Richard Howson

Tino rangatiratanga and mana motuhake: Nation, state and self-determination in Aotearoa New Zealand

This article brings perspectives from three Māori activists, each promoting issues of self-determination in different ways. It centres on tino rangatiratanga and mana motuhake, two concepts that inform modern Māori activism and life and practice, and more recently conceptions of Māoridom as “nation”. Using a Gramscian framework we argue that the New Zealand state has over time created a notion of one people within one state, and has in the past incorporated challenges to its legitimacy within a framework of popular consent. The desire by some Māori activists for self-determination promotes a separateness that to some extent challenges this idea of nation–state unity. An examination of these modern Māori activist politics allows us to observe the operations of hegemony as it forms and reforms in modern New Zealand.

From Ethico-political Hegemony to Postmarxism

Recent literature on postmarxism has neglected a direct and strong engagement with Gramscis theory of hegemony. What has happened through this disengagement is that postmarxism has been imbued with the poststructuralism of Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Foucault. That has rendered it incapable of becoming a theory that can engage the social as well as the political. This paper attempts to reengage with Gramscis theory of hegemony and to bring back both the political and the social by focusing on a key aspect of the concept of hegemony—that is, the ethico-political. It argues that, far from being “just theory,” postmarxisms engagement with Gramsci moves it toward a practical politico-social ontology. In this paper, the nexus between hegemony, the ethico-political, and postmarxism is developed by focusing on two of postmarxisms key concepts: antagonism and equivalence.

Korean Cinema's Female Writers-Directors and the "Hegemony of Men"

The South Korean film industry represents a masculine-privileged gender regime that over the last few decades has shown a newfound strength both at home and abroad. However, challenging this masculine privilege are a growing number of important though unheralded female writer–directors operating in both the independent and commercial sectors of the industry. In this article, we present a case study that explores the work of five of these female writer–directors within this context. We begin by asking two key questions: can female writer–directors find a voice within the Korean film industry that challenges the traditional gender stereotypes both within the industry and in the wider Korean culture? How can the Korean experience connect to the Western experience? The first methodological step in explicating the case study is the setting out of a particularly Western theoretical approach that emphasises the idea that masculine privilege exists hegemonically within the so-called “hegemony of men.” We then go on to highlight specific elements in the work of these female writer–directors that expose aspects of both challenge and constraint within the hegemony of men. We conclude that although the work of these female writer–directors indeed challenges tradition and gendered stereotypes sustained within the hegemony of men, such challenges represent moments of reformism rather than revolutionary systematic change.

Men/Masculinities: new directions in Australian theory and practice

The articles included in this special issue arose from the inaugural conference of the Fay Gale Centre for Research on Gender at the University of Adelaide in 2010. The conference entitled Transforming Gender brought speakers together, many of whom sought to present new and innovative approaches to theorising and examining masculinities, including consideration of social change, emotions, citizenship, as well as of gender relations more broadly. As Raewyn Connell states in the Introduction to this special issue, while there are ‘good foundations’ in masculinities studies to build upon, this special issue ‘enters a terrain of cultural conflict . . . [that] must be in some ways perilous’. This brief claim opens up the nature of the environment in which this conference and masculinities studies more broadly operates today. It is sustained by the claims of Hearn and Morrell (2012, 4) who recently pointed out that the current environment for masculinities studies is a place in which there is little if any ‘unanimity’ with ‘many areas in which disagreement is evident and many concepts remain contested’. It is not surprising then that in such an environment a simple examination of the kind presented by Jim Messerschmidt (2012, 57) on just one key, though contested, concept like hegemonic masculinity shows a considerable level of citations: 540 times between 2006 and 2010. Perhaps even more importantly, the rate of increase over this period has seen citations rise from 22 in 2006 to 173 in 2010, an almost eight-fold increase over the period. What is to be made of scholarship in this environment and what is the future of further masculinities studies? Comparatively, masculinities studies continues to be a growing field with a direct impact on policy also becoming increasingly important. Research on men and masculinities in Australia has a history that can be traced back through the last three to four decades. It is a development that, in many ways, has gone hand in hand with the field of gender studies. A key thematic that has at times driven, and at other times guided, the development of masculinities studies has been what Robyn Wiegman (2002, 32) describes as ‘feminism’s turn towards the study of men and masculinity’. In other words, masculinities studies, particularly in the Australian context, continues to be profoundly influenced by feminist theory and method. An important consequence of this for the development of masculinities studies has been the centring of men as objects of study in their own right in a way that seeks to remove the veil of social, political and economic invisibility that has previously cloaked men and their actions. Initially, the focus was predominantly on men’s domestic violence and the education of boys. Slowly, issues surrounding men’s health have also emerged with particular focus given to issues such as, road accidents, industrial injuries, diet and sexually transmitted diseases (Connell 1998, 1). The applied aspects of masculinities studies have, more recently, given way to new approaches and issues that have begun to challenge many of the taken-for-granted

EDITOR'S PROLOGUE

The articles included in this special issue arose from the inaugural conference of the Fay Gale Centre for Research on Gender at the University of Adelaide in 2010. The conference entitled Transforming Gender brought speakers together, many of whom sought to present new and innovative approaches to theorising and examining masculinities, including consideration of social change, emotions, citizenship, as well as of gender relations more broadly. As Raewyn Connell states in the Introduction to this special issue, while there are ‘good foundations’ in masculinities studies to build upon, this special issue ‘enters a terrain of cultural conflict . . . [that] must be in some ways perilous’. This brief claim opens up the nature of the environment in which this conference and masculinities studies more broadly operates today. It is sustained by the claims of Hearn and Morrell (2012, 4) who recently pointed out that the current environment for masculinities studies is a place in which there is little if any ‘unanimity’ with ‘many areas in which disagreement is evident and many concepts remain contested’. It is not surprising then that in such an environment a simple examination of the kind presented by Jim Messerschmidt (2012, 57) on just one key, though contested, concept like hegemonic masculinity shows a considerable level of citations: 540 times between 2006 and 2010. Perhaps even more importantly, the rate of increase over this period has seen citations rise from 22 in 2006 to 173 in 2010, an almost eight-fold increase over the period. What is to be made of scholarship in this environment and what is the future of further masculinities studies? Comparatively, masculinities studies continues to be a growing field with a direct impact on policy also becoming increasingly important. Research on men and masculinities in Australia has a history that can be traced back through the last three to four decades. It is a development that, in many ways, has gone hand in hand with the field of gender studies. A key thematic that has at times driven, and at other times guided, the development of masculinities studies has been what Robyn Wiegman (2002, 32) describes as ‘feminism’s turn towards the study of men and masculinity’. In other words, masculinities studies, particularly in the Australian context, continues to be profoundly influenced by feminist theory and method. An important consequence of this for the development of masculinities studies has been the centring of men as objects of study in their own right in a way that seeks to remove the veil of social, political and economic invisibility that has previously cloaked men and their actions. Initially, the focus was predominantly on men’s domestic violence and the education of boys. Slowly, issues surrounding men’s health have also emerged with particular focus given to issues such as, road accidents, industrial injuries, diet and sexually transmitted diseases (Connell 1998, 1). The applied aspects of masculinities studies have, more recently, given way to new approaches and issues that have begun to challenge many of the taken-for-granted