‘It was good to learn how to show affection’: Central American men who reject hypermasculinity

Abstract

To understand why some men ‘reproduce’ socially legitimated violence in their relations with other men, women, children and sub-alterns, and some do not, it is necessary to go beyond structural accounts to an understanding of the dynamics through which cultural demands, environmental constraints and socialisation shape subjectivity. This is an exploratory study of a small sample of men, who reject the use of disciplinary violence towards children and differ from the ‘hegemonic’ hypermasculine norm in other domains. Attention is drawn to the critical role of attachment experiences in enabling men to reject violence as a normative practice. These experiences appear to have galvanised these men's capacity to accurately interpret their own mental states and those of others.

Para entender las rezones por las cuales algunos hombres ‘reproducen’ a la violencia legitimada por la sociedad, en sus relaciones con otros hombres, con mujeres, niñ@s y grupos subalternos, es necesario mirar más allá de los factores estructurales, y trazar la manera en la cual la cultura, el entorno, y la socialización afectan a la subjetividad. Este estudio exploratorio de un pequeño numero de hombres que rechazan el machismo hegemónico en sus entorno, y de incluyendo el uso del ‘castigo’ físico como forma de socializar y educar a sus hij@s. Se llama la atención en particular, al apego y a los factores comúnmente asociados con la resiliencia psicológica, en explicar el proceso por los cuales estos hombres llegan a rechazar a la violencia. Los hallazgos de este estudio exploratorio son congruentes con otros, que llaman la atención a la capacidad de los hombres que rechazan a la violencia, de interpretar a sus propios estados mentales y comprender la subjetividad de l@s otr@s.

Keywords:

• resilience
• masculinity
• Guatemala
• parenting

Palabras claves::

• resiliencia
• masculinidad
• Guatemala
• padres

Acknowledgements

The doctoral fieldwork on which this paper was based was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). We would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and Dr Matthew Broome for reading and commenting on a draft of this paper and to Karin Friederic, Oswaldo Montoya and Jessica Martinez for their insight. Our thanks are due, above all, to these men and others who shared their life histories.

Notes

1. Data was recorded and analysed using SPSS. Bivariate analysis, using the χ² procedure, showed the relationship between variables with a statistical significance of <0.05. All categories were entered into a logistic regression model in numeric blocks and were eliminated through backward selection, using a stepwise process. This elimination process halted when all remaining variables had statistically significant associations (p= <0.05) (OR 0.386, p<0.030). For example, it was possible to see that parents who never struck children (around 30% of the population) tended to respond that they had been ‘raised with much love,’ did not complain that children were ‘disobedient,’ tended to have secondary education and live closer to the city centre. They also tended to express affection through conversation and positive reinforcement. Parents who used the belt or whip were (i) less likely to say that they were ‘raised with love’ (OR 0.386, p<0.030); (ii) more likely to say that they punished children because the latter ‘disobey or go out without permission’ (OR 2.887, p<0.022); (iii) more likely be women who have sole or primary responsibility for disciplinary practices (OR 3.925, p<0.015); and (iv) more likely to live in rural villages rather than the edge of the city (OR 0.148, p<0.017).

2. White Ribbon Campaign (www.whiteribbon.com, accessed 1 July 2009).

3. http://www.whiteribbon.com/; http://www.lacobranco.org.br/