French Masculinities
DescriptionFrom the foppish courtiers of the eighteenth century to the brave soldiers of the Revolution, from robust colonizers in Indochina and Algeria it the tough guys of the criminal underworld, masculinities in France have historically been varied and complex. Closely tied to representations of national health and power, perceptions of French manhood remain intimately bound up with the changing status of the hexagon in modern history.
French Masculinities makes a valuable contribution to gender studies by presenting, for the first time, a comprehensive and critical overview of ideas of how virilité has been imagined in France from the eighteenth century to the present. Incorporating insights of cultural and social historians as well as specialists in film and literature, this collection approaches masculinities in a complex and interdisciplinary manner that will appeal to a wide range of readers.
Reviews
Assembling a distinguished group of European, American, and Australian scholars, French Masculinities applies and advances the latest ideas and approaches to the subject. Forth and Taithe emphasize that the story of French manhood through the ages is especially complicated and distinctive for several reasons, including the nation’s ambivalent military heritage and current waning international status. Framing the book brilliantly are a substantial introductory survey of issues and scholarship by the editors and an Afterword by Robert Nye, doyen of the history of masculinity in France. This welcome work will surely become a point de départ for all future scholarly work in the field. -- Mark Micale, University of Illinois
Contents
Introduction: French Manhood in the Modern World;
Christopher E. Forth & Bertrand Taithe
Chapter 1: Elite Masculinities in Eighteenth-Century France;
Anne C. Villa
Chapter 2: Men without Women? Ideal Masculinity and Male Sociability in the French Revolution, 1789-99;
Sean Quinlan
Chapter 3: Making Frenchmen into Warriors: Martial Masculinity in Napoleonic France;
Michael J. Hughes
Chapter 4: Neighborhood Boys and Men: the Changing Spaces of Masculine Identity in France, 1848-1871;
B. Taithe
Chapter 5: La Civilisation and its Discontents: Modernity, Manhood and the Body in the Early Third Republic;
Christopher E. Forth
Chapter 6: Enemies Within: Venereal Disease and the Defense of French Masculinity between the Wars;
Judith Surkis
Chapter 7: Colonial Man;
R. Aldrich
Chapter 8: In the Name of the Father: Fe/male Masculinities in Vichy France;
M. Pollard
Chapter 9: Revolt and Recuperation: Masculinities and the Roman Noir in Immediate Post-War France;
Claire Gorrara
Chapter 10: High-Heels or Hiking Boots? Masculinity, Effeminacy and Male Homosexuals in Modern France;
Michael Sibalis
Chapter 11: Cinematic Stardom, Shifting Masculinities;
Michael O'Shaughnessy
Chapter 12: Virilité in Post-War France: Intellectual Masculinity, Jewishness and Sexual Potency;
Jean-Pierre Boulé
Chapter 13: Threatening Virility in the French Banlieues, 1989-2005;
André Rauch
Afterword: Robert A. Nye