Exploring Aging Masculinities: The Body, Sexuality and Social Lives

220 Pages·2016·1.076 MB·English

by  David Jackson (auth.)

Exploring Aging Masculinities
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Exploring Aging
Masculinities
The Body, Sexuality and Social Lives
David Jackson
IndependentResearcher,UK
Palgrave
macmillan
EXPLORINGAGINGMASCULINITIES:THEBODY,SEXUALITYANDSOCIALLIVES
©DavidJackson,2016
Foreword©JeffHearn2016
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DOI:10.1057/9781137527578
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Names:Jackson,David,1940–
Title:Exploringagingmasculinities:thebody,sexualityandsociallives/
DavidJackson,IndependentResearcher,UK.
Description:NewYork:PalgraveMacmillan,2016. | Includes
bibliographicalreferencesandindex.
Identifiers:LCCN2015032827 |
Subjects:LCSH:Oldermen—GreatBritain—Psychology. | Masculinity—
GreatBritain. | Aging—GreatBritain. | Lifestyles—GreatBritain.
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Contents
Foreword:ResearchwithOlderMen,Slowly vi
Preface ix
Acknowledgements xvii
1 Introduction 1
2 ResearchMethodology 27
3 AgingMen’sEmbodiedSelves:RethinkingAgingMen’s
RelationshipswiththeirChangingBodies 38
4 AnHistoricalandCulturalAnalysisofAgingMen’s
SexualitiesintheUK 56
5 LearningtoLivewithParkinson’sand‘AnUnpredictable
Body’asanAgingMan:AnInvestigationintoAge,
MasculineIdentityandDisability 89
6 TheChallengesandOpportunitiesofAgingMen’sSpousal
Caregiving 102
7 LearningtheHiddenSkillsofStayingAlive:HowdoSome
AgingWorking-ClassMenSurvivetheProcessesofAging? 122
8 ExploringAgingMen’sEmbodiedandSocialAgencyina
FreeMarketEconomyContext 145
9 Conclusion 168
Notes 179
Bibliography 182
Index 192
v
Foreword: Research with Older
Men, Slowly
Aging:Age,aging,aged;gender,gendering,gendered–notethediffer-
ences:agingmeansgettingolder,whilegenderingmeansmanydifferent
relationstogender;agedmeansold,whilegenderedmeansmanythings
andrelations.Thetemptationtofollowthesingulartimelineofageis
strong and embedded in language. Age is still naturalized. We all die,
butinthemeantimealotofdifferencespersistinhowages,agings,and
agednesseswork.
Time: I am nearly 68, not so different from some of the men you will
shortlymeetinthisbook...
Asyouage,yougetneareryourowndeath,increasinglyso.Asyouage,
the probability of hearing of the deaths of friends and colleagues gets
greater,unlessyougetveryoldinwhichcaseitmaybethatmostorall
ofyourcontemporarieshavedied.
Time gets more precious; it speeds up; we are on an accelerating
escalator.
At the same time, life often slows down in some ways, physically,
socially,mentally.Yettheideathatagingissimplyatimeofemptiness
issurelymisplaced.
Timespeedsupandslowsdownatthesametime.
Gender: And then add to this gender, in this case the gendering of
men...imagesofmenandmasculinityaresodominatedbyyoungmen
andmenofmiddleyearsthatitishardlynoticedthatthemeaningsof
menandmasculinitiesdifferat18and80.
Men do not, usually at least, suddenly become old or very old, or
younger old, or older old. This builds on their earlier lives as workers,
fathers, singles, unemployed, and so on – and also on their embodied,
ethnic,class,sexual,intersectionalandemotionallives.Theyaresimul-
taneously old and not old, men and not men. It is wrong to define
vi
Foreword:ResearchwithOlderMen,Slowly vii
these people as only men or only anything, whatever the structural
advantagesmenhold.
Writing,...and reading: How on earth can you write about aging,
that is old and older aging? And when this happens to be focused
on aging that is the aging of older men what happens then? Is this
yet another male sexual narrative or a deep fissure from that? How
do you put all this into words on the page? David Jackson’s book
dares to do just that, with a subtle and nuanced analysis of the
complexity, the ambiguous, bodily fragmented complexity, of older
men’s lives. It is based primarily and importantly on very unusual,
perhaps unique, set of data on a diverse selection of older men’s lives,
through no less than a five-fold interview or conversation process,
what the author calls “intimate conversations”. As the author points
out, this focus on intimate conversations between the research partici-
pantsandtheresearcherisprobablythemostdistinctivefeatureofthis
book.
The book is exceptional in terms of the length of time of these inti-
mate conversations and this “slow research” as a whole process. This
showstheimportanceofdevelopingnew,different,politicallyinformed
methodologiesinresearchingonandwitholder,slower,lessspeedypeo-
ple, sometimes with clear disabilities, sometimes not or less visibly so.
Italsospeakstotheneedforcareful,slowerreading,nottheridiculous
soundbiteoftheheadlineorthefetishizedacademicarticle.
Biography and history: This extended work is contextualized in rela-
tiontothreemainbodiesofwork:first,broadercriticalresearchstudies
of men and masculinities; second, intersections of age, class and gen-
der; and,third,historical,political-economicchangeover the lifetimes
ofthemeninterviewed.
Men’s lives as older men or older old men are to be understood both
biographicallyandhistorically,intheirgenderedhistorical-biographical
contexts. This study lays the basis for a broader biographical approach
tomen,agingandgender.Thereisthusaspecialfocusofissuesofaging,
work,health,disabilityandthebodymoregenerally.
Old age is also the time when material resources fork – from the pro-
tectedandcushionedveryricholdtothedesperateandverypoorold–
hence the significance of older, ‘grey’ and pensioner activisms. These
blatant divergences may die with the individuals, yet are continued
throughandfortheinheritorsoftherich.
viii Foreword:ResearchwithOlderMen,Slowly
Please read it: The book disrupts thinking and practice on men and
masculinities, on age, class, gender and sexuality, and is important for
policyandpolitics,forcarers,professionals,andofcourseolderpeople
themselvesandourselves.
Burning: ‘Old age should burn and rage at close of day’ wrote Dylan
Thomas.
JeffHearn,Helsinki,April2015
Preface
In an article I wrote for the Auto/Biography journal called, ‘Beyond
one-dimensional models of masculinity: A life-course perspective on
the processes of becoming masculine’ (2003), I talk about the histori-
callyunique,socialspace(betweenretirementanddeath)thatisslowly
emerging in the lives of older men. I also suggest that this unique,
social space might prove to be a creative space for re-thinking old age
together with a critical re-assessment and possible re-formulation of
conventional,masculineidentities.
Insomeways,thisiswhatIhavetriedtodointhisbook.Attheage
of 75 I have started to connect old age studies with the critical men
and masculinity field. As one reviewer commented, ‘There has been
insufficient attention devoted to the intersection between aging and
masculinity in both the gerontological and the masculinity academic
literatureandthisbookaddressesthegap.’
TheformofresearchmethodologythatIhavechosenforthisinvesti-
gation–aqualitative,‘intimateconversation’typeofresearchprocess–
is a deliberately appropriate form of research to use with aging men.
The extended interview processes keeps pace with the daily rhythms
anddeepeningagesoftheresearchparticipants.
In writing this book I have also become aware of a new, reading
public, particularly in the 50+ section of the population. There is a
broader, more diverse reading public now taking shape out there who
are thoughtful and curious and want to make sense of their changing
lives. This emerging group are not just younger academics but older
women and men who want to engage with the dilemmas and oppor-
tunitiesoftheagingprocess.Iverymuchhopethisbookreachesoutto
thesenewvoicesinreadinggroupsaswellasinHigherEducation.
Lookingagainattheinter-relationsbetweenoldageandmasculinities,
Ineedtoacknowledgethatoldageisunignorablypresentinmyevery-
daylifeinallitssuddenswerves,alterationsandmovements.Asaresult,
I have expanded and deepened my research interests in aging men’s
lived experiences and also in the complex biographies of eight, other,
agingmenaswellasalivingcuriosityaboutmyownlife.
In terms of critical men and masculinities, I think readers probably
needawiderbackgroundofgenderrelationsandsexualpoliticstointro-
duce them to how the author has gradually developed an interest in
ix