In the text, Masculinity, Michael Kimmel expresses the following, “institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes”. Kimmel is expressing his point of view of how a man will change the way he thinks towards a certain situation depending on the depth of it. The setting plays an important role in how the man will interpret what is masculine to himself. For example a man will behave differently when he’s with his male friends than when he’s with his girlfriend. In the episode that we watched during class, we saw the different scenarios in which being masculine for a man is determined. How one acts protective over their family and how one might be violent during a situation depends on the circumstance and the social background they come from. Secondly, in the article by Kimmel he uses the “masculinities” rather than the term masculinity because his idea in this is that there are many ways to view a man. There is not one simple and correct way interpret what makes a man because all men are different in their own ways. The upbringing of one also determines how one may view or think what a man really is because no one comes exactly from the same background. In the episode of “Man Enough” all the men around the table expressed the different ways they were each brought up and how these were also the reasons as to how they became the men that they are. Also it is important to understand the fact that a man will always be changing due to the things that life will make them face.

In the paragraph about gender and institutions, Kimmel talks about the gender expectations  that society sets through the gendered institutions that determines how an individual will act in a community. Gender institutions can be workplace, family, school or even the media. In other words, boys and girls are expected to behave a certain way, to dress a certain way or to choose a certain career path in the future. For example, in older days, the only “acceptable” jobs for women were administration (being a secretary) or other “office jobs”, whereas for men it was jobs such as being a firefighter or police officer. In the episode of Man Enough, they talk about how men are “put in a box”, which means that they are expected to act tough, to not show any signs of emotions or weakness, to be misogynist, and they are taught that they are stronger than women and that men need to protect women. Sometimes, being in that box is easier than stepping out of that box, which makes that some boys and men conform to those gendered expectations and institutions.

Furthermore, Kimmel mentions that masculinities come plural form because of it can exist and be interpreted in so many ways. According to Kimmel, masculinity varies from one culture or country to another, through history, society  and finally through one’s personal life. In respecting those different forms of masculinity, we allow social change in the sense that we will allow more man to feel comfortable in their own definition of masculinity, as a result, they will less find the necessity to prove that they are man enough. As the men put it in the episode of ‘Man Enough’, men should become allies to women instead of trying to prove that they are different to women. Instead of conforming to the “bro code”, which implies silence  and inaction when a woman is being harassed by another men, they should not be afraid to speak up and be an ally to women. Therefore, if we allow man to define  and be comfortable in their own masculinity, we will allow such social changes to occur.

In the text, Masculinity, Kimmel states, “Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes”. What he means by this is that the difference between gender’s is forked throughout a male or a female childhood. Male are subject and shown to distance themselves from their mothers to develop more masculine traits such as being emotionless, more assertive, and being physically strong. They are showed how they should act based on their sex. If you are a male you are encouraged to pursue a masculine career path such as engineering. Meanwhile, if you are a female, you are thought to follow a more feminine career such as being a nurse. Men are thought that to be more masculine they must be physically stronger than females, should have sexual conquests, and should like sports and cars. In the 4th episode of “Man enough”, fast cars and women are seen as objects. Men are taught to need to like sport cars and girls, and wanting to have them, therefore viewing them to be similar and view them as objects.

Later on in the text, Kimmel states,”Understanding how we do masculinities…opens up the unimaginable possibilities of social change”. He uses the plural term of masculinity, “masculinities”, since there is more than one definition of masculinity. To be masculine varies between different cultures, and countries. Being masculine in Germany is different than it is in a tribe in an African tribe in the Republic of Congo.

For generations men have been the majority worker, but women also have the same problem. Everyone been having difficulty and advantages on different things, but society see advantages by gender. Like a secretary being a feminine job. There are men out their who would enjoy being a secretary but the bias barrier of being judge or the reaction of different people.

Kimmel explains genders as institutions as like a practice, a law between genders. There’s a rule that is followed by everyone who wants to be comfortable. Comfortable in a way that people accepts your job as your gender and not comfortable to you. Women doing sports or being a business woman. These are just examples that surprise people who have lived through those rules.

After watching “Man Enough” Episode 4, that I’m still healing of it. These mental laws that no one said or done. Institutions that we follow are to live our best lifes and for us to be the top of society and in the economy. Rules that makes men to make the choices, hide their emotions and not able to understand women. These rule makes us as object and not just women. “Women have to watch over men and protect against men.” Said in the documentary. Also hiding the fact of listening and understanding one another.

I think what Michael Kimmel was trying to say, in his text “Masculinity” is that the society you live, and the people around you are the ones that tell you how to act based on your gender. Then, thanks to the information that the people around you have given you on how men and women should act, you will most likely tell other boys and girls how to act as well, therefore, reproducing the “gender order” (Kimmel at al 2000). In the movie, from a young age, boys have been socialized to be aggressive, and emotionless, but also to be the protector and the provider for their families. Then, when they grow up, they will probably pass that way of thinking on to their kid as well.

Kimmel uses “masculinities” because each culture’s definition of a man is different. Kimmel mentions it himself, adding that the definition is a model for people, mostly boys, to compare themselves against to grow and know what a man is in their culture (Kimmel at al 2000). In the documentary “Man Enough”, there were two types of men that I was able to pull; there was the violent and emotionless predators and the “Allies”. Most men act like the predators to be accepted in the group because as a human, we crave that sense of belonging. Therefore, whoever is the “Alpha” of the group is the model for the others. However, if young boys see their idols do something different than the Alpha’s acts, they might choose their idol instead of the Alpha, because of the platform that the idol has. That’s why, at the end of the documentary, they mention that people should “Grow, Share, and Encourage” so the people can learn to respect others.

Some gendered jobs are rooted in stereotypes and are linked to a persons behaviour or expected role. Michael Kimmel explains that, “Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of the gender order through several gender process”, meaning society only accepts what a man or woman “should” act like based on the characteristics of their gender, or in some cases, their ability to see who is more fit to work in that specific institution; whether it be at a public workplace or a job they hold at home. For example, some may think that a man should strive for jobs that are mostly dominated by males, or might have physical characteristics that suit the . Who says that a man can’t work as a nurse or a woman can’t work as a car mechanic? Interestingly enough, society continues to pressurize male and female dominated jobs with less credibility instead of influencing people to choose whichever domain they’d like to pursue in, no matter the gender. The 4th episode discusses how men feel victimized by the pressure of society’s stereotypes and how they feel like they must act a certain way to fit in and be a man.

Is their solely one true definition of masculinity? No, it differs from person to person. A man can be whatever he chooses to be. The same concept applies to women. A woman can choose not to act “feminine”, so does that mean she’s not a woman? When talking about masculinities, we refer to the different ways of being a man. Boys learn “appropriate gender roles” according to expectations of society and the influence of their peers. The documentary mentions how men feel trapped in a box. Inside the man box, their is a list of roles that demonstrate conventional masculinity, which makes them feel forced to be, act and behave exactly like the list of roles presented in the box. Women and men continue to struggle with feeling forced to act perfect. Someday, I hope that society realizes that being a perfect man or woman is just being yourself.

What Michael Kimmel means by “Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes.” is that our society is separated into genders such as men, women and other genders which then creates a gender hierarchy which then gives birth to a gendered system in the society meaning that some processes, such as some teaching/education or jobs, are going be based off of or aimed at one main gender. Moreover, women are disadvantaged when it comes to finishing their studies at an early age compared to men because they have certain responsibilities such as taking care children after labor while the men provide for the family. This shows how women have less time to “live” their lives than men do.

One way this can relate to the “Man Enough” episode is through the different definitions or characteristics that society nowadays ties into masculinity, because nowadays basically we define men as the opposite of women and as people who dominate. Men are defined as the dominant gender of society, as superior to women and other genders which form the gender hierarchy. Moreover, an example of a gendered process that young boys go through is when making friends: they avoid making friends with girls because of the code that “boys and girls can’t be friends”.

Kimmel uses plural “masculinities” because there isn’t only one definition of masculinity. It differs in each culture or country. For example, what it means to be a man as an Italian doesn’t exactly mean the same as being a man in America. The term masculinity and its definitions in the episode is brought up a lot. They say to be a man today is to be strong, to not show emotion or to avoid anything feminine. That to be a man is to be sexually dominant, that you can’t just be “friends” with a girl. In the their discussion they say that all these definitions are what oppresses men and causes them to be less open about their emotions which then causes them to feel alone and helpless, because they feel like they would be judged and seen as weak by society.

When Kimmel states “Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes.” (Masculinity, p. 3), he means that our surroundings shape the mindset of people, wether it be school, our work or even our family. They are the ones who define to us what being “manly” or “feminine” is. Just like shown in the episode of “Man Enough”, men always have to be the one in charge, the dominant one as well as being emotionless to be perceived positively by our surroundings. It was also shown that as time passes, men act more and more violent in many ways without realising it, for example when it was said that young men were saying “I’d hit that”, one of the guys said that he was told that now it’s “I’d smash that”. Being more and more violent is being normalized.

By saying “Masculinities”, he means that masculinity doesn’t only have one definition, it has a lot. It all depends on many things like where we grew up, how we were taught. For example, being a “man” might have a different meaning here in North America than Africa or Asia. In the episode of “Man Enough”, they talk about how men have to do certain things to be viewed as a “man” or else they might be seen negatively, they called it the “man box”. In it were things that were considered to be masculine and men had to do those things to be viewed as a man, though this can vary from the place we come from.

“Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of the gender order through several gendered process.”

Michael Kimmmel

In this given statement, I believe that Michael Kimmel wanted to emphasis the fact that institutions plays a big role in “gender making”. Whether it is in a workplace, home, mall or any kind of of places where a group of person gathers, an act of a certain “masculine/manly” ways are expected from men. If they were to fail to fit in those manly criteria, they are either judged, and/or criticized by the public who follows the socially constructed view of masculinities. Men and women are expected to follow there respective roles in a workplace. Men are more on the heavy and handy jobs, where as the women are more on the organization. There is a sort of a discrimination towards them if they are found doing job that are not designated for there gender. For example, a man working as a cabin crew, commonly known as flight attendants. Until recently, women are mostly associated to do this and not men. If you are to work in this domain, you are regarded as gay. Why? It is because this job requires you to take care of the passengers and be a server/nurse on board. Given the requirement to take care, where this act is considered very feminine, you will rarely see men doing this sort of a career. A barrier is put in place by the social norms that requires you to follow a certain act of your sex. In correlation to the 4th episode of “Man Enough?”, it was mentioned during there discussion that they are obligated to fit in the safe box or else they will be judged and criticized.

By the term “masculinities”, the author meant all the definitions of what makes a man, a man. All the definitions that the society made up to put a certain standard of what is a man. He prefers using the term masculinity rather than male, because male is a term associated with biological sex and masculinity is a gender, what it meant to be a man on the social and cultural context and how you are molded to act the way you are. To fully understand what are masculinities, you need to know its meaning in an anthropological, historical, sociological and psychological dimensions. Just like they discussed in episode 4 of “man enough?”, in a historical dimension, since the ancient times, men are taught to be the predator hunting preys, where in this context meant the women. They do not respect women as equal since then and this are why the hierarchy is lead by men. The experiences of women that will never occur if you are a man such as walking alone at night and randomly grabbed off to be raped is an example of how men doesn’t see females as humans, but rather objects or preys.

In conclusion, I believe that vile acts doesn’t define masculinity, the way the society look at men are based on the acts of the minority, because the majority certainly do not stand out.

With this phrase, Kimmel is explaining how different scenarios and specific places in our society form differences between both genders and how these differences shape our perspective of what a man really is. For example, in a team project or a social event, usually people in the group will turn towards the male to direct the group and divide the tasks needed to be done. This gives an image and sense of power to the male which in turn creates a division and ultimately a hierarchy. This is in fact what divides our society and creates stereotypes on men which could pressure some to fit in this particular image created by these stereotypes. In the fourth episode, the pressure of the stereotypes can be understood when the males discuss how they too have been victim of the pressure by adopting this mentality. Subconsciously, they participate in the division of our society because it’s the only thing that they have learned, they don’t know any better.

I think that Kimmel used the term “masculinities” to describe how there are many things that could define a male and that it’s not solely one or a few characteristic that decide what a man is. Also, that these things do not have to be common to each person, that every male can have different characteristics. In “Man Enough”, it can be clearly understood what “masculinity” is. The men explain how there’s this way of life that men are “supposed” to be like, to act in a certain way, to talk a certain way, to do specific things that maybe they don’t necessarily want to do, but they know that if they don’t, they won’t be considered “Man Enough”.