Why Americans struggle over the future of masculinity
When Roberta Chevrette explores the idea of a “crisis in masculinity” with her students, she’ll often have them analyze some of the cartoons that proliferated in the early 20th century as the suffrage movement began to gain momentum.
Some of the cartoons mock women making political speeches, sexualizing their appearance with the caption “only a figure of speech.” Other images depict women smoking cigars and playing cards in a backroom while a visibly frustrated man in the next room washes clothes and holds a crying child. “Notice to fathers: wash your shirts with Sud’s soap.”
Another depicts a sketch of a girl brandishing a rolling pin, glaring at a startled and confused young boy: “You believe in women’s suffrage – don’t you?”
“There is a certain power in these rhetorical tools, which say, ‘Oh, hey, no, women’s rights? That means that men will be oppressed or somehow feminized,’” says Dr. Chevrette, professor of rhetoric, intercultural communication, and
