Sunday, July 29, 2012

New Journal - New Male Studies: An International Journal


I found the announcement for this new journal at the National Coalition for Men site - the longest standing men's rights group in the country. Their agenda is centered on ending sexual discrimination against men - and how that plays out often looks like bashing all forms of feminism and, by extension, women in general.

The editor is Dr. Miles Groth, one of the leaders of the new male studies movement (an effort to reject the tradition of men's studies on the grounds that it grew out of the women's studies departments at most colleges and is therefore tainted with feminist beliefs and agendas). The advisory board includes Warren Farrell (of course) and Pelle Billing.

Maybe they will avoid the misogynistic tone that so often seems to be a part of the men's rights movement, with which this journal is indirectly affiliated, and present truly useful material for understanding the plight of men and boys in the 21st century. The first two issues are linked to below.

New Male Studies: An International Journal

SUNDAY, JULY 29, 2012

New Male Studies: An International Journal (NMS) is an open access online interdisciplinary forum for research and discussion of issues facing boys and men worldwide.

Rationale

In response to a now well-documented decline in the overall well-being of males in postmodern culture, a group of Australian, Canadian, European and American scholars have gathered to work together to publish research essays, opinion pieces, and book reviews on all aspects of the male experience.

Main Foci

Several broad areas of fundamental interest and concern have been identified:

(1) the experience and outcomes of education for boys and young men, (2) challenges and difficulties of developmental transition for males – especially adolescents, (3) significant disparities in health outcomes for men compared with women, (4) the vital role of fathering, (5) the inordinate number of males in the penal system, (6) the characterisations of men and boys cultivated within popular culture, academe, and many social institutions, and (7) how men experience and are affected by the kinds of occupational, familial, and social roles that are culturally required of them.

Tri-annual Publication

New Male Studies will three times annually publish invited manuscripts by experts in their fields as well as contributions by young scholars and others submitted for peer review.

Website design and web hosting provided by the Australian Institute of Male Health and Studies.

Editorial Stance

The journal’s editorial and advisory board members envision the new male studies as providing an academic, non-polemical, and proactive forum for the clarification of issues and the promotion of fresh approaches to understanding and addressing challenges boys and men currently face.

Quantitative and qualitative research, opinion pieces, essays, and relevant book reviews are welcome, as are reflections of a personal nature of interest to those who have had similar experiences.

Scholars will be published who work in areas as diverse as: law, economics, psychology, biology, genetics, medicine, anthropology, literature, education, forensics, public policy, demography, history, sociology, and other related disciplines.

The journal will play a pivotal role as a forum for discussion, and a clearinghouse of work being carried on in academe, government, and at the grassroots level. The work of all academics including independent scholars is especially welcome.

NMS Position Statement

Discussion of gender in the last half century has often been characterised by a polarisation of the sexes; making it very difficult to engage with issues of vital importance to healthy interpersonal and social relationships. Gender ideology - and reactions against it - all too often have not only curtailed possibilities of reasoned dialogue, but have sidelined crucial informative evidence and silenced individuals with unpopular views.

NMS recognises the need to pursue a different approach to understanding gender issues and the contemporary experience and roles of males in society; an approach that is:
· open to constructive academic dialogue guided by available evidence of a range of different academic disciplines, consideration of both men’s and women’s particular cultural experience and circumstances, and the indispensable contribution both sexes make to the quality and viability of family and community life;

· guided by principles of equity, intellectual integrity, and a view of human experience, society, and ethics that is inseparable from biological, psychological, cultural, economic realities

· careful to avoid intellectual reductionism, political partisanship, ideological advocacy and defensiveness, while instead openly pursuing enquiring and dynamic multidisciplinary scholarship
Download Issue 1.1 (2012) pp. 1-120 as a PDF

Download NMS Volume 1 Issue 2 as a PDF

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