Theme 9: Gendered sexualed transnationalisations, deconstructing the dominant: Transforming men, “centres”, knowledge/practice

By Katherine Harrison on 29 Jun | 0 comments

Theme 9: Gendered sexualed transnationalisations, deconstructing the dominant: Transforming men, “centres” and knowledge/policy/practice

Transnational processes operate beyond nations, across nations, between nations, and within nations.(1) Various forms of transnationalisations, coupled with postcoloniality and global processes, have created new and changing material and representational hierarchies. This GEXcel research theme focuses on these various gendered, sexualed,(2) intersectional, embodied, transnational processes, in relation to contemporary and potential changes in power relations. The theme develops from and builds on the work process in two of the earlier GEXcel research themes, namely: Theme 1 (“Gender, Sexuality and Global Change”) (http://www.genderexcel.org/node/96),(3) and Theme 2 (“Deconstructing the Hegemony of Men and Masculinities: Contradictions of Absence”) (http://www.genderexcel.org/node/101).(4)

More precisely, this research theme addresses the relations between the construction of what may appear as “general” or generic social processes, and the deconstruction of what may appear as “specific” forms of the dominant.(5) Such dynamics, and contradictions, are examined through and in terms of the possibilities of transformation and social change, rather than static description. In particular, the possible transforming of men and other “centres” is highlighted. In one sense, this process can be understood as an attempt to apply some of the insights of postcolonialism, transnational feminisms,(6) and “Southern theory”,(7) to men,(8) the political North and other “centres”. The One(s) are made into the Other(s).(5) These reversals and transformations are not only about the much cited need to relate, or “integrate”, theory and practice, but concern more complex relations of knowledge/policy/practice.

Transnational processes occur in/through multiple transnational sites and arenas, including:
•    transnational business corporations and governmental organisations, the almost total dominance of men at top levels of transnational corporate management, and their gender-segregated labour forces;
•    global finance, and the masculinisation of capital market trading and business media;
•    militarism and the arms trade;
•    international sports industries and their gender segregation;
•    migration;
•    ICTs, virtualisation, image transfer and circulation;
•    the sex trade, and sexualisation in the global mass media;
•    transportation, water, environment, energy;
•    knowledge production.

Transnationalisations take many forms and have many implications for men and gender relations.(9) A key example of the impact and power of transnationalisation is the importance of managers in large transnational organisations for the formation and reproduction of gender orders. However, transnationalisations are among the most contradictory of processes, with multiple forms of absence for both men in power and those dispossessed through, for example, forced migration. Multiple forms of transnationalisations problematise taken-for-granted national and organisational contexts, men and gender relations in many ways.

This research theme is specified through three overlapping sub-themes. The first two consider the implications of transnationalisations, applied, first, to the hegemony of men and other privileged “centres”, and, second, to knowledge production, including virtual knowledge production. The third sub-theme highlights new developments in critical studies on men and masculinities in the light of these and other processes of substantive and theoretical change:

(i)    the impact of transnationalisations in changing, critiquing and deconstructing privileged “centres”, including the hegemony of men.(10) It addresses the contradictory implications of transnationalisations for new patriarchal forms (“transnational patriarchies” or “transpatriarchies)(11) and the (de)construction of the hegemony of men’ and other privileged “centres”, such as “Europe”, “the North”, “white people”. This may, for example, include the interplay of men’s transnational privilege and transnational threat to (some aspects of) men, or other parallel processes.

(ii)    transnationalisations of knowledge, knowledge production and knowledge communities, including virtual knowledge communities. This includes deconstructing dominant hierarchies of knowledge, representation and different sensory media, for example, changes in the relative valuing of the written word, spoken word, and the visual. This is important for the marginalisation, probably increasing marginalisation, of certain social groups in multicultural contexts of knowledge. The transnationalisation of knowledge production also has repercussions for both everyday ‘lived realities’ and the political development of global or transnational (pro)feminism more generally.

(iii)    new developments in deconstructing the hegemony of men and masculinities in terms of age/ageing, embodiment, virtuality and transnationalisations. This sub-theme is a specific development of the work in GEXcel Theme 2 (“Deconstructing the Hegemony of Men and Masculinities”). It addresses new developments in both substantive studies and theorisations on men and masculinities, and the sub-field of critical studies on men and masculinities. In both cases major emphasis is placed on positive critiques of existing frameworks, and of possible separations between this sub-field and feminist, queer and other critical gender and sexuality scholarship more generally. In this analyses, men may be subject to undoing, Othering and potential abolition as a powerful social category.

We welcome applications, focusing on one or more of the sub-themes above, to become part of this exciting research theme and thriving research environment. It is also possible to make application to participate in the theme, as a self-funded GEXcel Open Position Scholar.

Notes
(1)    For example, Aihwa Ong (1999) Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationalism, Durham, NC: Duke University Press, Durham, NC; Sallie Westwood and Annie Phizacklea (2000) Trans-nationalism and the Politics of Belonging, Routledge, London; Ludger Pries (ed.) (2001) New Transnational Social Spaces, Routledge, London; Patricia R. Pessar and Sarah J. Mahler (2001) Gender and Transnational Migration, Center for Migration and Development, Princeton University, Working Paper #01-06e: http://cmd.princeton.edu/Papers_pages/trans_mig.htm; Jeff Hearn (2004) ‘Tracking ‘the transnational’: Studying transnational organizations and managements, and the management of cohesion’, Culture and Organization, 10(4): 273-290; Steven Vertovec (2009) Transnationalism, London: Routledge.

(2)    ‘Sexualed’ refers to having meaning or structure in relation to sexuality, and is thus broader than some uses of both ‘sexual’ and ‘sexualised’. See Jeff Hearn and Wendy Parkin (1987/1995) ‘Sex’ at ‘Work’, New York: Prentice Hall/St Martin’s.

(3)    See GEXcel Volumes II-IV: http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/48, http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/49, http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/50;

(4)    See GEXcel Volumes V-VII: http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/51, http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/55, http://www.genderexcel.org/webfm_send/61

(5)    Jeff Hearn (1996) ‘Deconstructing the dominant: making the One(s) the Other(s)’, Organization: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Organization, Theory and Society, 3(4): 611-626.

(6)    For example, Inderpal Grewal and Caren Kaplan (eds.) (1994) Scattered Hegemonies: Postmodernity and Transnational Feminist Practices. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press; Chandra Talpade Mohanty (2003) Feminism Without Borders: Decolonizing Theory, Practicing Solidarity, Durham, NC: Duke University Press; Manisha Desai (2006) ‘From autonomy to solidarities: Transnational feminist political strategies’, in Kathy Davis, Mary S. Evans and Judith Lorber (eds.) Handbook on Gender and Women’s Studies, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 457-468.

(7)    Raewyn Connell (2008) Southern Theory, Cambridge: Polity; Helen Meekosha (2008) Contextualizing disability: developing southern/ global theory. Keynote paper given to 4th Biennial Disability Studies Conference, Lancaster University, UK 2nd-4th September. http://www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/events/disabilityconference_archive/2008/key...

(8)    For example, Lahoucine Ouzgane and Daniel Coleman (1998) ‘Postcolonial masculinities: Introduction’, Jouvert: A Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 2(1); Robert Morrell and Sandra Swart (2005) ‘Men in the Third World: Postcolonial perspectives on masculinity’, in Michael Kimmel, Jeff Hearn and R.W. [Raewyn] Connell (eds.) Handbook of Studies on Men and Masculinities, Thousand Oaks, CA Sage, 90-113.

(9)    For example, Andrea Cornwall and Nancy Lindisfarne (eds.) (1994) Dislocating Masculinity: Comparative Ethnographies, London: Routledge; Marysia Zalewski and Jane Palpart (eds.) (1998) The ‘Man’ Question in International Relations, Westview Press, Oxford; Jeff Hearn and Wendy Parkin (2001) Gender, Sexuality and Violence in Organizations, London: Sage; Penny Griffin (2005) Neoliberal Economic Discourses and Hegemonic Masculinity(ies): Masculine Hegemony (Dis)Embodied, IPEG Papers in Global Political Economy No. 19. http://bisa-ipeg.org/papers/19PennyGriffin.pdf; Jeff Hearn and Keith Pringle, with members of CROME (2006/2009) European Perspectives on Men and Masculinities: National and Transnational Approaches, New York: Palgrave Macmillan; Jeff Hearn (2006) ‘The implications of information and communication technologies for sexualities and sexualised violences’, Political Geography, 25(8): 944-963; Emily Esplen and Alan Greig (2008) Politicising Masculinities: Beyond the Personal. Brighton: Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex; Mike Donaldson, Ray Hibbins, Richard Howson and Bob Pease (eds.) (2009) Migrant Men: Critical Studies of Masculinities and the Migration Experience. New York: Routledge.

(10)     Jeff Hearn (2004) ‘From hegemonic masculinity to the hegemony of men’, Feminist Theory, 5(1): 49-72.

(11)    Jeff Hearn (2009) ‘Patriarchies, transpatriarchies and intersectionalities’, in Elzbieta Oleksy (ed.) Intimate Citizenships: Gender, Sexualities, Politics, London: Routledge, 177-192.