Industry forging Masculinity: “Tough Men”, Hard Labour and Identity
Industry forging Masculinity: “Tough Men”, Hard Labour and Identity

Summary/Abstract: In a wide range of virilities, male identities and their modern historical representations that start with a “chivalrous” attitude, as George L. Mosse puts it, one of them is unique – not only because it excludes “classical” physical aesthetics, so important in forming many male identity stereotypes, but also because it exists alongside and “in opposition to” other expressions of masculinity. Hard-working men in a heavy industry milieu – e.g. shipyards, mines, construction or metallurgy, have developed a somewhat different attitude towards unhealthy, difficult and often very poorly paid jobs which created the very core of their masculine identity. That is why it must be seen as part of Gramsci’s propulsive concept of popular culture opposing the hegemonic culture which, according to the author, is “born inside the factories”; i.e. these “tough” men (and often women e.g. Stakhanovism, Shock work) were the industrial “version” of “progressive folklore”.

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