ‘Nervous Conditions’ comes from Jean Paul Satre’s introduction to Franz Fanon’s book about the psychosocial effects of colonization ‘The Wretched of the Earth’ where he says that ‘the condition of the native is a nervous condition.[2]’ Dangarembga clearly means to foreground gender as the category which determines African women's lives and keeps them "natives" in relation to the dominant and controlling power structure. "Nervous conditions" could also be interpreted as a ‘metaphor for those internalized definitions of femaleness that shape, from within women's private and public lives.’[3] The African women in the novel face racism, sexism and oppression in their community while navigating their lives within the margins of both traditional and Western colonial cultures. Tambu’s early self admired her educated aunt, pitied her mother who ‘suffered from being female and poor and uneducated and black.

Masculinity and femininity are unescapeable. We are taught how to be masculine or feminine from birth but for men, the highest form of masculinity achievable is hegemonic masculinity. In this essay, I will define hegemonic masculinity, discuss how it perpetuates homophobia by restricting the way men interact with one another and by the use of the word fag, and how it perpetuates gender inequality through the expectations of violence, no emotions, and being breadwinners.

Early African Literature often puzzled the conflict between tradition and modernity. Western knowledge was almost automatically associated with modernity while tradition concerned itself with African cultures and/or histories, the latter often given less value, while Western knowledge was seen as the obvious path to success and advancement in life. In Nervous Conditions, Tsitsi Dangarembga presents this dichotomic association and exposes its toxicity through her main female characters’ journeys. In the book, Tambu is plucked from her family with the opportunity of a colonial education and she is aware from the start that these are unique possibilities that will allow her to elevate her status. As the story progresses, the effects of Tambu’s dissociation from the homestead start to present themselves and by the end of the novel, the loss of her culture is crippling. Nyasha undergoes a similar process growing up partly in England, away from her extended family and her culture. For Tambu, the harmful association of progress with Western values and culture is revealed through the juxtaposition of the description of her arrival at the mission in the beginning of her story and her arrival at the Sacred Heart at the end of the novel, as well as her reaction to the Christian wedding imposed to her parents by her uncle. For Nyasha, her breakdown at the end of the novel is representative of the toxic dichotomy of modernity and tradition within African literature. The implication

Nervous Conditions is concerned with women who live in a traditional African society in Zimbabwe (former Rhodesia), who struggle to find their place in the patriarchal system and who search for their independence. Each female protagonist in the novel finds her own way of dealing with her situation; however, this essay focuses on two characters-Tambu and Nyasha whose response to the male power is very different. While Tambu escapes from the environment of inequality in order to seek her liberation, Nyasha chooses to resist the patriarchy but her rebellion against her father ends up tragically as she suffers from the nervous conditions.