Contestations on Masculinity in the Context of Work: A Post-modernist Study of Mining and Steelworks

Abstract

The sociohistorical time called postmodernity has destroyed previously established social boundaries (Bauman, 2001). A crisis of masculinity also prevails in this context, provoking a questioning of masculinity, as well as of the predominance of older male cultural models in organizational arenas (Amaral, 2005; Brooks, 2010; Robinson, 2000). Using a cultural approach (Connell, 2004; Prasad, 2012) this article aims to analyze how the changes in masculinity have affected the male division of labor in the mining and steel sector. An important aspect is that most of the work on gender is dedicated to studying femininity as something inherent to women, while another is studying the phenomenon of masculinity in the workplace. This field research was a qualitative one that collected data through semi-structured interviews. Changes were observed to have occurred in relation to the division of labor between men and women, however, these changes occur more rapidly in private life than in the workplace. Masculinity has the function of organizing work. An inability to perform work activities related to command and conceptualization is attributed to women and effeminate homosexual and heterosexual men.

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