ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to survey key issues addressed on Chicano masculinities in various disciplinary fields. Drawing on a critique of the “classification” of Chicano masculinities as marginalized masculinities (Connell 1995), this paper recalls that Chicano men, as all men, may embody a wide range of identities and cannot be considered as only marginal. Three fields of inquiry are then explored. Firstly, I highlight how the notion of machismo has been widely associated with Chicano men and I address the question of performing machismo and violence through popular culture. Then, I analyze gay and queer Chicano masculinities through the lens of a case study: the changes in male same-sex practices among Mexicans in the United States reveal new definitions of Chicano gay masculinities (more specifically the male sexual role) since the early 1990s. In the third section, Chicano masculinities are discussed in relation to the borderland identity and hybridity. Finally, I conclude this chapter by suggesting to “intersectionalize” our investigations on Chicano masculinities.
