Establishing Development Orthodoxy: Negotiating Masculinities in the Water Sector

Despite important work in development studies on the ‘male bias in the development process’, it is generally recognized that gender and development analyses have been slow to engage with masculinities. Focusing attention on the nexus between identity and globalizing development discourses, this article explores the relationship between masculinities and development through an analysis of the gendering of water paradigms. By analysing the example of the recent Cochabamba water wars in Bolivia, and placing them in historical context, the author explores how gendered representations and language are used to downplay and upgrade particular understandings of modernity as they relate to water management, and examines the mechanisms through which specific gendered identities become associated with the most successful versions of ‘modern’ development.     

Digging up Unearthed down-under: a hybrid geography of a musical space that essentialises gender and place

Hybrid geographies are well developed in studies of human–nature relations and environmental humanities, but less so in geographies of music and gender. In this article, we use hybrid geographies to frame our critical engagement with Australia's triple j's Unearthed, a publically funded website and radio station that presents new music. Hybrid approaches enable us to understand gendered power relations in music by deconstructing the ways power differences are built on cultural, social, spatial and technological relations. Engaging netnographic and mixed-method approaches we critique Unearthed as a democratic music cyberspace. We identify the limited constructions of gender and geographic location, some of which are unique to this online presence, while others are shared with broader musical spaces. We argue that the interactions between technology, artists, fans and the online spaces, as mediated by Unearthed, situate emerging artists in relation to gender, geography and genre, and thus constrain possibilities for a more democratic musical space. Unearthed manifests as a musical space where rurality is exoticised while urban origins are diminished, and hegemonic masculinities remain dominant. We suggest that the potential of Unearthed can be realised if gender and geographic hegemonies are recognised and otherness is de-essentialised.     

Performing ‘Oriental’ masculinities: embodied identities among Vietnamese men in London

The young British-born Vietnamese are a largely unrecognised group in society and are generally not considered part of multiethnic Britain. A key characteristic of their racial positioning has been the very specific forms of hegemonic gendered labelling shaped by discourses of Orientalism. These Orientalist discourses subject Vietnamese men to pernicious stereotyping linked to ‘passive’ and effeminising forms of ‘subordinate’ masculinity. The ethnic and gendered dimensions of male Vietnamese youth experience are further compounded by the intersecting processes of social class and urban geographies which provide a distinct range of identity outcomes; these are particularly acute for working-class men living in highly urbanised areas. This article explores how young Vietnamese men subvert Oriental labels and stereotypes by using a range of unexpected, creative and ‘spectacular’ manipulations of hair, dress, style and comportment. I argue that Vietnamese men negotiate and perform ethnic masculinities through conscious and strategic forms of agency which entail everyday mundane forms of ‘risk’. The article draws upon primary data from in-depth, narrative interviews and participant observation.     

Gendering Palestinian Dispossession: Evaluating Land Loss in the West Bank

Despite increasing attention to Palestinian territorial dispossession, there is inadequate attention paid to how this dispossession is gendered in its legitimising discourses and practices. Inattention to gender results in a failure to understand the power relations at play in the processes through which Palestinians are dispossessed of their land, the discourses that serve to support that dispossession and the impacts of that dispossession. This article examines the roles of Israeli hegemonic militarised masculinity as deployed in discourses and practices of “security” as well as idealised Zionist femininity and idealised Zionist masculinity as deployed in discourses and practices of “God‐given Righteousness”. It finds that both are effective means of dispossessing Palestinians of their land, and that in settlements in the West Bank, the hegemonic militarised masculinity is often subsumed under idealised Zionist femininity and masculinity when it comes to settlement expansion and the violent dispossession of Palestinian land.     

The gender dimension of the agrarian transition: women,men and livelihood diversification in two peri-urban farming communities in the Philippines

Based on parallel field research conducted in two peri-urban villages in the cities of Naga and Valencia, the Philippines, this article deploys gender analysis to understand livelihood diversification in the context of agrarian change. In analyzing the role of state organizations and NGOs in (re)producing gender differences, hierarchies, roles and identities within agrarian settings, it brings poststructuralist and postcolonial theory into conversation with political economy to explore how gender is at stake in daily livelihood struggles. Specifically, attention is drawn to how structural constraints and institutional discourses still render livelihood diversification a gendered project, and how state and other development organizations are continuing to perpetuate gender inequalities and reinscribe normative gender discourses, particularly around masculinities and women's reproductive roles, in agrarian communities.     

‘From cricket lover to terror suspect’ – challenging representations of young British Muslim men

In contemporary media and policy debates young British Muslim men are frequently described as experiencing cultural conflict, as alienated, deviant, underachieving, and as potential terrorists. In this article we seek to convey the everyday negotiations, struggles and structural constraints that shape the lives of young British Pakistani Muslim men in particular. We draw on interviews with British Pakistani Muslim men aged between 16 and 27 in Slough and Bradford. These are from a broader project, which focused on the link between education and ethnicity, and analysed the ways in which values and norms related to education, jobs and career advancement are accommodated, negotiated or resisted in the context of their families, communities and the wider society. A range of masculinities emerge in our data and we argue that these gender identities are defined in relational terms, to other ways of being Pakistani men and to being men in general, as well as to Pakistani femininities. While we recognise the fluidity, instability and situatedness of social identities, we also illustrate the ways in which masculinities are negotiated at the intersection of gender, ethnicity, class, religion, age and place and enacted within contexts which are themselves subjected to racialised and gendered processes. Our findings offer a varied and contextual understanding of British Pakistani masculinities.     

Automobility and masculinities between home and work: trucks as the ‘new normal’ in Newfoundland and Labrador

Automobiles are ubiquitous objects of private consumption and their meaning and use are shaped by different aspects of identity, including gender. The gender dimensions of automobility associated with particular types of vehicles have not been extensively researched. This article studies pickup trucks and masculinities in relation to home and work in the industrial construction sector in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. There, like in much of North America, trucks have become the most commonly purchased new vehicles over the last decade. Their widespread popular appeal contrasts with their historical development for manual labour gendered as masculine, such as farming and fishing, in rural places and environments conducive to such labour. Drawing on interviews with construction industry actors and workers, the article shows how new, expensive trucks have come to reflect the hegemonic masculinity at male-dominated industrial construction projects, while also showing how the meanings and uses of trucks are complex and contested. Trucks are understood to be functional for work and driving, but they are also status symbols, often used only sparingly for commuting, masculinized domestic work and leisure activities. The article unpacks the new and expanding popularity of the truck and its positioning in practice in relation to masculinities, work, and to the landscape in a place-based gender regime. In doing so, it contributes to efforts to contextualize masculinities in place, while also revealing how they are related to gender constructs in other places and at other scales.     

The consequences of internal displacement on civil war violence: Evidence from Syria

How do flows of internally displaced persons (IDPs) affect wartime violence? We argue that government and rebel forces respond to IDP flows in different ways, which condition where and when they employ violence. State responses are driven by the need to identify insurgents and their civilian supporters, and depend on how much information they have about where IDPs are coming from and where they are seeking to resettle. Rebel responses are driven by their need to monitor and control civilian movements, which leads to more violence against civilians in transit areas heavily trafficked by IDPs. Drawing on novel subnational data from Syria, we employ social network analysis to examine migration flow characteristics beyond aggregate IDP inflows and outflows. We find that the greater the local clustering of IDP flows – i.e., the less complex and diverse displacement movements are – the more pro-government combatants are able to detect IDPs’ origins and destinations, and the higher the number of civilian killings. Transit locations, meanwhile, become epicenters of rebel violence against civilians. While scholars have found that more information about civilian behavior causes combatants to employ more selective violence, our results suggest that more information about displacement prompts more collective violence from governments. The findings also indicate that governments respond to IDP flows after movement, whereas rebels respond to IDP flows during movement. This underscores the importance of focusing on how armed groups respond to displacement flows in order to better understand the consequences of population movements in wartime.     

The banality of displacement: Discourse and thoughtlessness in the internal refugee crisis in Colombia

Colombia has one of the largest internal refugee populations in the world. For years government agencies and NGOs presented vastly disparate statistics, with government figures showing much lower estimates of the amount of internally displaced persons, or IDPs. In this article I suggest that the discourse of displacement in Colombia was dominated by a “war over numbers” at the expense of a more complex characterization of the displaced population. Drawing on Hannah Arendt's suggestive ideas on the banality of evil, I propose the notion of the “banality of displacement” to examine two distinct but related processes. First, the normalization of violence over time has made forced displacement appear as a mundane social fact in Colombia. Second, this banality is actively produced through an “attitudinal thoughtlessness” in government and NGO circles. To illustrate this banality at play, I focus on two interrelated aspects. First, I examine the history of IDP management in Colombia, in particular the disputes over displacement statistics. Second, I explore the “colour-blindness” in the counting strategies and the lack of reliable data regarding displaced Afro-Colombians. In a final section I discuss ways in which the banality of displacement has been contested, both from civil society and by the Constitutional Court, which has challenged the Colombian government over its handling of the displacement crisis. I also suggest more broadly how a re-reading of Arendt brings a critical sensibility to other geopolitical contexts, exemplified by geographers' engagement with the “war on terror.”     

The Rise and Fall of ‘Internally Displaced People’ in the Central Peruvian Andes

This article analyses the possible effects of the introduction of the category of ‘internally displaced people’— IDP — in the context of violent conflict in central Peru. It gives an account of the ways in which the IDP category has been introduced and appropriated by local NGOs, people affected by violent conflict and displacement, and by the governmental organization, PAR, set up to facilitate return and repopulation after the declared end of the armed conflict. The category has facilitated and given leverage to a national organization of IDPs. However, the agencies and programmes that work in support of IDPs tend to regard existing mobile livelihood practices as an impediment for advocacy and longer‐term development strategies. This article suggests that, instead of considering displacement (and return) as an absolute break with the past, a focus on networks and mobile livelihoods may be a better way to help people affected by violent conflict to move beyond emergency relief.     

Hegemonic at home and subaltern abroad: Kamaiya masculinities and changing mobility in Nepal

As former bonded labourers (or slaves), the Kamaiya of far-west Nepal have a history of marginalization, poverty and limited mobility due to the constraints inherent in the Kamaiya system of bonded labour (banned in 2000). Based on ethnographic research in the post-slavery era, this article examines how mobility is becoming an important part of Kamaiya masculinities. I consider in particular an account of migration acquired over a series of interviews with a Kamaiya man named Ram. Ram’s migrant trajectory from Nepal to India and back over variable lengths of time reflect a broader literature on circular migration in India. I argue that transnationally performed migrant masculinities are alternatively subordinated and hegemonic across geographically diverse contexts. By accepting and performing subordinated, often oppressive masculine roles in a broader South Asian context, men such as Ram are producing new, locally hegemonic or at least desirable masculine roles in Kamaiya villages in Nepal.     

Homelessness,nature, and health: toward a feminist political ecology of masculinities

Engaging with feminist political ecology and leveraging experiences from a 16-month critical ethnography, this research explores ways in which masculinities served as both a rationale and an outcome of men facing homelessness living in the margins of an urban municipal public park – a space known as ‘the Hillside.’ Ethnographic narratives point to Hillside residents making their home in nature, connecting experiences in nature with various masculinities, and the gendered eschewing of social services. These portrayals further highlight the perceived feminization of social services within a context of rapidly neoliberalizing urban environments, and illustrate the ways participants positioned and engaged with social services. Entanglements of health and nonhuman nature prompt a feminist political ecological engagement with masculinity. Experiences from the Hillside add textured richness to discourses concerning the ways in which contemporary landscapes are constructed, perceived, experienced, and co-constituted through and with gender.     

‘It can be dangerous for the uterus’: hegemonic masculinity and cooperative recycling in São Paulo,Brazil

This study examines performative social relations, specifically the role of hegemonic masculinity in shaping gendered space. First, by drawing on personal experiences and qualitative data from my research in São Paulo, Brazil, I examine the most salient aspects of hegemonic masculinity in the lives of female recyclers. Second, I suggest that masculine domination is not simply something established by men which aims to oppress women, but hegemonic masculinities can be (re)produced by women. I affirm this notion by exploring the ways in which hegemonic masculinity and common perceptions of social roles, abilities, and inabilities are discursively (re)produced by female recyclers. In particular, I argue that exploring the subordinate position of women is a productive means to gain a deeper understanding of hegemonic masculinity, while also, the concept of hegemonic masculinity is an effective tool for understanding the subordinate role of women. My experiences with the recyclers provide a context through which the fluid, complex, and dynamic nature of hegemonic masculinity can be further revealed.     

Twentysomethings and twentagers: subjectivities,spaces and young men at home

This article examines young men's (aged 18–25 years) meanings of home and practices of homemaking, comprising material and social relations. The discussion contributes to three areas of geographical interest: home, masculinities and youth. Both geographies of home and masculinities have begun to consider men's experiences and meanings of home, but young men's domestic practices remain largely unexamined. Geographical work on youth has examined housing transitions, but the gendered experiences of young men need further interrogation. To provide insight into young men's homemaking, this article presents qualitative case studies drawn from fieldwork that investigated relations between masculinities and domesticities in Sydney, Australia. Young men are arguably out-of-place at home in conventional discourses of gender and space, but homes are nevertheless crucial sites for shaping masculine subjectivities. Masculinities and homes are co-constituted through domestic practices, generating diverse intersectional subjectivities and spaces. In this article, three subjectivity-space, or masculine-domestic, relations are discussed, which also counter the centring of heterosexual couple family homes in domestic imaginaries: young men in parental homes, share-housing and ‘alternative’ family homes. I examine similarities and differences across and within these masculine domesticities. This multiplicity of ‘youthful masculine domesticities’ offers a set of qualitative examples for use in public rhetoric that seeks to redress uneven gender dynamics in contemporary domestic life.     

Masculinities and Fieldwork: Widening the discussion

Although recent work on masculinities has emphasised the complex ways in which masculinities are produced, performed and interpreted in different contexts, to date these insights have been given little consideration in relation to the process of ethnographic research itself. In this paper, I explore the negotiation of masculinities during fieldwork, with an emphasis on issues confronting male researchers who fail to conform to dominant expectations of ‘manliness’ which have currency in a given setting. I review how male social scientists have written about their fieldwork experiences, and note that many of these accounts in some ways serve to reinscribe the hegemonic masculine positions of their authors. Through a discussion of my own fieldwork with young people in a British voluntary organisation, I address how my masculinity was critiqued and policed, particularly by young men. I conclude by calling for a wider discussion of masculinities and fieldwork. However, I also note my ambivalence about writing the gendered self into research, if this means that those who conform to hegemonic ideals will be validated in reaffirming these identities in print while others are asked to expose the ways in which they fail to do their gender ‘right’.

Aunque obras recientes de masculinidades han enfatizado las maneras complejas en que masculinidades se producen, se representan su papel, y se interpretan en contextos diferentes, hasta la fecha estas perspicacias no han dado mucha consideración con relación al proceso mismo de investigación etnográfica. En este artículo, exploro la negociación de masculinidades durante el trabajo de campo, con un énfasis de temas se enfrentan investigadores masculinos los cuales no se conformen de las expectaciones dominantes de ‘hombría’, lo que tiene valor en escenarios específicos. Reviso como científicos sociales masculinos han escrito sobre sus experiencias en el campo, y noto que muchas de estos relatos en algunos modos sirven para reinscribir las posiciones hegemónicas masculinas de sus autores. A través de una discusión de mi propio trabajo de campo con jóvenes de una organisación voluntaria británica, concluyo que requerimos una discusión mas amplia de masculinidades y trabajo de campo. Sin embargo, también noto mi ambivalencia de escribir su género mismo dentro de su investigación, si se significa que los que se conforman a las ideales hegemónicas estén validado en reafirmando sus identidades publicado, mientras se preguntan otros a revelar las maneras en que se fracasen para hacer su género ‘correcto’.     

Claiming and Controlling Space: Combining heterosexual fatherhood with artistic practice

This article is structured around nine short vignettes that explore the complex and embedded gendered relations of fatherhood for heterosexual male contemporary Canadian visual artists at different stages of life. In contributing to the geographical literature on work, gender, and identities, this article answers the questions: What form does hegemonic masculinity take in the visual arts? How do male artists organize and conceptualize work life and family life? What impact does fatherhood have on artistic identity construction? In formulating answers to these questions, I argue that dominant discourses of masculinity have left some men feeling illegitimate as both artists and fathers, and reliant on spatial control as a mechanism to ‘fix’ their artistic identities.     

Gendered mobilities in the making: moving from a pedestrian to vehicular mobility landscape in Shimshal,Pakistan

Although feminist geographers understand gender and mobility as mutually constitutive social processes, few studies explain how gender relations are constituted in particular mobility contexts, and how and why they shape mobility patterns in specific socio-spatial circumstances. We address these questions in an analysis of gendered mobilities in Shimshal, Pakistan, which until recently have taken shape in the context of a pedestrian mobility regime. The gender and mobility relationship has transformed as vehicular mobilities have replaced pedestrian mobilities with the construction of the Shimshal road. To demonstrate empirically the co-constitution of gender and mobility, we analyze aspects of socio-spatial context that have shaped gendered pedestrian mobilities, followed by those associated with the new vehicular mobility regime that are modifying gender relations in Shimshal. Shifting gender relations reshape corporeal mobility patterns. Road infrastructure has enhanced men’s and youth’s outbound travel as wage earners and students, respectively. These mobilities have reshaped women’s capacity to move, constraining their mobility beyond the village. As prosperity becomes contingent on outbound movement, men’s and youths’ social horizons and mobilities are expanding, while women’s compromised access to mobility as a social resource produces new mobility hierarchies and gendered exclusions.     

‘La doble condición’: landmine victims,forced displacement,and disability in Colombia’s Magdalena Medio

The small body of scholarship that examines the intersection between forced displacement and physical disability draws important attention to the material difficulties simultaneously disabled and displaced people experience. Instead of focusing on disability as a condition lived against the spatial backdrop of forced displacement, this paper approaches disability and displacement as mutually referential spatial conditions. Based on fieldwork with internally displaced landmine victims in Colombia’s Magdalena Medio region, this research highlights how the intersection between physical impairment and forced displacement produces both disabling spatial imaginaries of fear as well as painfully embodied rhythms of daily life. Nonetheless, this paper draws attention to urban agricultural projects’ enabling potential to produce grounding rhythms of labor for landmine victims. Finally, this paper suggests that contexts of forced displacement require close consideration of spatial imaginaries of fear as well as experiences of direct structural violence as key factors underpinning the social production of disability.