HEGEMONIC MASCULINITY AND SOCIAL MARKERS OF DIFFERENCE:
A study on the practices that build young masculinities
The main focus that guided the formation of the field of gender studies (in the second half of the 20th century) and its subsequent academic institutionalization (in the 1980s) was to establish a theoretical-conceptual (but also political) basis capable of showing that subordination of women was a construction of patriarchal society and, in this way, could be fought. As the focus during this period of formation/institutionalization was turned almost exclusively to the subordination relationship of women within the patriarchal social system emphasized and studied by feminist theories, research on men and masculinities remained in the shadows (ARRILHA, UNBEHAUM, MEDRADO, 1998 ).
This research is linked to the current that, in the tradition of masculinity studies, consider gender as a historically and culturally situated social construction (BEAUVOIR, 2016a, HARAWAY, 2004; CONNELL, 2105; CONNELL and PEARSE, 2015; VIGOYA, 2018 et al. . al.). In addition, this research recognizes that masculinity studies owe the advances promoted by feminist theories, especially in relation to the way in which they theoretically and conceptually captured the central problem of women's subordination. However, it is worth mentioning that the research presented here considers that power operates through multiple and fluid structures of domination (PISCITELLI, 2009). This perspective allows us to understand gender as part of a system of domination closely articulated with class, race, nationality, age, among other dimensions.The main objective of this dissertation is to investigate how the practices that build the local versions of masculinities of young people (between fifteen and eighteen years old) are constituted from the interaction between the elements associated with hegemonic masculinity (heterosexual performance, physical strength, financial success, among others). other categories) and social markers of difference (such as race, class, nationality, sexuality).