Text, Body, and Tools

Abstract

This article explores processes by which masculinities change, using examples from the Norwegian forestry industry. Forestry has traditionally been one of the most masculine rural work activities and an arena where hegemonic rural masculinity is expressed. The study is based on mediations of masculinity in a forestry magazine covering a period of twenty years. Using text, body, and tools as an analytic scheme, pictures of temporal variations of, and relations between, “traditional” and “new” types of masculinity are described. Even though practical, physical work in the forest is a basis for rural hegemonic masculinity, other types of work with new cultural influences (organizational and expert work) lead to “dialogical” masculinities, which open up for more flexible boundaries and cultural borrowing. This might be important to secure the future viability of rural industries and communities, especially if the recruitment of women is desirable.