From Panthers to Promise Keepers: Rethinking the Mens Movement (New Social Formations) - Softcover

Judith Newton

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0847691306 ISBN 13: 9780847691302

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers (UK), 2004

Synopsis

Written for a general audience, From Panthers to Promise Keepers draws on years of readings about, interviews with, and intimate observations of the men and networks who were involved in what some have called the mens movement. Focusing on the decades between 1950 and 2000 in the U.S., From Panthers to Promise Keepers places networks of gay men and of black men (and women) at the center of its investigations, exploring some of the unexpected ways in which these seemingly marginal networks were precursors to, rather than mere followers of, the white and heterosexual mens groups that followed and that became the objects of media attention. This study also demonstrates that networks with radically different positions on important social issues nonetheless shared two related activities—criticizing individualist, self-making values and attempting, through surprisingly similar ritual practices, to construct ideals of masculinity that were more expressive of vulnerability, tenderness, and care.

Mens politically varied efforts to refashion masculine ideals during the last 50 years have contributed to a different global climate with respect to masculinities. Near the end of the 1990s, agencies such as UNESCO helped the reform of masculine ideals become more widely seen as a necessary component of movements for social justice and a culture of peace. Current efforts to revive a more aggressive and force-based masculine ideal, a masculinity for a culture of war, are one of many testaments to the cultural resonance of what has been called the mens movement.

About this title

About the Author

Judith Newton is professor of women and gender studies at University of California, Davis. She is the author and editor of many books, including Women, Power, and Subversion: Social Strategies in British Fiction, 1778-1860 and Starting Over: Feminism and the Politics of Cultural Critique. She is currently head of the Consortium for Women and Research at UC Davis.

Edition details

• Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers (UK)
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0847691306
• ISBN 13: 9780847691302
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304