The effects of father absenteeism on the development of a masculine identity of young Xhosa men in an urban township
- Authors: Kibi, Aluta
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Absentee fathers -- South Africa , Men -- Identity , Masculinity , Men -- Psychology
- Language: English
- Type: Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10948/22332 , vital:29944
- Description: The absence of a biological father in a family system is associated with a myriad of familial and societal problems. Although father absenteeism affects the entire family system, boys raised in the absence of a paternal figure appear to be the most affected especially when they belong to patriarchal cultures. Among the many important roles played by a father in his son’s development he plays a significant role in modelling a culture specific masculinity. This masculinity enables him to effectively navigate the social spaces to acceptance from others within his culture. In his absence, boys look elsewhere for masculinity models some of which may be damaging to the males identity. Although there is substantial research on masculinity there is however paucity of research on how young Xhosa men develop a masculine identity in the absence of a paternal figure. This study sought to elucidate common themes through semi-structured interviews with young Xhosa men in navigating a masculine identity for themselves in the absence of a biological father. A purposive sampling technique was used to recruit participants for this study. Thematic content analysis was used to analyse the data, using Tesch’s method. The results of the study are beneficial to absent fathers, single mothers raising boy children and cultural leaders.
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- Date Issued: 2018
Young men’s talk about menstruation and hegemonic masculinity in the South African context: a discursive analysis
- Authors: Glover, Jonathan
- Date: 2018
- Subjects: Menstruation -- Social aspects -- -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Hegemony -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Masculinity -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Sex role -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Men -- Attitudes , Men -- Psychology , Human body -- Social aspects -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape , Men's studies -- South Africa -- Eastern Cape
- Language: English
- Type: text , Thesis , Masters , MA
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/60244 , vital:27758
- Description: Current research in the sub-Saharan and other resource poor contexts indicates the largely negative social constructions of menstruation and menstruating women. Young men have been shown to reproduce these negative constructions and reinforce the stigmatized status of menstruation in these contexts. To my knowledge no studies have examined the ways in which young men talk about menstruation and menstruating women in South Africa. In this research, I aimed to explore the ways in which young men (in a resource poor area in the Eastern Cape) talk about menstruation in with their male peers in a focus group context and how this talk serves to enable specific subject positions (both masculine and feminine) that may reproduce, comply with and resist constructions of hegemonic masculinity (as outlined in previous South African research). By drawing on Raewyn Connell’s influential framework of masculinities and augmenting this with Margaret Wetherell and Nigel Edley’s contributions, this research adds to the growing body of research on masculinities in the South African context. I utilized a discursive framework in which to understand the interpretative repertoires drawn on in everyday talk about menstruation and the specific subject positions made available by these. Purposive sampling was used to recruit a total of 37 participants from two former Department of Education and Training schools in the Eastern Cape. Participants were young ‘black’ men with a mean age of 18.3 In analyzing and interpreting the data two overarching patterns emerged. In the first, the participants discursively distanced themselves from menstruation (and femininity in general) in order to avoid possible marginalisation and subordination in relation to local hegemonic masculine ideals. In doing this, the participants drew on a number of interpretative repertoires including: a dualistic repertoire, a bad (versus ideal) femininity repertoire and an abject femininity repertoire, which assisted in creating numerous subject positions. These subject positions allowed the young men to align themselves closer to hegemonic masculine ideals, and create distance by positioning menstruating women as the ‘other’. In the second overarching pattern, menstruation was constructed as a threat to masculine identity; within this construction, the young men discursively negotiated the ideological dilemmas surrounding this ‘highly feminine’ topic in ways that bolstered their positions within the gender hierarchy. Overall, hegemonic masculinities in this context were discursively reproduced and complied with in the participants’ accounts.
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- Date Issued: 2018