Country Boys
Masculinity and Rural Life
Hugh Campbell editor Michael Mayerfeld Bell editor Margaret Finney editor
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Pennsylvania State University Press
Published:15th Jul '06
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- Hardback£96.95(9780271028743)
Rural masculinity is hardly a typical topic for a book. There is something unexpected, faintly disturbing, even humorous about investigating that which has long been seen and yet so often overlooked. But the ways in which we think about and socially organize masculinity are of great significance in the lives of both men and women. In Country Boys we also see that masculinity is no less significant in rural life than in urban life.
The essays in this volume offer much-needed insight into the myths and stereotypes as well as the reality of the lives of rural men. Interdisciplinary in scope, the contributions investigate what it means to be a farming man, a logging man, or a boy growing up in a country town and how this impacts both men and women in city and country. Chapters cover not only the United States but also Europe, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand, giving the book an unusually broad scope.
“Country Boys demonstrates how images and realities of the lives of rural men—from cowboys, farmers, and lumberjacks to militiamen, agrarian patriarchs, and the lads down at the local pub—play central roles in the social construction of masculinities of all sorts, as well as in the gendered construction of rural life. Avoiding both idealization and denigration of rural masculinities, these essays indicate and excavate, literally and figuratively, underexplored locations to yield important and enlightening sociological insights. The essays in this volume make a very significant contribution to our understandings of the economies, sexualities, politics, and health of rural life on a global scale.”
—Harry Brod, University of Northern Iowa
“This edited volume represents a solid contribution to two areas of study in sociology. . . . The editors present a cogent introduction to the field, and the last two chapters are thought-provoking explorations of the changes surrounding rural masculinities.”
—A.A. Hickey Choice
“The collection is refreshingly progressive and, at times, unapologetically optimistic, being run through with the leitmotiv of the very real possibility of change.”
—Thomas Thurnell-Read The Sociological Review
ISBN: 9780271028750
Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 22mm
Weight: 540g
336 pages