“Be a man”: boys’ talk about gender in families

ABSTRACT

This paper draws from an ethnographic study of 8–9-year-old primary school boys’ construction of masculinities. We focus on a group of Indian and black school boys situated in a working class setting in South Africa. In their narratives, the family emerged as one of the central organising sites for the social production and reproduction of masculinity. While masculinities are produced within a broader social and cultural context, this paper gives significance to family dynamics in shaping and reinforcing young masculinities. We show that while boys address family in relation to the reification of gender binaries and hegemonic patterns related to gender roles, sexuality and violence, their performances of masculinities were not entirely reiterative of these norms. Instead, boys actively challenged, negotiated and resisted dominant norms hence destabilising homogenous conceptualisations of children as passive recipients of received knowledge and oppressed power. We foreground young boys’ agency in their negotiation of masculinities and further demonstrate how the broader historical and social forces of race, class and culture intersect with dominant gender discourses within the context of families to enable plural versions of masculinities.

KEYWORDS:

• Young boys
• gender
• masculinities
• families
• South Africa

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethics approval statement

Ethical clearance obtained from the University of KwaZulu-Natal ethics committee and from the South African Department of Education.

Notes

1 South Africa has a unique political and historical landscape that arose out of apartheid and colonialism. Under apartheid, people were categorised as black, white, Indian, and coloured (mixed-race). These categories are now used for social redress.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by South African Research Chairs Initiative of the Department of Science and Technology and National Research Foundation of South Africa [grant number 98407].

Notes on contributors

Diloshini Govender

Diloshini Govender is a PhD graduate from the School of Education, University of KwaZulu-Natal. Her key area of research focuses on exploring how primary school boys’ construct and negotiate masculinities.

Deevia Bhana

Deevia Bhana, PhD, is Professor and the DSI/NRF South African Research Chair in Gender and Childhood Sexuality. Her most recent books are Love, Sex and Teenage Sexuality Cultures in South Africa: 16 Turning 17 (Routledge, 2018), Childhood Sexuality and AIDS Education: The Price of Innocence (Routledge, 2016) and Girls Negotiating Porn in South Africa: Power, Play and Sexuality (2022).