The Void of Acceptable Masculinity During Czech State Socialism

Abstract

During Czech state socialism, masculinity in cultural representations was bound up with the official sociology, and thus, it was likely to be discredited in popular perception. As the dominant ideology took over the main existing models, the concept of masculinity was devoid of any alternative model. The popular novel published during the last years of state socialism, which this article considers as a case study, fills the void of masculinity with the body as the last resort to which a man seeking an alternative can turn in this situation.

Struggling for a Socialist Fatherhood: “Re-educating” Men in East Germany, 1960–1989

“…Indeed, an increasing number of men in this region began to deplore what they considered to be the consequences of the socialist "liberation" of women, namely, that the state's support of women and mothers "marginalized" men in the family, that they had become "emasculated...victim[s] of a socialist nanny state," 14 and that the young generation of boys lacked positive masculine role models. 15 In a number of representations, the very popular East German film "The Legend of Paul und Paula," for instance, women and mothers were the principal heroes and depicted as independent, desirable, and eager to live life to the full, but men (Paul in this case) lacked courage and were ready to comply with the rules for the sake of their careers and personal comfort. 16 Other representations did maintain the ideal of at least morally, if not physically, strong men.…”

“…However, these men were often represented as part of the unofficial culture, for instance, (masculine) leaders of the dissident movement or (masculine, and mostly Western) rock stars. 17 In this "void" 18 of official masculinity, "socialist," that is, involved, emotional, and equal, fatherhood emerged as a new ideal of masculinity. From the 1950s on, representations of men's bodies as strong bodies performing hard work were increasingly complemented, if not replaced, by tender bodies, for example, fathers caring for their children.…”

“The Meaning of His Life Was Work”: The Construction of Identities in the Oral Narratives of Older Czech Men

“…Despite the fact that this research perspective has provided scholars with a way to approach problems related to women from an interdisciplinary point of view (see Lenderová 2008 for history; Havelková and Oates-Indruchová 2014;Havelková and Oates-Indruchová 2015a for sociology), far less is known about masculinities in the Czech Lands and in what is currently the Czech Republic. Although one work of particular interest is an extensive recent collective volume on masculinities which includes both historical and sociological texts (Svaříčková Slabáková et al 2012), the extremely limited sociological research on masculinities demonstrates a preference for the investigation of young men (Šmídová 1999Maříková 2007) or focuses on masculinities as affected by state-socialist Czechoslovakia (Vodochodský 2008;Oates-Indruchová 2006. The prevalent focus on the era of state socialism can be partially explained by the need to come to terms with the communist past in this country in general and is also up to a point the result of efforts by feminist scholars to challenge the myth of emancipation having been a prime concern of communist leaders (Nečasová 2011(Nečasová , 2014(Nečasová , 2015.…”

“…This "void", she argues, was caused by the dominant state ideology regarding the representation of men as defenders of socialism. Men therefore had no opportunity to choose their identity but were forced into uniformity by identification with the labour force, with socialist citizenship and with their mission as "soldiers and defenders of the country" (Oates-Indruchová 2006).…”

“…were not, according to the author, accepted by men, and other positive representations of masculinity were absent (Oates-Indruchová 2006. 115 After the fall of communism, the most likely candidates to fill the "void"…”