Self-Made Man

Norah VincentMale impersonators
Self-Made Man

Author: Norah Vincent

Publisher: Atlantic

ISBN: 1843545047

Category: Male impersonators

Page: 0

View: 168

GET EBOOK
Narrated with exquisite insight, humor, and empathy, the author uses her firsthand experience--the 18 months she masqueraded as a man--to explore the many remarkable mysteries of gender identity.

Self-made Men

Henry RubinPsychology
Self-made Men

Author: Henry Rubin

Publisher: Vanderbilt University Press

ISBN: 0826514359

Category: Psychology

Page: 236

View: 454

GET EBOOK
In Self-Made Men, Henry Rubin explores the production of male identities in the lives of twenty-two FTM transsexuals--people who have changed their sex from female to male. The author relates the compelling personal narratives of his subjects to the historical emergence of FTM as an identity category. In the interviews that form the heart of the book, the FTMs speak about their struggles to define themselves and their diverse experiences, from the pressures of gender conformity in adolescence to being mistaken for "butch lesbians," from hormone treatments and surgeries to relationships with families, partners, and acquaintances. Their stories of feeling betrayed by their bodies and of undergoing a "second puberty" are vivid and thought-provoking. Throughout the interviews, the subjects' claims to having "core male identities" are remarkably consistent and thus challenge anti-essentialist assumptions in current theories of gender, embodiment, and identity. Rubin uses two key methods to analyze and interpret his findings. Adapting Foucault's notions of genealogy, he highlights the social construction of gender categories and identities. His account of the history of endocrinology and medical technologies for transforming bodies demonstrates that the "family resemblance" between transsexuals and intersexuals was a necessary postulate for medical intervention into the lives of the emerging FTMs. The book also explores the historical emergence of the category of FTM transsexual as distinguished from the category of lesbian woman and the resultant "border disputes" over identity between the two groups. Rubin complements this approach with phenomenological concepts that stress the importance of lived experience and the individual's capacity for knowledge and action. An important contribution to several fields, including sociology of the body, gender and masculinity, human development, and the history of science, Self-Made Me will be of interest to anyone who has seriously pondered what it means to be a man and how men become men.

Interpreting the Self

Diane BjorklundLiterary Criticism
Interpreting the Self

Author: Diane Bjorklund

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

ISBN: 0226054489

Category: Literary Criticism

Page: 286

View: 430

GET EBOOK
In this ambitious study, Diane Bjorklund explores the historical nature of self-narrative. Examining over 100 American autobiographers published in the last two centuries, she discusses not only well-known autobiographies such as Mark Twain and Andrew Carnegie but also many obscure ones such as a traveling book peddler, a minstrel, a hotel proprietress, an itinerant preacher, a West Point cadet, and a hoopskirt wire manufacturer. Bjorklund draws on the colorful stories of these autobiographers to show how their historical epoch shapes their understandings of self. "A refreshingly welcome approach to this intriguing topic. . . . [Bjorklund's] extensive and systematic approach to her source material is impressive and enriches our understanding of this essential subject."—Virginia Quarterly Review "Bjorklund studies both famous and obscure writers, and her clear prose style and copious quotations provide insight into the many aspects of the changing American self." —Library Journal

The Self-made Myth

Brian MillerPolitical Science
The Self-made Myth

Author: Brian Miller

Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers

ISBN: 9781609945060

Category: Political Science

Page: 218

View: 963

GET EBOOK
Exposes and demolishes the myth of the self-made businessman and presents profiles of businesspeople who acknowledge the help they received from public investments and other support.