Marginalized and Protest Masculinities: Conceptualizing Racism for Black Men in Families

Abstract

Family contexts are sites to analyze the changing expectations associated with masculinity, revealing the multiple expressions of various types of masculinities. However, research in family and gender studies often uses catchall categorizations to understand complex dynamics that influence families who confront race and racism. This article emphasizes theoretical tools that address race, racism, and masculinity, conceptualizing masculinities as intersectional and family-level processes through racial discrimination and racial socialization. The social construction of masculinities is inseparable from racism and shapes family relationships in tandem with structural conditions and institutions controlled by laws and policies. It identifies marginalized and protest masculinities—concepts that scholars have less frequently used but that foreground race and racism and hold the capacity to explain how masculinities emerge in family contexts.