Multipurpose Masculinities: Gender and Power in Low Countries Histories of Masculinity

• Main Author: Stefan Dudink
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Open Journals 2012-03-01
• Series: BMGN: Low Countries Historical Review
• Online Access: https://www.bmgn-lchr.nl/articles/1562

<p>This article introduces the contributions to a <em>BMGN - Low Countries Historical Review</em> special issue on Low Countries masculinities. It outlines a shared theoretical framework that focuses on what historian Mrinalini Sinha has called, 'the rhetorical and ideological efficacy' of notions of masculinity 'in underwriting various arrangements of power'. The article's central argument is that the history of masculinity should move 'beyond masculinity' by analysing the deployment of masculinity in the making, legitimisation and contestation of not just power relations of gender, but also other power relations. It points to the origins of this framework in post-structuralist strands of women's and gender history and evaluates critically the usefulness of the notion of 'hegemonic masculinity' for such an approach.</p><p> </p><p>This article is part of the special issue '<a href="/6/volume/127/issue/1/">Low Countries Histories of Masculinity</a>'.</p>