Boyhood Studies

This issue of Boyhood Studies contains material from established and emerging authors who continue to tackle important issues related to boys’ and young men's lives across the globe as well as within literature written about and for boys. We also look forward and draw readers attention to an upcoming special issue (volume 17, issue 1) that focuses on global south perspectives on youth and will be edited by Shannon Philip and colleagues. As new questions arise within academic institutions in the Global North around decolonization and colonial frameworks, this forthcoming special issue will explore how a decolonial and Global South–focused analysis of young lives can contribute analytically to the field of boyhood and young men.

Puberty marks a time of significant transition in the life of a boy as he progresses toward adulthood—and a time of confusion and concern. Many questions are likely thought or asked by the boy as he approaches and lives with puberty. Sex education is taught formally and informally, in the home, on the schoolyard, in the media. Over the twentieth and into the twenty-first century, publishers have produced numerous books about puberty and its experience for young readers. In this article, I consider a specific debate that unfolds in these books, namely, circumcision. To these ends, I define the circumcision debate, briefly consider the genre of puberty books, and analyze the circumcision debate in these books. While these books recognize a circumcision debate, they ultimately frame the circumcised penis or intact penis as equally viable and normal.

This article analyzes debates about online pornography filters and youth in the Swedish press between 2016 and 2020, focusing on the depiction of boys and young men. Critics of filtering software argued that boys could self-regulate if they were provided better sex education and if parents communicated with them about pornography. In contrast, advocates posited that boys are incapable of developing healthy sexuality because online pornography is a powerful drug that leads to addiction and contributes to a rape culture. As boys were considered unable to get a filter “in their head,” proponents argued for disciplinary supervision through software in schools.

Using a historical, autoethnographic approach in this article, we discuss six student-led cricket matches that we organized in Perth, Australia, from 1979 to 1981. From a Foucauldian perspective, we present these games as a student-led resistance against the normalizing and disciplinary processes of official school and youth cricket. The original scoresheets and match summaries exist both then and now only as subjugated knowledges. As these matches’ two captains, we attribute the positive atmosphere, which encouraged such creative initiatives, as being partly due to one class teacher's vision and ethos, which contrasted with the toxic hypermasculinity of the other men teachers. Through a look at our student-led cricket matches of 1979–1981, we recall memories of whiteness within a socially conservative and overall pro-British cultural context.

“Brotherhood” is used for marketing all-male Catholic schools and is often synonymously with “belonging.” This article examines those terms from three perspectives—the academic literature, the students’ views, and the views of faculty and staff—to define them. Regarding school, belonging can be defined as being affiliated with the institution, being personally accepted, respected, and included in the social environment. In Catholic schools, belonging is fostered through religion classes, religious art, statues, crucifixes, and displays of student work that illustrate beliefs and practices of the Catholic life, as well as social justice projects. The elements of brotherhood are a shared experience that unites the members and is consistent with the values of the group, group members caring about each other with a desire to see the members of the group succeed, and members taking responsibility for the group and making sacrifices when necessary.

The changing dynamics of masculinity in a post-feminist world entails an analysis of the representations of boyhood and masculinity in varied temporalities and cultures. Primarily through the theories of Judith Butler, Raewyn Connell, and David Buchbinder, this article explores the problem of men and their social roles. It discusses the issue of double vulnerability faced by gay men in a patriarchal social dynamic that affects their identity construction. Through the spectacle of textual analysis, we examine Nemat Sadat's, The Carpet Weaver (2019), the tale of Kanishka, a gay boy living in a war-torn Afghanistan, and his migration to America, which aids in shaping his identity. We also examine the intersections of the masculine image within a political war zone, exploring the subject of gendered violence against men.

Young lives in the Global South are shaped by myriad dynamics of colonialism, economic inequalities, race, class, caste, and gendered and generational inequalities. In particular, the colonial legacies and contemporary capitalist inequalities within the global order have powerfully redefined what youth lives are in many countries of the Global South today. In this commentary piece, I argue that there is great value in thinking about youth through empirical, historical, and relational perspectives from the Global South, primarily for analytical sophistication but also to enrich mainstream youth sociology itself. This commentary piece also opens a dialogue between “youth sociology” and “connected sociologies” in order to produce some decolonial Global South perspectives on youth. Through focusing on changing youth cultures in India and South Africa, this commentary explores how neocolonial and neoliberal processes shape youth cultures and the many global relationalities, connections, and inequalities that emerge from thinking comparatively.

Reigeluth, Christopher S. 2022. The Masculinity Workbook for Teens: Discover What Being a Guy Means to You. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger Publications