American Studies Senior Work

Kimmel, Michael S. “Consuming Manhood: The Feminization of American Culture and the Recreation of the Male Body, 1832-1920”. Michigan Quarterly Review, 33(1994): 7-36. 

The essay examines men’s efforts to rediscover their lost manhood at a time in the nineteenth century when masculinity was seen to be in crisis. 

Assertions/Claims:

• In the nineteenth century, masculinity was seen to be in crisis.
• This led American men to search for their lost manhood in various ways.
• Men become anxious when their masculinity is constantly tested, so they search for reassuring symbols or metaphors of masculinity
• In the late nineteenth century, one such symbol of masculinity was a muscular body – the establishment of a new doctrine of physicality and the body.

Kimmel describes how masculinity was destabilized in the first half of the nineteenth century (reasons why masculinity was in crisis)

• At beginning of 19^th century, manhood was equated with adulthood, and conveyed an inner sense of morality and strong character. To be manly was to own property or land, or for working men, to possess physical strength, autonomy and independence. Men accepted their responsibilities towards their wives and families, and their community.
• Later in the century, with industrialization and urbanization, the concept of the “self-made man” emerged. Men’s identity and self-esteem depended on success in the capitalist marketplace. The marketplace was unstable, there were economic crises over which men had no control, they worked not for themselves but for anonymous large factories or businesses – they lost their sense of independence and autonomy.

Men tried to solve this crisis in masculinity in a variety of ways (evidence that men went in search of their lost manhood in various ways  – also increases significance of claim)

• They tried to keep women out of the workplace and maintain the idea of separate spheres for men and women.
• They went to fight in the Civil War (War as symbol of masculinity).
• They tried to gain control over their “raging desires and animal lusts” – there were many advice books about the “crime of masturbation”(Evidence for crisis in masculinity – conflict between men’s true nature and the need for restraint).
• They went West to the Frontier, to start afresh and escape the constraints of domestic life and the efforts of women to civilize them (Frontier as a symbol of masculinity).
• Later on in the century, they tried to exclude immigrants and blacks from the workplace.
• They replaced the Frontier with imperial expansion (metaphor/symbol of masculinity).
• They turned to fantasies about heroic physical action – eg novels about the Wild West (metaphor/symbol of masculinity).

In the second half of the nineteenth century, the notion of the “feminization” of American culture became popular (Evidence that at that time, masculinity was seen to be in crisis). American men had apparently lost their manliness and were becoming soft and feeble. There were a number of explanations put forward (Reasons why in the nineteenth century masculinity was thought to be in crisis) :

• Degeneration caused by an influx of immigrants, leading to mixing of different races and fears of cultural degeneration.
• Rapid industrialization and urbanization, which created physically inactive men working in large corporations.
• The feminization of boys by their mothers and female teachers (men were absent from the home most of the time).
• Over-civilization, making men weak and effeminate, and producing words like “sissy”.
• Anxieties about male homosexuality as a visible gay male subculture emerged in the cities. As a result, men became fanatical in their avoidance of feminine traits or appearance.
• Modern civilization caused the disease of “neurasthenia” or “American Nervousness”. Women with neurasthenia were confined to bed to rediscover their femininity. Men with the disease had to reinvent their masculinity through fresh air and the strenuous outdoor life.

At the end of the 19^th century, the notion of manhood (the opposite of childhood, and an expression of inner, moral character) had been replaced by masculinity (the opposite of femininity, and something that had to be constantly demonstrated or proved).

By the end of the 1870’s, the idea of “inner strength” was replaced by a doctrine of physicality and the body. Men replaced the inner experience of manhood and the muscular body produced by years of hard physical labor, with a body perfected in a gymnasium. By the turn of the century, a massive national health and athletics craze was under way (Evidence for the establishment of a new doctrine of physicality and the body). Sports (including weightlifting) were a central element in the fight against feminization. Sports made boys into men and instilled moral virtue. Men compulsively attempted to develop manly physiques as a way of demonstrating their manhood. The body did not contain the man: it was the man.

Conclusion. Through sport (including weightlifting) American men went in search of their lost manhood. Men wanted increasing control over their bodies. “The body was the template of the healthy, self controlled and therefore self possessed man”.

Kimmel does not imagine alternatives to his argument.

He cites a mixture of primary and secondary sources to support his claims.

Examples of primary sources in the article:

• Pyke, Rafford, “What Men Like in Men”. Cosmopolitan (Aug. 1902): 405-6. This is an attack on so-called “sissies”.

 This source supports his claim that masculinity was in crisis because (reason) of the notion of the feminization of American culture that was popular in the nineteenth century. Kimmel uses direct quotes from the article. For example, Pyke describes sissies as “flabby, feeble and mawkish”. Kimmel gives page numbers for the quotes.

• Schindler, Solomon, “A Flaw in our Public School System”. Arena 6 (1892): 60.

 Again, this source supports Kimmel’s claim that masculinity was in crisis because (reason) of the notion of the feminization of American culture. Rabbi Schindler criticized “the preponderance of women’s influence in our public-schools” which was feminizing boys. Direct quote – page number given.

Examples of secondary sources in the article:

• Green, Harvey. Fit for America: Health, Fitness, Sport and American Society (2006). New York: Pantheon.

This source is used as evidence to support the claim that at the turn of the century, masculinity was in crisis. The source provides evidence that men bought enormous numbers of advice and guide-books to find out how to become and remain manly. No direct quote and no page numbers given.

• Park, Roberta J. “Physiologists, Physicians and Physical Education: Nineteenth Century Biology and Exercise, Hygienic and Educative” in Sport and Exercise Science, ed J.W. Berryman and R.J. Park. Urbana: University of Illinois Press (1992): 141.

Used as evidence to support the claim that by the end of the 19^th Century, a massive nationwide health and athletics craze was in full swing, as men compulsively attempted to develop manly physiques as a way of demonstrating manhood. The self-made man of the 1840’s “shaped himself by acting upon the material world and [testing] himself in the crucible of competition”. Direct quote – page number given.

~ by Alex Johnston on October 4, 2014 .