ABSTRACT
This chapter is concerned with the content and persistence of the stereotype of male friendship and its relation to the realities of modern life. It argues that the myth persists because it provides an ideology that enhances the idea of friendship between men. The stereotype of male friendship has been made familiar through repetition in a large body of literary materials from modern Western cultures and their antecedents. The image of male friendship closely parallels that of romantic love. Both idealize a dyadic relationship and set expectations of undying loyalty, devotion, and intense emotional gratification. The study of friendship in Western societies challenges the concepts of anthropology because they have been shaped by the institutionalized forms of friendship in non-Western societies: blood brotherhood, trade friends, and bond friends. The value of male solidarity and the definition of manliness implicit in the myth have lost much of their force for modern society.
