This book explores ideas of masculinity in the maritime world in the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century. During this time commerce, politics and technology supported male privilege, while simultaneously creating the polite, consumerist and sedentary lifestyles that were perceived as damaging the minds and bodies of men. This volume explores this paradox through the figure of the sailor, a working-class man whose representation fulfilled numerous political and social ends in this period. It begins with the enduring image of romantic, heroic veterans of the Napeolonic wars, takes the reader through the challenges to masculinities created by encounters with other races and ethnicities, and with technological change, shifting geopolitical and cultural contexts, and ends with the fragile portrayal of masculinity in the imagined Nelson. In doing so, this edited collection shows that maritime masculinities (ideals, representations and the seamen themselves) were highly visible and volatile sites for negotiating the tensions of masculinities with civilisation, race, technology, patriotism, citizenship, and respectability during the long nineteenth century.

Autorentext

Karen Downing is a researcher and casual lecturer at the Australian National University. Her research interests are in the history of masculinities, emotions, and culture.

Johnathan Thayer is Assistant Professor at the Graduate School of Library and Information Studies, Queens College, City University of New York. He teaches and conducts research in archival studies, public history, and the intersections of urban and maritime history in U.S. ports.

Joanne Begiato is Professor of History at Oxford Brookes University. She specialises in the history of masculinities, emotions, material culture, family, and marriage.

Inhalt
Introduction - Joanne Begiato, Karen Downing and Steven Gray
Part I: Nineteenth century masculinities Regency masculinity? The place of Napoleonic War veterans in the history of masculinities Karen Downing A splendid body of men: Fishermen as model males in late-nineteenth-century British imagery Mary O'Neill Part II: Civilisation and race He was possessed of the very first natural abilities: American mariners' construction of masculinity in the Early Republic Dane A. Morrison
The ocean, the Orient, and manly drama: The persuasive masculinities on display in the North Pacific that influenced the 1854 Treaty of Kanagawa Bruce Makoto Arnold Part III: Technological change Displaying the wooden walls of Old England: The HMS Foudroyant as a monument to lost skills and manhood, 1892-1897 Alexa Price
Bachelor sailors? Negotiating masculinity, mobility, and domesticity in c. 1880s to the 1930s Finland - Laika Nevalainen Row, row, row your boat: How the Marine Corps engendered landing parties in the US Department of the Navy, 1898-1934 Heather Venable
Part IV: Patriotism, citizenship and respectability From prodigal sons to emblems of empire: Maritime manhood and labour reform in the Wilhelmine Merchant Fleet David Brandon Dennis Mapping masculinities in New York City's sailortown Johnathan Thayer
The shrine of manly virtues: Heroic masculinity and HMS Victory in the 1920s Sarah Westbury Part V: Nascent and Fragile masculinities Masculinity, the navalist leagues and the Anglo-German naval race Neil Fleming
There will never be another hero like Nelson: Overcoming frailty in 1918 Lucie Dutton
Conclusions and future directions Quintin Colville