Masculinities Journal
Some Disputes Surrounding Masculinity as a
Legitimate Category of Historical Inquiry in the
Study of Late Antiquity
Michael Edward Stewart
Abstract:
This paper examines the growth and some of the disputes
surrounding “masculinity” as a legitimate category for both social
and more traditional scholars seeking to understand Late
Antiquity. It shows how investigations of masculinity often serve a
political purpose. Some researchers delve into a topic such as
“homosexuality” as a way of revealing how particular societies
such as ancient Greece and Rome had greater tolerance towards
same-partner sex than their modern counterparts. This agenda
helps to explain why many studies on Late Antique masculinity
focus on men as sexual beings. It might also account for the
reluctance by some academics to accept social history as a
legitimate historical tool.
If critics of social history have been correct in pointing out the
dangers of letting our modern obsession with sexuality “cloud”
our view of the past, it is just as vital to point out the androcentric
nature of many ancient cultures in comparison to many modern
western cultures. Indeed, living in a world of increasing gender
equality can hinder our understanding of the ancient Romans.
Indeed, one cannot understand the Roman past without
understanding the central role that ideologies of masculinity
played in this society.
Keywords: Late Antiquity, social history, masculinity
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Masculinities Journal
Geç Antik Dönem Çalışmalarında Tarihsel
Sorgulamanın Geçerli Bir Kategorisi Olarak
Erkekliği Çevreleyen Tartışmalar
Michael Edward Stewart
Özet:
Bu makale, geç Antik dönemi anlamaya çalışan hem sosyal
bilimlerden hem de daha geleneksel disiplinlerden araştırmacılar
için geçerli bir kategori olarak "erkekliği" çevreleyen bazı
tartışmaları ve bu tartışmaların gelişimini inceler. makale özünde
erkekliğe dair sorgulamaların nasıl politik bir amaca hizmet
ettiğini ortaya sermektedir. bazı araştırmacılar, eşcinsellik gibi bir
konuyu, Antik Yunan ve Roma gibi uygarlıkların nasıl da çağımız
uygarlıklarından daha büyük bir hoşgörüye sahip olduğunu
göstermek amacı ile didik didik ederler. Bu tavır, niçin geç Antik
dönem erkekliğine dair bir çok çalışmanın erkekleri temelde
cinsel varlıkları olarak ele aldığını açıkları bu durum aynı
zamanda, bazı akademisyenlerin toplumsal tarihi, geçerli bir
tarihsel araç olarak kabul etmedeki isteksizliğini de açıklar.
Şayet toplumsal tarihi eleştirenler, cinsellikle ilgili modern
saplantımızın geçmişe yönelik görüşümüzü "gölgelemesine" izin
vermenin tehlikelerine işaret ederken haklı iseler, günümüz
modern batılı kültürleri ile kıyaslandığında birçok antik kültürün
insan merkezli doğasını işaret etmek de aynı derecede hayatidir.
Giderek artan düzeyde cinsiyet eşitliğinin olduğu bir dünyada
yaşamak antik Romayı anlamamıza engel olabilir. Aslına bakılırsa,
Roma toplumu içinde erkeklik ideolojilerinin oynadığı merkezi
rolü anlamadan Roma tarihini anlamak mümkün değildir.
Anahtar kelimeler: Geç Antik dönem, toplumsal tarih, erkeklik
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S
ometimes, when I mention that I study “masculinity,” or use the
term in an abstract or paper, certain scholars can become
somewhat defensive, or in the worst instances, downright
dismissive. Such reactions should not surprise. Certainly, there continues
to be a sharp divide in the study of Late Antiquity between those
considered “traditionalists” and those labelled “social historians.”
Despite one’s own views on the topic, one tends to be categorised as
belonging to either one group or the other. Attacks launched from both
sides frequently utilise harsh rhetoric. For example, in his recent work
on the sixth-century Byzantine historian Procopius, Anthony Kaldellis
scolds social and cultural historians for their supposed lack of
understanding of the ancient Roman world and its literature (13-15).
Some of this criticism is warranted. Indeed, much of my recent work has
been devoted to balancing what I believe has been an overemphasis on
sexuality in much of the recent scholarship on Late Roman and Early
Byzantine masculinity. This paper takes a narrower look at both the
growth of masculinity as a tool of historical inquiry and some of the
disputes surrounding this methodology as a legitimate category for
studying ancient Rome and early Byzantium.
The Study of Men as a Gender
I
n the historiographical tradition, one’s gender was perceived as
firmly rooted in biology; “one was born man or woman” (Pohl 23).
Scholars long regarded the borders between man and woman as firm
and impassable. In the past thirty years, this paradigm has changed.
Scholars have shown convincingly that notions like gender are
susceptible to various interpretations and instability (Searle 41-45).
Therefore, the cultural environment that one grows up in plays a
fundamental role in shaping one’s perception of the world around one.
The study of men as a gender developed in the wake of advances
made in women’s studies in the past forty years. Linked indelibly with
the social upheaval of this time, few topics in contemporary academia
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have gained as much focus or generated as much enmity. Gender studies
emerged from the women’s movement of the 1960s-80s. Reacting to the
dominance of men in historical writing, these works originally aimed to
give women a place in the evaluation of the past (Smith 1-5). Scholarship
in this area suggested that the degraded social role that women played in
much of history remained closely connected with the idealisation of the
“universalised masculine.” While many cultures considered the
masculine as essential and perfect, they saw the feminine as insignificant
and flawed (Kuefler 2-3).
Somewhat ironically, building on the methods of these feminist
scholars, researchers began to explore the construction of masculinity
throughout history. Several of these studies noted that women represent
only one of many groups that have been marginalised in the historical
record. Many cultures— ancient and modern—have treated ethnic
minorities, slaves, and members of the lower classes as the “equivalent
to women because they were subordinated men” (Williams 135). While
scholars like the philosopher Judith Butler recognise that men and
women seldom make up homogeneous social groups, she suggests, “the
feminine is always the outside and the outside is always feminine” (48).
Despite critiques of his work by some feminist scholars and
classicists, the innovative research of the French philosopher Michel
Foucault
remains
fundamental
for
modern
works
considering
masculinity in the ancient Greek, Roman, and early Byzantine worlds.
Foucault’s proposal that concepts like sexuality both change over time
and remain intimately connected with the symbiotic power relationships
amongst all members of a society has influenced a generation of scholars
(Behr 4-15). Additionally, his work showed that the old contrast of the
sexually promiscuous “fun loving” pagan versus the chaste and
“repressed” Christian was deeply flawed (Use of Pleasure 32). He
pointed out as well, that ancient Greek and Roman forms of sexuality
differed from modern concepts; Foucault argued that sexual orientation
was an invention of nineteenth-century Western Europeans (History of
Sexuality 43). In a viewpoint particularly embraced by gender scholars,
for Foucault, masculine ideology remained at the core of ancient Greek
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and Roman morality. These systems, he explained, represented “an
elaboration of masculine conduct carried out from the viewpoint of men
in order to give form to their behaviour” (Use of Pleasure 22-23).
Feminist scholars who continue to criticise the methodology of
Foucault and/or the study of masculinity in general seem uncomfortable
embracing a field that places men at the forefront of historical inquiry
once more (Conway 9). Accounts of aristocratic men certainly dominate
the historical record. So then how, and perhaps more importantly, why
study men as a gender? Unlike the obstacles that stand in the way of
scholars trying to find a “historical voice” for marginalised groups like
women or the lower classes, the sources for the analysis of masculine
ideologies are readily available. Nevertheless, this very abundance
makes finding “real” men in history somewhat problematic. When one
looks at the portraits of men found in the Roman and the early Byzantine
periods, for example, quite often only stylised images emerge. This point
is particularly relevant when examining the classicising and the
ecclesiastical historians of the Late Roman and the early Byzantine eras.
Similar to contemporary celluloid action-heroes and villains, the men
depicted in these accounts frequently display rhetorical notions of ideal
and non-ideal masculine conduct, producing men who often seem more
like cartoon-characters than genuine human beings. Nonetheless,
heroism itself serves as a sort of hyper-masculinity. What one finds in
many modern gender studies of the ancient world is primarily a “public”
view of codes of ideal manly conduct. Yet, just as the 1980s action-hero
Rambo tells one about American notions of masculinity , foreigners, and
the political environment of the Reagan era itself, the heroes, villains,
and barbarians found in the ancient literature divulge significant aspects
of the Roman and the Byzantine value systems. This popularity does not
mean that everyone in these cultures adhered to the models of manliness
and unmanliness found in these works. I would argue, however, that like
the themes of hyper-masculinity and unmanliness seen in modern
movies, these writings appealed to a diverse audience, and therefore
reflect the values—of not only the hierarchy of these Empires, but also of
large segments of their populations.
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Of course, dissonances remained between men’s expected social
roles and the actual personalities of Roman and early Byzantine men. In
the real world men consistently failed to live up to the stringent
masculine ideal articulated in the literary sources of the day. The nature
of the source material means that the private world of these men
remains mostly hidden. Just like their female counterparts, the cultural
construction of “man” was often insufficient to contain individual “men”
(Cooper; Kuefler 2). I would suggest, however, that at times we may get a
glimpse beneath the cracks and see the different ways these men
“proved” their manliness.
Several other challenges confront the researcher attempting to
separate the “real man” from the “constructed” one. Perhaps the most
critical question is how does one define or study a topic as seemingly
ambiguous as masculinity? By masculinity, scholars do not refer
generally to the anatomical or biological features of the male body, which
remain relatively constant among a range of societies and over time, but
to the variety of meanings that these cultures place or have placed on
persons with a male body. Therefore, a man may display “feminine”
traits, yet remain biologically male. The “feminine” trait itself, however,
may be transient and open to a wide range of interpretations.
Behaviours that one culture, group or era labels as “masculine” might be
called “womanly,” “unmanly,” or effeminate” (all three of these
expressions mean essentially the same thing) in another society, group
or period (Montserrat 153-58). For instance, excessive sexual
encounters with women, which may be seen as a sign of manliness in
contemporary western culture, commonly indicated “unmanliness” in
the Roman world (Williams 143-44).
Scholars call this concept the social construction of gender. Simply
defined, social construction means that one’s knowledge of objects or
ideas develops by interacting with the surrounding social order.
Therefore, the cultural environment that one grows up in plays a
fundamental role in shaping one’s perception of a flexible notion such as
masculinity. As John Searle argues, a twenty-dollar note is by its nature a
worthless piece of paper; it holds no intrinsic value except the worth a
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culture places upon it. It gains value (cultural meaning) because people
communally experience money as having worth, and so come to attach
value to it (41-45). Scholars apply this same argument to subjective
constructions like masculinity and ethnicity. This is not to say that all
human characteristics are socially constructed. This point is particularly
true of sexual orientation, which may be non-voluntary and biologically
orientated; nonetheless, how a culture understands and defines sexual
orientation is socially constructed (Partner). It is more challenging to
ascertain the value systems of individuals who act outside the
established boundaries of conventional society. Masculine ideology is not
always defined by a dominant paradigm, but can also be shaped by an
individual’s will and choice, which may be created through the effect of
subcultures or other social groupings. Modern academics label these
competing ideologies as subordinate masculinities (Connell; Karras 1722).
Disputes
I
nvestigations of masculinity often serve a political purpose. Some
researchers delve into a topic such as “homosexuality” as a way of
revealing how particular societies such as ancient Greece and Rome
had greater tolerance towards same-partner sex than their modern
counterparts. By showing that cultural views on masculinity are
constantly evolving, these scholars seek to reveal how and why
Christianity
established
a
“hostile”
ideology
that
condemned
homosexuality, banned women in the clergy, and in the West prohibited
the marriage of priests (e.g. Boswell; Jordan). By using historical texts
against the Catholic Church, these activists hope to influence the
Church’s future platform towards these issues. They contend that the
Church instituted these policies in reaction to the social concerns of Late
Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and for that reason, its stance on these
matters should be adapted to reflect a more inclusive and more
progressive modern world (Smith 3-4). For these academics, the study of
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history provides the opportunity to not only see the way things were, but
also a chance for glimpsing the way things might be (Kuefler 297).
This agenda helps to explain why many studies on Late Antique
masculinity focus on men as sexual beings. It might also account for the
reluctance by some academics to accept social history as a legitimate
historical tool. As we saw in the introduction, some of the criticism is
scathing. The respected Byzantine scholar, Warren Treadgold, is another
sceptic. He writes, “Byzantine thinking had little in common with today’s
Postmodernism, which looks for truth in panegyrics and saints’ lives, for
bias in historiography, everywhere for sexuality, and nowhere for
religious faith” (preface 14). Even Peter Brown’s masterful Body and
Society has been accused of portraying bodies as predominantly sexual
vessels (Louth). As John Behr warns, our modern preoccupation with
sexuality has caused researchers like Brown to overstate the importance
of this issue for our Late Antique writers (11-15).
Other critics of social history have accused many of its
practitioners of using anachronistic methods in their research. In the
field of ancient sexualities and masculinity, the debate between those
labelled as Essentialists and Social Constructionists has been particularly
visceral. The sceptics claim that many investigations on sexual difference
in the Greco-Roman world are flawed because they project modern
perceptions of sexuality and gender onto Greek and Roman societies
where these concepts held greatly different meanings. Moreover, many
classicists have frowned on the “gendered” approach to understanding
ancient Rome and Greece. These critics suggest that much of the work by
social historians has misunderstood, mistranslated, or stretched the
meanings of important Greek and Latin terminology to support their
theories. They maintain, as well, that many of these studies by social
historians have focused too heavily on rhetorical sources and too
narrowly on private aspects of masculinity, particularly sexuality (Behr;
Kuefler, “Boswell Thesis,” 1-25). In response, some social historians have
reversed the charges by accusing their detractors of misinterpreting
their work, and of using out-dated and anachronistic methods
themselves. We find an example of this counter-attack in Bruce O’Brian’s
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contention that historians have always looked to the past to both
illuminate contemporary concerns and to find “themselves.” He suggests
that no historian can achieve complete detachment. He and other social
historians submit that at least they are aware of the dangers of
interpreting the past through modern eyes (172-74).
Despite the acrimony at times between the two schools, scholars
in the past fifteen years have attempted to reconcile the disparate
methods preferred by classicists and social historians. Political events in
the first decade of the twenty-first century led to an increased awareness
that concepts like heroism and manliness mean different things in
different societies and change over time. The aftermath of the attacks on
the twin towers in New York city on September 11, 2001, in particular,
saw an increased interest by academics on how ancient thinkers
formulated the abstract concepts of manliness and courage (Rabieh 2-4;
Sluiter and Rosen 1-2). These investigations have combined traditional
historical, philological, and archaeological analysis with gender and
socio-linguistics studies to explore Roman masculinity by examining the
semantic range and gendered meanings of terms and concepts like virtus
(“virtue,” “manliness,” courage”) and ἀρετή (“goodness,” “excellence,”
“virtue”). Most importantly, they have shown the fluidity of these
concepts by revealing how “gendered” vocabulary like virtus, ἀνδρεία
(“manliness,” “manly spirit,” “courage”) and ἀρετή have shifted meanings
over time and, at times, meant different things to different people
according to the context they were used (Sluiter and Rosen 1-4). Other
researchers based in classics have borrowed some of the techniques
developed in gender history to investigate how masculine ideologies
governed the public speech and behaviour of Roman and early Byzantine
men (e.g. Edwards; Gleason; Williams; Foxhall and Salmon; Hobbs;
Burrus; Kuefler).
The disputes concerning the validity of social history and the
limitations of classical studies for understanding historical shifts
represent just one front in the larger debates circulating in the field of
Late Roman and early Byzantine history. At the heart of many of these
arguments lie long-established controversies concerning the end of the
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classical world, the advent of Christianity, and “the fall of the Roman
Empire.” In the historiographical tradition, these upheavals brought
about both a decline in civilisation and the triumph of superstition over
rationality (Goffart 230). The past forty years, however, has witnessed a
surge of interest in seeing Late Antiquity as its own unique historical
epoch. At the vanguard of this movement, Peter Brown’s, The World of
Late Antiquity (1971), presented a more optimistic vision of the breakup
of the Roman Empire. Instead of seeing this period as an era of decay,
leading to the “backward” Greek Byzantine Empire and the barbarised
kingdoms of Western Europe, Brown and his followers present Late
Antiquity as a complex period of cultural germination. These researchers
have argued that developments in this era—particularly the intellectual
growth and spread of Christianity—have helped to shape the modern as
well as the medieval world.
Because of the increased focus on this era, in the past forty years,
the period known formerly as the “Dark Ages,” has become somewhat
‘brighter.” Scholars have reworked the model of Western Europe
gradually crumbling into ignorance as the Empire retreated to the East
and “barbarian” peoples flooded into the West. As we have seen above,
this paradigm shift brought about a fecund period for Late Antique social
historians, and in particular, those interested in uncovering ancient
masculinities. In the past few years, however, several studies have
questioned this more optimistic vision of the end of the Ancient World
and the advent of the Early Middle Ages. So too have these works
criticised what they see as an over-reliance on the newer historical
methods preferred by social historians (e.g. Heather; Ward-Perkins). As
the historian James O’Donnell remarks, there continues to be a division
among those scholars who embrace innovative historical techniques, and
those who largely reject them. He writes:
Followers of Peter Brown and Averil Cameron tend to focus on the
eastern half of the Empire and see late antiquity not as merely the end of
the classical world, but as the first period of the middle ages. They tend
to show more interest in religious and cultural history, and are open to
methods used in other humanistic disciplines. Their debunkers prefer
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Masculinities Journal
military and political history to the religious, and overall tend to distrust
theory (O’Donnell).
My own research strives to use methodologies from both
schools (Stewart). It integrates disparate secondary and primary
sources to create a greater sense of how early Byzantine secular
and ecclesiastical writers linked representations of military valour
to their notions of the qualities that made up “true” manliness.
Like many historians, my environment has influenced me. Indeed,
the events surrounding 9/11/ and the ensuing wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq provided me with the original impetus for
trying to understand how a demilitarised segment of a population
could embrace militarism and men’s martial virtues as a type of
hyper-manliness. Living in the United States in this period, I found
myself bombarded on a nearly daily basis by a myriad of visual
and literary images promoting the soldier’s life as the epitome of
the manly life. Even more interesting, were the various ways nonsoldiers both publically admired and sought to connect
themselves with the martial legacy of the state and the manly
identity of its soldiers. The image of a President, who had avoided
fighting in Vietnam as a youth, draping himself in manly martial
imagery made me ponder the ways similarly non-martial
emperors from the Later Roman and early Byzantine Empire, may
have promoted their own martial and masculine ideology. In the
highly patriotic world of post 9/11 America, the field of battle
seemed to provide a realm where soldiers—who hailed largely
from the less privileged classes—could establish a raw manliness
superior to that of powerful executives, politicians, famous actors,
and professional athletes. While appreciating the dangers of
making anachronistic comparisons between a modern state like
the United States and an ancient one like the early Byzantine, it
made me consider the ways and some of the reasons why civilian
members of a population could, not just admire, but seem to share
in a “group” masculinity shaped by the exploits of a relatively
small percentage of men.
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I will close this paper by returning to the debate introduced
in the introduction. If critics of scholarship examining ancient
masculinities have been correct in pointing out the dangers of
letting our modern obsession with sexuality “cloud” our view of
the past, it is just as vital to point out the androcentric nature of
Rome and Byzantium in comparison to many modern western
cultures. I would argue that living in a world of increasing gender
equality can hinder our understanding of the ancient Romans and
the early Byzantines. Unquestionably many ancient Roman and
Byzantine men from the ruling classes valued “true” manliness as
a cultural ideal. Indeed, hegemonic masculine ideologies
disseminated the views of a political elite intent on justifying and
protecting the existing political order. While the past must always
remain a “foreign country,” familiarising ourselves with these
ancient masculinities can provide us not only with a better
understanding of ancient Rome and Byzantium, but also offer us
essential insights into our own era.
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