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OverviewAre men truly predisposed to violence and aggression? Is it the biological fate of males to struggle for domination over women and vie against one another endlessly? These and related queries have long vexed philosophers, social scientists, and other students of human behavior. In Brutes in Suits, historian John Pettegrew examines theoretical writings and cultural traditions in the United States to find that, Darwinian arguments to the contrary, masculine aggression can be interpreted as a modern strategy for taking power. Drawing ideas from varied and at times seemingly contradictory sources, Pettegrew argues that traditionally held beliefs about masculinity developed largely through language and cultural habit-and that these same tools can be employed to break through the myth that brutishness is an inherently male trait. A major re-synthesis of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century manhood, Brutes in Suits develops ambitious lines of research into the social science of sexual difference and professional history's celebration of rugged individualism; the hunting-and-killing genre of popular men's literature; that master text of hypermasculinity: college football; military culture, war making, and finding pleasure in killing; and patriarchy, sexual jealousy, and the law. This timely assessment of the evolution of masculine culture will be welcomed and debated by social and intellectual historians for years to come. Full Product DetailsAuthor: John PettegrewPublisher: Johns Hopkins University Press Imprint: Johns Hopkins University Press Dimensions: Width: 15.60cm , Height: 2.80cm , Length: 23.50cm Weight: 0.612kg ISBN: 9781421407647ISBN 10: 1421407647 Pages: 424 Publication Date: 26 November 2012 Recommended Age: From 17 Audience: Professional and scholarly , Professional & Vocational Format: Paperback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: Manufactured on demand ![]() We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier. Table of Contents"Preface Introduction: The De-Evolutionary Turn in U.S. Masculinity Darwin and Evolutionary Psychology, Then and Now John Dewey, Pierre Bourdieu, and Masculinity as a Habit of Mind ""The Caveman within Us"" and the Masculinist Culture of Mimicry 1. Rugged Individualism Frederick Jackson Turner's Frontier Thesis: Origins, Composition, and Meanings Turner's Influence on the Social Psychology of the City Radical Individualism: Masculinist Art, Angst, and Alienation in the City Dudism, Cowgirl Feminism, and the Search for Authenticity in the ""Old West"" 2. Brute Fictions The American Literary Genre of Hunting and Killing Reading for Plot: Call of the Wild, The Virginian, and the New Male Readership Irony, Atavism, and Other Variations on the De-Evolutionary Theme 3. College Football Thorstein Veblen and the Rise of ""Exotic Ferocity"" in American College Football Victor Turner, Stanford Football, and Hypermasculine Liminal Subjects Clifford Geertz at the Big Game: ""Thick Description"" of Football as the Cultural Equivalent of War 4. War in the Head Civil War Memory, Blood Sacrifice, and Modern American Fighting Spirit Of Rough Riders, Blood Brothers, and Roosevelt the Berserker War as Sport for Doughboys, Golden Boys, and Slackers Postscript: Marine Corps Spirit and the U.S. Warrior Class, 1941–2003 5. Laws of Sexual Selection Race, Lynch Law, and the Manly Provocation Marriage, Cultural Defense in The People v. Chen, and the Heat-of-Passion Defense in Texas Compulsory Heterosexuality, the Charles Atlas Muscle-Beach Fable, and Sexual Dimorphism Unbound Epilogue: Irony, Instinct, and War Irony, Sam Fussell's Muscle, and Masculinity as a ""Parodic Tableau Vivant"" Instinct, Deep Masculinity, and the Decline of Males The Iraq War, Hypermasculinity, and the Metaphor of Disease Notes Essay on Sources Index"ReviewsPettegrew... casts a challenge against conventionally accepted Darwinian notions of brutishness as an essential and natural male trait. He argues that male dominance and aggression are not predestined by instinct, but culturally and ideologically constructed, desired, and performed through time... This book contributes to intellectual and cultural history on gender and manhood. Choice 2008 Pettegrew's book remains rigorous and passionate in its narration of the historic appeal as well as the immediate dangers of de-evolutionary masculinity. -- Jennifer Travis American Historical Review 2008 Ambitious study... valuable in exploring the vast cultural production of masculine instinct as a fact of life. -- Woody Register Labor History 2009 To Pettegrew's great credit, his study looks both forward and back: at the way masculinity was naturalized as aggressive in turn-of-the-century society; and, perhaps more importantly, at the extent to which modern-day historians, scientists, and ordinary citizens deploy discourses of evolutionary psychology, sociobiology, and psychology in a misplaced effort to read gender as the offspring of biology and society. -- Martin A. Berger Journal of American History 2008 Will be of interest to scholars of cultures of violence and middle-American masculinity. He offers a solid history of the naturalizing revelry of men in the violence they do. -- Neal King American Journal of Sociology 2009 It will spark debate within the field for its bold explanation of why modern men feel as though violence is both their burden and right. -- Ryan Anderson H-SHGAPE, H-Net Reviews 2008 A vivid, massively researched history of 'hyper-masculine' sensibility at the turn of the twentieth century... An instructive and provocative view of men's dark side. -- Peter Filene Men and Masculinities 2008 This fascinating and ambitious study explores how an aggressive 'de-evolutionary' model of masculinity was woven into a broad range of American institutions... Pettegrew brings together feminist theory, 'an anthropological ironist perspective' and a wealth of gender studies scholarship to investigate the development of a pervasive mindset of brutish masculinity within a rich selection of archival and popular cultural materials... This well-researched and engaging volume will certainly enrich the ever-growing field of men's studies. -- Christina Jarvis Gender and History 2008 Pettegrew... casts a challenge against conventionally accepted Darwinian notions of brutishness as an essential and natural male trait. He argues that male dominance and aggression are not predestined by instinct, but culturally and ideologically constructed, desired, and performed through time... This book contributes to intellectual and cultural history on gender and manhood. * Choice * Pettegrew's book remains rigorous and passionate in its narration of the historic appeal as well as the immediate dangers of de-evolutionary masculinity. -- Jennifer Travis * American Historical Review * Ambitious study... valuable in exploring the vast cultural production of masculine instinct as a fact of life. -- Woody Register * Labor History * To Pettegrew's great credit, his study looks both forward and back: at the way masculinity was naturalized as aggressive in turn-of-the-century society; and, perhaps more importantly, at the extent to which modern-day historians, scientists, and ordinary citizens deploy discourses of evolutionary psychology, sociobiology, and psychology in a misplaced effort to read gender as the offspring of biology and society. -- Martin A. Berger * Journal of American History * Will be of interest to scholars of cultures of violence and middle-American masculinity. He offers a solid history of the naturalizing revelry of men in the violence they do. -- Neal King * American Journal of Sociology * It will spark debate within the field for its bold explanation of why modern men feel as though violence is both their burden and right. -- Ryan Anderson * H-SHGAPE, H-Net Reviews * [A] vivid, massively researched history of 'hyper-masculine' sensibility at the turn of the twentieth century... An instructive and provocative view of men's dark side. -- Peter Filene * Men and Masculinities * This fascinating and ambitious study explores how an aggressive 'de-evolutionary' model of masculinity was woven into a broad range of American institutions... Pettegrew brings together feminist theory, 'an anthropological ironist perspective' and a wealth of gender studies scholarship to investigate the development of a pervasive mindset of brutish masculinity within a rich selection of archival and popular cultural materials... This well-researched and engaging volume will certainly enrich the ever-growing field of men's studies. -- Christina Jarvis * Gender and History * Author InformationJohn Pettegrew is an associate professor of history and director of the American Studies Program at Lehigh University and coeditor of the three-volume Public Women, Public Words: A Documentary History of American Feminism. Tab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |