Q: Look at the results from Tuesday's survey on the traits of masculinity, which I also showed in class. How important are the top two responses, muscles and athletics/sports, for establishing masculinity? Should we be working to take into account other characteristics?
A: Personally when someone mentions the word masculine an image of a big buff guy with "athletic" clothes and a baseball cap on his head immediately pops into my head. I think I speak for a lot of people because not too many people these days really like to be creative when creating stereotypes for a person. To me it was no surprise seeing those characteristics as the top two, but I do think we should broaden our horizons more when "labeling" somebody. I think there was a good point made in class that even if you don't have muscles or aren't the athletic type, you could still be labeled masculine if for example; you serve as a person's protector or are a handyman.
Where do stereotypes come from? Do you imagine each person creates a stereotype from scratch?
ReplyDeleteThe two examples you give of alternative definitions of "masculinity" (protection and being handy) are things that women can be just as easily as a man.
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