Gender studies have been a core component of Western humanities education since the early 1990s. At its core, gender studies are concerned with the cultural and social forces that shape our ideas about gender and sexuality, and as gender studies programs have become firmly established in humanities and social science departments at international universities, the central concepts and concerns of gender studies have taken on interdisciplinary significance in fields such as literature, art history, film, communications, linguistics, sociology, anthropology, political science, history, and philosophy.

Todd Reeser’s Masculinities in Theory was first published at a time when masculinity studies had emerged as a central element of the field of gender studies, yet few resources existed to support the instruction of masculine studies theory. Now in a new, thoroughly revised edition, this valuable textbook offers students a foundation in the theories which support the field of masculine studies and demonstrates how students can use these theories to investigate constructs of masculinity which they encounter in their own lives. The field of masculine studies has grown rapidly since publication of the first edition, and the new edition accounts for changes in attitudes, priorities, and concerns in the most pressing investigations in the field. The new edition features new examples drawn from popular culture and current events, including the masculinities of Trump and Putin, indigenous masculinities, and the contributions of the Black Lives Matter movement to modern thoughts on masculinity. Chapter Six, formerly called ‘Non-Male Masculinities’, has been thoroughly revised to more accurately account for the experience of affective masculinities and masculine identity in people who do not identify as men, and a new Chapter Seven deals with trans masculinities and nonbinary experiences of masculinity.

An ideal interdisciplinary resource, Masculinities in Theory, Second Edition, will offer students an exciting introduction to this cornerstone of the field of gender studies.

Todd Reeser is Professor of French and Chair of the Department of French and Italian at the University of Pittsburgh, USA, where he also holds a secondary appointment in the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Program. Much of his work has explored concepts of gender, sexuality, and identity, with a particular focus on the Renaissance and on cinema. His other books include Moderating Masculinity in Early Modern Culture, Setting Plato Straight: Translating Ancient Sexuality in the Renaissance, and Queer Cinema in Contemporary France.

Acknowledgments

Introduction: The Study of Masculinity

1. Theorizing Masculinity

2. Social Masculinity and Triangulation

3. Sexing Masculinity

4. Theorizing the Male Body

5. Masculinity in Disguise

6. Masculinities Beyond Men (formerly titled Non-Male Masculinities)

7. Trans* Masculinities (new chapter)

8. Masculinity and Racialized Subjectivities

9. Masculinity and the Nation

10. Interracial Masculinities

11. Unstable Time: Masculinity in History

Index