Reddit reviews Gendered Society Canadian Edition

I suggest Kimmel as a starting point. People tend to take him as being unbiased about feminism due to being a man (he even brings that up in one of his sociology texts).

The Gendered Society is pretty good as well. He's got a good talent for explaining why gender issues do not just affect women, and how they affect men as well. The Reader goes into some case studies about Men's Issues (Male Nurses, for example) as well as race and class issues.

Textbooks can be a bit pricey, but those are definitely worth it. If you are buy a University you might be able to pick up a 2000 copy on the cheap as well.

Yes.

The course covers a fairly wide swath of material, blending history, theory (of the critical variety), and empirical case studies. Its primary purpose is to introduce students to an examination of men and men's lives using the tools of sociology, and it does this through a few avenues:

1. History: We embark on something of a "masculinities throughout the ages" tour of men's lives. We look at everything from historical fashion trends (high-heels and silk stockings as the height of men's fashion in early modern Europe for example) to warfare, sex and sexuality, and the relationship between men and emotion.
   
   
2. Theory: This part of the course introduces students to the tools of the sociological trade. Students are introduced to the analytical and methodological instruments that we can use to examine men's lives. This is where we talk about "the basics" like intersectionality, bio-power and the body as a site of discipline, etc. We also talk a bit about the different sociological lenses that can be used to examine men and men's lives, from older functionalist approaches to more contemporary post-structuralist and feminist perspectives.
   
   
3. We attempt to disentangle the complex interactions between bodies and culture using concepts like Connell's "body-reflexive practices" and the "reproductive arena" (sorry, these sources are adequate, but the best ones are paywalled). This section is always challenging because the process of disentangling can have the effect of reproducing the very distinctions between body and practice that we're trying to trouble in the first place.
   
   
4. Case studies. Throughout the course, I draw on empirical studies that look at men and men's lives, in order to put the theoretical discussions we have into a more grounded social reality. We talk about things like men and violence, suicide, mental health, homelessness, men and emotion, men and education - both primary and later - and men and relationships - queer, gay and straight. We talk about the different understandings of masculinity that people have that are tied to race, class, and culture (what is a "real man" in white working class families vs. indigenous communities vs. white upper class families, etc.) The whole point of these case studies is to illustrate how the tools of sociology can give us solid, reliable data - both qualitative and quantitative - that can help us work towards understanding the challenges of masculinities in the 21st century.
   
   That's enough of a rant from me! I'll link some of the books I will be drawing on in my course below:
   
   If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer!
   
   Connell: Masculinities
   
   Connell: The Men and the Boys
   
   Kimmel and Messerschmidt: Men's Lives 9th edition - this one showcases dozens of authors, each of whom brings their own deep insights into contemporary masculinities.
   
   Kimmel and Holler: The Gendered Society
   
   Wade and Ferree: Gender: Ideas, Interactions, Institutions