Male Breast Cancer in the Public Imagination

Abstract

Breast cancer in American culture is intrinsically tied to normative ideologies of femininity. Within the highly visible public discourse about breast cancer, men with the disease (both transgender and cisgender) remain nearly invisible. The very presence of breast cancer in men is unthinkable precisely because its presence challenges the association of femininity with breasts. In this chapter I explore the ways that male breast cancer emerges in public discourse in order to explore the ways in normative expectations of masculinity emerge as a narrative framework for bringing trans and cis men into the breast cancer conversation as well as the ways that masculinity is deployed differentially in representing breast cancer in these two groups of men.