Masculinising domesticity: an investigation of men’s domestic foodwork

In the contemporary consumer culture, Western males are increasingly devoting significant amounts of time to domestic cooking. As part of the so-called foodie culture, domestic cooking has become a legitimate practice through which male consumers have started to express their masculine identity (Johnston & Baumann, 2010). As domestic cooking is traditionally characterised as a feminine performance (DeVault, 1991; Inness, 2001), men’s growing enthusiasm for it is a potential contribution to a more ‘equitable [gender] division of domestic labour’ (Szabo, 2012, p. 624), and some scholars even suggest that we already are witnessing the change (Aarseth, 2009; Aarseth & Olsen, 2008). But is men’s entrance into domesticity unquestionably enhancing the status of the traditionally inferior domestic field? We explore the transforming meanings of masculinity when men enter a traditionally feminine consumption domain.