Mabel Kikelomo Olayide Ayo March 2023 ID: 202205519

Complex Masculinities

The re-evaluation of gender in modern culture includes the friction and strain caused
by gender roles. A critical appraisal of masculinity, femininity, and androgyny as standards
for successful functioning in a society that is changing quickly is part of this gender re-
evaluation. Men and women analyse, maintain, and redefine their attitudes, beliefs, and
behaviours regarding their masculine, feminine, and androgynous roles through the process
of gender-role re-evaluation. Re-evaluating gender roles is another aspect of society's
preoccupation with how the sexes relate to and interact with one another. Currently, the sexes
are asking questions regarding their gender-role definitions and how they have been
emotionally influenced or restricted by their socialisation and sexism in their lives. Many
people are learning from these gender re-evaluations that gender-role tensions and conflicts
result from early gender-role socialisation and societal expectations about the appropriateness
of masculine and feminine duties. Many people find it challenging to fit the re-evaluation of
gender roles into their emotional, professional, and interpersonal lives, and there is significant
struggle to do so without strain and conflict.

Concentration on the magnitude and causes of ambivalent attitudes towards gender

roles and female participation in the workforce from a comparative perspective, ambivalent
sentiments are those that appear to be inconsistent and contradictory. It is further argued that
a gap between people's objectives and the structural likelihood of attaining them may lead to
attitudinal ambivalence. Referencing the work of Mirra Komarovsky entitled ‘Cultural
Contradictions and Sex Roles: The Masculine Case’:
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/225407, many studies have extensively
documented the role conflicts that women experience. The goal in this research was to
determine whether recent social changes and the resulting misalignment of sex roles have had
stressful consequences for both men and women. It was thus expected that involved males
would have a socially structured lack of resources for upholding the standard of intellectual
masculinity in their interactions with their female companions quite close in age. In this case,
this theory was proven and data from the study lent support to an explanation for the
majority's adjustment.

Further analysis of the work of Mirra Komorovsky entitled, ‘Cultural Contradictions

and Sex Roles’: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/219982, according to a study
of women, they frequently encounter expectations for their adult sex roles that are mutually
exclusive. That is why in instance, a female might address the contradiction between the
image of a housewife and the ideal of a "professional girl" through her family and her male
friends. Thus some females play ambiguous roles in line with the demands of the movement,
and all experience the unease and insecurity that are the psychological effects of cultural
conflict. Conferring with the work of Carrigan, Connell and Lee:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/657315, both men and women have been impacted by sexual
politics and feminism, notably homosexual politics and gay masculinities, both in the field
and in sociology. Sex-role studies had primarily discussed the roles played by women in
families, but it had also included men. Studies of masculinity conducted prior to the rise of
feminist theory concentrated on sex role paradigms, modernisation, and a refusal to recognise
oppression or power. But, aside from those that examine gay masculinities, active analyses of
masculinity are few and far between. Men's work that emphasises sexual exploitation,
brutality, and patriarchal guilt is further classified as "paralysing politics of guilt." These are
the cornerstone ideologies of a masculine standpoint in the dichotomy of inter-relational
gender identities from a post-modern perspective.
Mabel Kikelomo Olayide Ayo March 2023 ID: 202205519

REFERENCE LIST

Carrigan, T., Connell, B. & Lee, J. (1985) Toward A New Sociology of Masculinity, Theory
and Society, (5), Volume 14, pp. 551-604.

Komarovsky, M. (1946) Cultural Contradictions and Sex Roles, American Journal of

Sociology, (3), Volume 52, pp. 184-189.

Komarovsky, M. (1973) Cultural Contradictions and Sex Roles: The Masculine Case,
American Journal of Sociology, (4), Volume 78, pp. 873-844.