Reactionary Gender Studies? The Historiography of Mexican Masculinity by Galadriel Mehera Gerardo

Reactionary Gender Studies?

The Historiography of Mexican Masculinity

Galadriel Mehera Gerardo

Since the so-called feminist revolution of the 1970s, scholarship on women has become fairly commonplace. Especially within the social sciences, scholars have increasingly examined women’s lives in past and present times. Examining the previously ignored history of women has brought forth an entirely new way of looking at the past, closely tied with the “new social history” which has emerged in the United States in recent decades. However, the counterpart of women’s studies, “men’s studies,” as they relate to men as gendered entities, has failed to proliferate in the manner women’s studies has. Only recently have scholars become interested in researching men and masculinity, and the scholarship has not flourished. Scholarship on masculinity has been especially sparse within studies of Latin America. The trend seems odd, especially given the common assumption in Western countries that Latin American men are “machos.” Recently, however, some scholars have attempted to permeate the uncharted area of study in countries like Mexico. Mexico proves especially interesting when examining masculinity given its strong association with the concept of “machismo” in the United States. Western scholars scrutinizing masculinity in Mexico, therefore, may have chosen the country as a seemingly quintessential representation of masculinity in all of Latin America. However, the strongest scholarship on masculinity in Mexico recognizes what is specifically Mexican about the expression of masculinity discussed, even assessing the variance of “masculinities” within Mexico, based on differing regions, classes, ages, periods, and ethnicities. The historiography of masculinity in Mexico proves difficult to discuss because of the variation in Mexican culture, resulting in a variety of discussions of masculinity. Not only do the few scholars who have researched Mexican masculinity differ in the region and periods in which they examine Mexican masculinity, but they also work in different areas of the social sciences, so they each approach the topic differently. Yet despite the differences in mode and method of study, the study of existing scholarship on Mexican masculinity proves valid because one can observe several trends, assumptions, and stereotypes in the scholarship which leave it lacking. While one must recognize the existing scholarship on Mexican masculinity proves revolutionary if only because it represents the first example of a new field of study, one must also acknowledge and anatomize its faults in order to insure more valid conclusions on the subject in future studies. While the works on Mexican masculinity both differ and agree depending on the aspect of masculinity discussed, they all represent similar failings because of source problems, a tendency to base their arguments on stereotypical notions, and a failure to employ an interdisciplinary approach. Future scholarship on masculinity may learn from these shortcomings and embrace the merits of the current scholarship, producing a better-rounded and realistic depiction of Mexican men, both past and present.

Background: Oscar Lewis and the Origin of the Term “Machismo”

Intrinsic to all studies of Mexican masculinity is the term “machismo,” a word used as the stereotype of Mexican men, portraying them as estranged from their wives and children, prone towards violence for no particular reason, and forcing the complete subjugation of women to men.[1] The origin of the term machismo remains unclear. Matthew Gutmann, an anthropologist who studied masculinity in a working class community in Mexico City, expresses the belief machismo is a new concept that emerged in the 1940s and is tied to Mexican cinema.[2] Although Gutmann shies away from completely attributing the emergence of machismo to cinema alone, he insists the concept emerged recently, yet he does not examine the source of the word itself, nor whether the stereotype associated with it actually emerged for the first time in the 1940s. The term is obviously tied to the much older word “macho,” which does not carry the negative connotations attached to machismo,[3] and in Mexico is used as a synonym for "boy" or "man." In her study of the phenomena of “marianismo,” the female counterpart to machismo, Evelyn Stevens examines the roots of marianismo, tracing them back as far as the early Mesopotamian cultures.[4] However, Stevens examines the traits associated with the concept of marianismo (a word invented by scholars to catalog the stereotype of Latin American women which juxtaposes them against Latin American men), not the derivatives of the word itself.

Despite the creation of the word marianismo by scholars, few have questioned the origin of the word machismo and its accuracy in describing Mexican men. The Oxford English dictionary supports Gutmann’s statement that the word machismo indeed emerged in the mid-twentieth century, claiming the word originated in the United States in the 1940s, deriving from the Spanish word macho.[5] Of five Spanish dictionaries examined,[6] only one contains the word machismo, and it is a dictionary published in the United States for English speakers learning colloquial Spanish.[7] Therefore the origin of the term machismo, and its validity as a concept consciously considered by Mexican men, remains uncertain. Such evidence as well as Gutmann’s assertion that machismo was “created” during the 1940s seems to make using the word in scholarly discussions of Mexican masculinity prior to that decade invalid. However, regardless of the origin of the word, some of the characteristics it describes doubtlessly did exist in Mexican society for centuries before the 1940s. The danger of using the word machismo emerges when scholars describe Mexican men as consciously considering the concept of machismo, assuming machismo (the ideal form of masculinity) dictates their behavior. While the word macho may have been used among Mexicans for some time, there is no proof machismo was. Furthermore, many scholars use the more subtle term of “honor,” to describe the motivation for Latin American men “defending” their masculinity in certain situations.[8] Western scholars today have yet to prove the term machismo is or was commonly used or understood among Mexicans in Mexico; instead, as Gutmann points out, scholars tend to assume the prevalence of the term among Chicanos in the United States implies a similar understanding in Mexico, which is not necessarily the case. Gutmann further asserts the term itself is associated with North American racism towards Mexicans, and he goes so far as to attribute the word machismo to North Americans' need to differentiate themselves from a “backward” sense of masculinity among a “lower” people.[9]

The question of the emergence of the term machismo brings forth another problem when examining assumptions in works on Mexican masculinity. In his rebuttal of the concept of machismo as a natural and all encompassing characteristic among Mexican men, Gutmann blames Oscar Lewis for popularizing the term.[10] Lewis, an American anthropologist, conducted pioneering research on Mexican masculinity in the 1940s and 1950s. His influence can be seen in the works of contemporary scholars of Mexican masculinity, and many discuss their opinions of his work. While Gutmann appears critical of Lewis for perpetuating the negative stereotype of the macho mexicano,[11] he points out much of the negative repercussions of Lewis’ work emerged from scholars' failure to analyze it and because recent scholars have used some of Lewis’ passages out of context.[12] Though many criticize Lewis for creating the image of the lazy Mexican man who beats his wife and wastes his days drinking, Gutmann points out that while Lewis does present Mexican men as secondary in household importance to their wives, he also notes the importance of active parenting among poor Mexican men, providing a less one-dimensional, purely macho image.[13] Steve Stern, who discusses gender in late colonial Mexico, also recognizes the influence of Lewis on his work. Although Stern appears to favor Lewis’ work, he notes that Lewis presents a “morbid” picture of Mexican peasant life. However, the problems Stern notes concerning Lewis’ work relate to his depiction of women, not men. He advocates reading between the lines of Lewis’ “pre-feminist” discourse to find female opposition within adherence to patriarchy.[14] However, Stern does not challenge Lewis’ ideas about men and masculinity, apparently agreeing with the concept of machismo. James Taggart also examines Lewis’ work, using Lewis’ depiction of Mexican men as a stereotype, which his own research will either refute or reinforce.[15] While Taggart juxtaposes Lewis’ work to Matthew Gutmann’s, he falls victim to the simplistic reading and sensationalist focus on specific incidents that Gutmann warns leads to misinterpretations of Lewis’ work.

Oscar Lewis proves an important influence on all of the contemporary scholars of Mexican masculinity; he researched the subject at a time when Westerners had little interest in studying masculinity, especially in “third world” countries. His studies prove useful if only as observations of Mexican family life during the 1940s, of which little else exists. However, his work must be taken with a grain of salt. Lewis wrote during a time when anthropologists practiced a sort of didactic cultural “othering,” also regarded as cultural imperialism, in which the standards of one culture were applied to another, resulting in a critical portrayal of the studied culture as intrinsically “different,” or “backward.” While Lewis conducted groundbreaking research on Mexican masculinity, he was a product of his times. Most contemporary scholars recognize the biases present in Lewis’ work. However, their ability to come to terms with its influence on their own work, and their recognition of stereotypes perpetrated by Lewis’ work, varies.

Characteristics of Mexican Masculinity and How Masculinity Is Constructed

Scholars analyzing Mexican masculinity must initially consider what “being a man” means in Mexico in the time and place they discuss as well as search for the ways this image of masculinity is created. The scholars appraised here look at Mexican masculinity in different periods and regions. Matthew Gutmann, as aforementioned, conducted an anthropological study of working class Mexican men in the colonia Santo Domingo in Mexico City. Historian Steve Stern attempted to understand greater trends in Mexican gender identities in the late colonial period by examining three cities with different ethnic compositions. Annick Prieur explored masculinity as it relates to homo- and bisexuality in a contemporary barrio outside Mexico City. In another contemporary study, Susanna Rostas examined Concheros dancers in Mexico City. And finally, historian James Taggart scrutinized the folktales of a contemporary Nahuat “Indian” in Mexico, assessing them for greater indications about Mexican male identity. Although the authors often discuss similar issues concerning Mexican masculinity, they also often arrive at differing conclusions and present seemingly contradictory arguments. This may occur because expressions of masculinity in Mexico vary across time and region, not necessarily because one scholar is right and another wrong.

In her study of the Concheros (groups of Mexicans of partial “Indian” blood who participate in Aztec dances), Susanna Rostas provides a fairly stereotypical image of Mexican men. According to Rostas, Mexican men primarily define masculinity in opposition to femininity.[16] She also conforms to the idea that mestizo males embody machismo, spending time bonding with other men and using and abusing women.[17] While Rostas attempts to defy the dominant stereotype by noting Mexican men are often close to their mothers and possess the ability to cry, she does not expose many other characteristics which defy the image of machismo, nor does she seem to disagree with the stereotype as a useful way of categorizing Mexican men.

Like Rostas, Annick Prieur examines contemporary expressions of Mexican masculinity, but in a very different setting. Mirroring Rostas’ argument, Prieur often reinforces negative stereotypes associated with Mexican masculinity. Prieur focuses on the sexual characteristics that constitute masculinity. Prieur asserts (without any quantitative data) that many contemporary urban working-class men in Mexico engage in homosexual acts at some point in their lives,[18] thus validating his own discussion of Mexican expression of masculinity based on the role men play in homosexual encounters. According to Prieur, engaging in sex with other men does not make a man less masculine; in fact, being the penetrator, whether of a man or a woman, enhances one’s masculinity.[19] Prieur, like Rostas, sees men’s perception of masculinity as juxtaposed against femininity. Being penetrated implies being feminine, polluted, and submissive, while penetrating a feminine person (whether male or female), serves as an expression of masculinity.[20] Prieur interprets men’s domination in homosexual acts as a means of defining oneself as masculine, in opposition to women or homosexuals.[21] He further explains masculinity was partly defined as being the opposite of femininity when attributing men’s desire to sexually dominate and drink excessively as a need to separate themselves from characteristics associated with women, such as humility and willingness to forgive.[22] Prieur also perpetuates the idea that machismo prevails among working class, urban Mexican men. He cites machismo and homophobia as traits present in penetrators that help define them as men.[23] Throughout the essay Prieur focuses on characteristics definitive of masculinity which conform to the idea of machismo, including extreme sexual desire, a tendency towards violence, and participation in a secret “men’s world” women are left out of.

Steve Stern also analyzes masculine characteristics as conforming to the concept of “machismo.” Because Stern’s discourse focuses on violence, his discussion of masculine qualities centers on their expression through domestic and local violence, although he also addresses stereotypical notions such as heavy drinking. Stern asserts that the ability to dominate socially and sexually characterized masculinity in late colonial Mexico.[24] He attributes construction of masculinity to the undefined term “society,” which forces men to conceive of masculinity in terms of power relations.[25] Power relations involved not only relations between husbands and wives, but also between a man and his male friends or a mestizo and “ethnically superior” men. According to Stern, among the defining characteristics of masculinity, those which implied power through association with ethnic or economic privilege proved most influential. Thus a man’s role as a provider served as a valid characteristic of masculinity, because keeping wives and children at home was an expression of economic success.[26] However, Stern also explores the variation of qualities defining masculinity based on men’s social standing, which dictated their ability to fulfill the upper-class “ideal” of masculinity.[27] Stern notes that while some continuity of idealized masculinity existed across classes, the lower classes did not simply accept the ideals of their social superiors.[28] Instead, they adapted masculinity to their particular situations, combining competence, courage, and adversary toward the upper class to create an ideal of masculinity that resembled that espoused by the upper class, but suited the restrictions of poverty.[29] And while Stern attributes much of the “general” internalizing of masculine identity to Mexican society, he notes the importance of the Mexican family in conditioning the specifically “subaltern” style of masculinity in lower-class men.[30] Stern, therefore, while asserting the validity of the machismo stereotype in describing Mexican men, also wishes to adapt the stereotype to include variants that existed based on class, region, and ethnicity.[31]

In yet another discussion of Mexican masculinity, James Taggart examines the characteristics associated with Mexican masculinity and the ways in which they are constructed. Because Taggart’s study focuses on only two examples -- a Spanish man and a Nuhuat Indian in Mexico -- he discusses Nahuat concepts about masculinity more than “Mexican” gender identity, although he does include what he views as “Spanish-speaking Mexican” concepts of masculinity in order to juxtapose them against Nuhuat ideas. Taggart, seemingly believing the opinions espoused by Oscar Lewis, describes the Spanish-speaking poor urban Mexican man as authoritarian, critical, and unsympathetic toward family members.[32] Although Nacho, the Nahuat man Taggart studies, tells stories describing men with characteristics similar to those told by Spanish-speaking men, Taggart asserts Nacho’s disapproval of traditional machismo qualities is observable in the fact he distances himself from the heroes in his stories.[33] Additionally, Taggart does not describe Nacho’s disapproval of machismo-like qualities as a personal preference, but as a sense of masculinity present in Nahuats in general. According to Taggart, Nacho attributes strength, courage, and assertiveness to Spanish-speakers’ sense of masculinity (an assumption Taggart apparently agrees with),[34] while his own sense of masculinity revolves around consideration for others and a desire to provide for one’s family.[35] In asserting the novelty of Nahuat men’s perception of masculinity, Taggart reinforces the idea “other” Mexican men define themselves as the opposite of women. Nahuats, on the other hand, respect women, and define their masculinity in different ways.[36] Additionally, Taggart claims masculinity is constructed through cultural influences, families, individual experiences, and specifically through ideas contained in folk tales.[37] While confronting interesting aspects of Nahuat gender dynamics, Taggart at the same time employs the stereotype of machismo as the epitome of Spanish-speaking Mexican expression of masculinity, thus contributing to an already negative stereotype.

Matthew Gutmann presents a different set of traits as definitive of Mexican masculinity than those presented by the other authors. Although Gutmann studies only a small group of Mexican men in a particular neighborhood of Mexico City, he is the only author to fight the image of machismo. For example, as opposed to the picture most scholars paint of Mexican masculinity meaning constant promiscuous sex, Gutmann describes masturbation as one of the defining characteristics of masculinity, at least among non-married men.[38] At the same time, Gutmann reinforces the idea that sexual desire is a definitive characteristic of Mexican men, but he divides this notion from the concept of Mexican men wanting to “spread their seed,” and thus “conquer” or “dominate” women.[39] And while Gutmann notes many Mexican men in the colonia Santo Domingo still viewed drunkenness as a masculine quality, it was actually not a requisite for fulfilling the role of a man, and was also becoming an increasingly degendered activity.[40] Gutmann also notes the emergence of active parenting, economic providing, and taking part in housework (though usually manual as opposed to domestic tasks) as other defining characteristics of masculinity.[41] Gutmann especially emphasizes the importance of parenting, asserting that “how children turned out” was also a significant definer of masculinity.[42] And while Gutmann notes the continued existence of wife beating in colonia Santo Domingo, he claims it no longer characterizes mainstream notions of masculinity, but instead results from specific social circumstances that make men feel powerless.[43] His argument parallels Heidi Tinsman’s discussion of wife beating in Chile, which she convincingly describes as the result of changing economic conditions that affected men’s ability to fulfill their ideal of masculinity.[44] Yet Gutmann takes his argument one step further, noting that men who partake in wife beating use the supposed “machismo culture” as a scapegoat which they can blame their actions on. Gutmann, like many others, notes the importance of society and the family in conditioning concepts of masculinity, paying particular attention to the role played by changing social circumstances and economic situations. Gutmann argues the qualities which constitute masculinity in contemporary colonia Santo Domingo include active parenting, ability to provide for one’s family, and sexual activity not necessarily indicative of domination, qualities conditioned more by changing social and economic circumstances than a timeless perception of what it means to be a Mexican man.

Several overarching themes exist throughout the works of the various authors. For one thing, the authors all contend Mexican men view masculinity as the opposite of femininity, and they assert the juxtaposition provides one of the primary ways men construct their gendered identities. However, if this is the case, how does one reconcile the fact men needed to avoid feminine characteristics such as sympathy and compassion, as asserted by Prieur, with the fact they were active, caring fathers, as described by Gutmann, or able to cry and express emotion, as Rostas depicted them? One could argue the various authors discuss the same theme in various times and regions, and therefore their arguments inevitably will not reconcile with one another. However, often times the authors can not reconcile that the concept masculinity was defined in opposition to femininity with their own hypotheses. For example, Gutmann argues male identities are often created as the opposite of women,[45] yet his book focuses on “alternative” depictions of Mexican masculinity, describing men as active parents and involved homemakers. If the men Gutmann describes indeed fulfilled such “alternative” gender identities by participating in activities Gutmann notes the men recognized as traditionally female, how then could they define their sense of manhood in opposition to femininity? Other authors, such as Stern, simply present the argument without providing any evidence or examples to illustrate the point. The fact that eighteenth century men grew angry when their wives did not have tortillas waiting for them after work does not necessarily indicate a tendency to determine one’s gender identity as the converse of femininity. The authors encounter problems in attributing an anti-feminine quality to Mexican men’s construction of masculinity because the idea either conflicts with their arguments, or no evidence exists to support such a claim. For these reasons, the believability of the concept Mexican men construct (or constructed) their gendered identity based on a juxtaposition to female identity remains questionable.

Another characteristic many authors attribute to masculine identity, violence and desire to dominate, receives vastly different treatments. Stern, who emphasizes violence as a characteristic of masculinity to the greatest extreme, notes several aspects of male violence. While Stern makes a great effort to dispel the belief in descarga violence—violence which men committed without intense provocation—he depicts violence as highly gendered, an attempt on behalf of lower-class men to retain their sense of masculinity in the only way they saw as suitable.[46] Given the men’s class subjugation, Stern depicts violence, including domestic violence, as a reasonable expression of the men’s desire to re-claim their sense of masculinity. For Stern, therefore, where gender relations were intrinsically tied to a power hierarchy, and “subaltern” men had few means to protest their situation, violence was naturally the definitive way of embodying masculinity. In contrast, Gutmann does not view violence as a characteristic of masculinity. Instead, he implies the “fictitious” notion of machismo, with its emphasis on male violence, provides men with a scapegoat for actions which are not used to fulfill a characteristic of masculine gender identity, but instead are a reaction to various external circumstances. Taggart depicts violence as a defining trait of masculinity among Spanish-speaking Mexicans, but not among Nuhuats. Yet in a contradictory manner, he ends his book with a description of violence between the two groups, seemingly contradicting his argument concerning the masculine ideal among Nuhuats.[47] In fact, the episode described by Taggart coincides with Stern's discussion of violence as prevalent among men in Indian communities, one of the characteristics which Stern argues joined the masculine identities of men from various regions and ethnicities in Mexico.[48] Stern describes violence as a means for dispirited men to assert their masculinity in circumstances when they felt their "manliness" challenged by their subjugation to their social superiors. While Gutmann's discussion sheds insight on domestic violence in contemporary times, Stern's argument provides a better model for understanding the gendered dynamics of violence on a broader scope, and despite some generalizations, Stern provides a convincing argument concerning the psychology behind male violence and its importance in constituting a male identity among the lower classes.

Machismo: Fact or Fiction?

All the authors also discuss the concept of machismo in their discourses on what qualities make up masculinity. Some do not question the validity or existence of the concept at all; Prieur asserts a machismo attitude defines a man as masculine, neither defining machismo nor defending his claim.[49] Rostas and Taggart both offhandedly use the term as an overarching ideal of Mexican masculinity, but do not address it as primary to their arguments. Stern and Gutmann, however, look at the concept of machismo from a more theoretical standpoint. Gutmann questions whether the quality exists at all among Mexican men, while Stern assumes a degree of validity to the term, and explores the nuances within machismo, which he dubs commonly overlooked.

Stern bases his discussion of machismo—which he argues exists—on the prevalence of violence and need to subjugate women that he finds prevalent in the court records he uses as his primary sources. By examining three regions in Mexico with differing social and ethnic structure, in all of which he finds various degrees of machismo present, Stern asserts the validity of the concept.[50] While he explains some characteristics of machismo, especially violence, emerged for different reasons and in different degrees in different regions, their presence nonetheless convinces Stern of an all encompassing ideal of masculinity, despite its regional diversity.[51] Stern goes so far as to assert machismo not only was a prevalent quality cross-regionally and among various ethnicities in late colonial Mexico, but that the same machismo sentiment exists among men in contemporary Mexico.[52] He bases his conclusion on his personal observations in contemporary Mexico, recent ethnographies, and gendered patriarchal language in politicians' speeches.[53] Therefore, several examples of violence and patriarchal rhetoric prove sufficient to convince Stern of the widespread existence of machismo in contemporary times. Moreover, his assumption concerning the prevalence of machismo in late colonial Mexico is based on one particular trait associated with the machismo stereotype, violence, which he finds evidence of in a very limited source.

Gutmann examines machismo in quite a different manner. As previously mentioned, Gutmann questions the very existence of machismo as a long term trend of Mexican male gender identity, believing it emerged in the 1940s. Gutmann claims not to find any pure example of machismo during his observation. Rather, he meets a variety of men who each embody a combination of male identities.[54] Moreover, he asserts that while he could invent four categories of men in colonia Santo Domingo, none of the men would actually define themselves in such a manner, and no man could fit into only one category.[55] He combines this assessment with the fact the men he meets consider the labels macho and machismo negative to support his belief in the nonexistence of machismo.

While Gutmann's argument proves fairly believable, it also expresses optimism about masculinity. While the term machismo may have recently emerged, and while the idea of an overarching gender identity which applies in some degree to all Mexican men may be valid, one cannot discount the theme of machismo too quickly. Apparently aspects which contemporary scholars attribute to the machismo ideology existed in previous time (and still exist today), although they may have not been part of a larger "value system," and they may not have been conceptualized as machismo among the men who performed them. Perhaps the qualities attributed to machismo—violence, drinking, household dominance, lack of emotion, and a general desire to subjugate women—should be taken apart and viewed as individual phenomena. Such an assessment might yield a deeper and more historically based understanding of the phenomenon so long dubbed machismo. For example, the apparent prevalence of wife beating throughout Mexican history may have nothing to do with a machismo sense of masculinity, but rather with economic circumstances, such as those suggested by Tinsman and Gutmann, which have prevailed among certain classes of Mexicans throughout time. Moreover, closer examination of the individual characteristics of machismo might yield various statistics; for example, perhaps wife beating is prevalent among lower class men, and lack of emotional attachment among upper class men, but not vice versa. Such a reassessment of machismo is necessary for understanding the true nature of how Mexican men have defined their gender identities throughout time and depending on class and ethnicity.

The Problem of Sources

Part of the problem with the discussion of machismo and masculinity more generally derives from the sources used. Many scholars writing on Mexican masculinity are anthropologists, and therefore base their conclusions only on observational research. Gutmann and Prieur both serve as examples of the shortcomings of this kind of scholarship. Both spent time living among the men they studied in Mexico City neighborhoods, and they base their arguments on their observations and interviews. However, neither author situates his argument historically. Prieur examines contemporary masculinity in a “here and now” sense, apparently not recognizing the undefined term “society” they so often refer to reflects the history of the people and places it encompasses. Because the two authors never discuss the historical background of masculinity in Mexico, they can ultimately never present an innovative discussion of how and why masculinity is constructed in the way they observe it expressed. Gutmann’s discussion of machismo, for example, loses credence because he does not explain how the term originated in the past, nor does he provide examples from the past to refute or reinforce the stereotype of machismo. Ignorance of the history of machismo proves especially detrimental to Gutmann’s argument because he argues the expression of masculinity he observes is a recent phenomenon, conditioned by recent social and economic changes. Yet he does not discuss the social and economic situations which determined a different expression of masculinity in the past, nor does he even explicitly describe past expressions of masculinity.

Although a historian, Taggart encounters similar source problems. Because Taggart uses oral history as his primary evidence, he too tends to ignore past concepts of masculinity and their influence on creating a gender identity in contemporary Mexican men. Additionally, Taggart suffers from a dearth of sources, apparently feeling that because his sources prove innovative means he does not need to cross-reference them with more traditional sources. Taggart bases his entire argument on two oral history interviews, one from a Spanish man and one from a Nahuat Indian man in Mexico. While Taggart’s discussion of myths as a valid form of cultural expression proves valid, his gaping generalizations based on two oral history accounts of myths appear unbelievable. Taggart believes that Nacho’s depiction of men in his retelling of myths provides an adequate means of understanding Nahuat gender identity in general, despite the fact Nacho’s uniqueness of opinion compared to other Nahuat men appears obvious when Taggart recounts the violence of the men in a confrontation with Spanish-speaking Mexicans.[56] Moreover, Taggart makes assumptions about the gender identities of Spanish-Speaking Mexicans which he provides no evidence for, save perhaps a few secondary sources and the assumption the sense of masculinity espoused by a Spanish-speaking Spanish man must be shared by a Spanish-speaking Mexican man.

Unlike the other scholars, Steve Stern does situate his argument historically, and uses historical documentation to back up his remarks. However, Stern’s sources are essentially flawed in several ways. For one thing, Stern only uses one type of documentation, court records, which many people would view as evidence of deviant behavior as opposed to a social norm. Stern argues the sources do in fact display normal, everyday gendered relations, perhaps to greater extremes than usual, and not simply evidence of deviance. He bases his argument on the fact the people in the court cases were not “loners,” but people connected to families, implying they exemplified “normal” behavior.[57] Additionally, Stern argues his sources are not only valid but provide the “hidden voices” of poor people disguised or absent in other sources.[58] Historian Richard Boyer believes Stern’s argument that criminal records express normal life experiences, based on the huge sample of criminal cases Stern examines.[59] Historian Susan Socolow, on the other hand, finds problems with the types of sources Stern uses, believing them to be generic and misused. According to Socolow, historians of the New Latin American Cultural History tend to use one or two cases to make sweeping claims about all of society.[60] Despite Stern’s claim to the enormity of his sources, one cannot ignore the partial validity of Socolow’s comment, given the fact Stern constantly refers to the same examples. And even if one accepts Stern’s argument that court records do provide an example of dominant behavior patterns, the use of one type of source alone cannot validly portray historical nuances such as gender roles, identities, and construction.

Conclusion: Proposed Directions for Future Scholarship

While the works of contemporary social scientists examining gender in Mexico possess flaws, they also prove triumphant. Each work possesses merits, and they provide a steady groundwork on which future scholarship will build. One can imagine that if the techniques employed by Gutmann and Stern were combined, an extremely accurate portrayal of Mexican masculinity (or masculinities) might emerge. The two biggest obstacles remaining in the path of scholarship on masculinity remain the stereotype of machismo and the failure to incorporate interdisciplinary sources. Once scholars remove the concept of machismo from their scholarly framework altogether, they will stop wasting time looking for evidence to prove or disprove the existence of a concept which may have been constructed by academia itself, and probably never existed in the “universal whole” implied by older works such as Oscar Lewis’. The concept of machismo inevitably clouds scholars ability to view evidence concerning Mexican masculinity objectively, and therefore it should be discarded until a more realistic, nuanced, and unbiased depiction of masculinity emerges as a comparison. Such a result can only be achieved through employing an interdisciplinary approach both to theory and sources. As made obvious in the current scholarship, resolutely anthropological or historical studies prove inadequate. A melding of traditional and non-traditional historical sources, as well as anthropological observation and interviews, will provide the strongest and most convincing scholarship on Mexican masculinity in the future.[61]