ABSTRACT
The construction of masculine identities has become a major research and media focus in recent years. While some publications on boys and masculinities centre on the ‘crisis of masculinity’ with its manifestations in relatively low levels of achievement in school and relatively high rates of suicide, violence, and alcohol and drug abuse among teenage boys (Farrington, 1995; Vizard et al., 1995), there have also been some ethnographic and discursive studies which address boys’ cultural practices (see Pattman et al. (1998) for a review). These studies converge on the idea (first developed by Connell, 1987, 1995) that it is possible to view constructions of masculinity as the products of interpersonal work, accomplished through the exploitation of available cultural resources such as the ideologies prevalent in particular societies.
