Re-examining Hegemonic Masculinity in High School Rugby: The Body, Compliance and Resistance

Abstract

While certain patterns of masculinity can assume hegemonic status to operate at an unquestioned, common sense level use of the concept of hegemonic masculinity runs the risk of missing multiple patterns of masculinity operating within and in relation to hegemonic masculinity in and around sport. Drawing on research conducted on rugby in an Australian Greater Public School (GPS) school, this article examines the ways in which variation, diversity, and resistance can be found operating within a particular form of hegemonic masculinity. Through critical re-examination of data from a study conducted in 1997, it peels back a layer of apparent compliance with a hegemonic form of masculinity among the boys in the 1st XV rugby team to identify a form of embodied resistance in the desire of the boys in the team to adopt a style of rugby that challenged the school's traditional approach.