Page 467 - Battleground The Media Volume 1 and 2

| Representat ons of Mascul n ty

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Laurie Ouellette

rePresentations oF MasCulinity

What does it mean to “be a man,” and how do the media answer this question
for us? Masculinity is probably most often assumed to be a natural phenomenon
that is coextensive with the biological condition of maleness. In the latter part
of the twentieth century, however, social scientists began to make a distinction
between sex (male and female; both biological conditions) and gender (mascu-
linity and femininity), and to view the latter as a socially constructed phenom-
enon, something that is created and maintained by the operation of a complex
set of social institutions and structures. The media in particular have been seen
as having a key role in shaping our ideas about what masculinity is, and in pro-
ducing ideals and norms of masculinity through the images of and narratives
about masculinity that they circulate. These images of masculinity often conflict
with each other, making masculinity itself a highly contested category and rais-
ing questions about what masculinity is and what it means.

hisTory

The impetus to create representations of masculinity is not a particularly re-
cent development. Some of the earliest examples of representations of mascu-
linity date back to ancient Greek statuary such as the much-copied Discobolus
of Myron (460–450 b.c.). These statues, and their Roman successors, provided
idealized images of the male body, muscular and virile. Often these images rep-
resent men engaged in sporting activities that serve to magnify the impression
of physical power associated with our ideas about what masculinity is. Although
there have been numerous changes in what is considered to be the masculine
norm since the time of the ancient Greeks, the ideal of masculinity captured in
Greek statuary has proven to be an enduring one. Its influence can be detected
in the way that the male body is portrayed in some of the art of Renaissance