Crisis of masculinity

Question 1

What are the five aspects covered on the Crisis of Masculinity?

Answer 1

1. With post-industrialisation, heavy manual work that provided some working-class men with a traditional masculine identity has disappeared.
2. It is increasingly replaced by jobs in new technology and the service industries. Many of these jobs are part-time or contract.
3. These new jobs have been increasingly taken up by women. This is called the feminisation of the workplace.
4. Mac an Ghaill (1994) describes the insecurity faced by these men as a crisis in masculinity.
5. Men may respond to this crisis by becoming depressed, fatalistic, turning to crime or adopting new, extreme identities (e.g. lizard man).