Masculınıty Perceptıon and Postmodern Concepts

People are born with two sex involuntarily. In time, societies impose various roles on men and women by the influence of these biological roles. In this process, the concept of masculinity has been used for different meanings at different times. We see that women are more charged with housework whereas men are assigned duties such as providing financial resources for the house. Differences in gender roles caused change and embodiment of social structure. The periods that initiated the embodiment of masculinity perception were the times that shift from the hunter-gatherer model to the feudal system and the Industry Revolution emerged. Next duty and role change were when the terms such as “unisex” occurred in the 1990s and consequently, men’s and women’s roles changed. Currently, the rapid spread of mass media, especially social media, changed masculinity perception.
Before the Industrial Revolution concepts of men and women were differentiated strictly. Division of tasks is a great indicator of that. In these times men had the duties such as householder, the one who brings food, the hunter. This changed with the feudal system. The feudal system brought a new economic system which brought a new division of tasks and this situation changed masculinity perception. Afterwards Industrial Revolution arose, since this time corresponds to the period that women attended business life more, it caused the masculinity perception to change at a point. The situation that caused masculinity perception to change most is the new concepts put forward in the postmodern era. The emergence of these concepts, caused some authors to define the situation as a crisis. Now, let’s investigate these postmodern concepts together.
Metrosexual
The concept of metrosexual was first used in an article by British author and culture commentator Mark Simpson in a newspaper in 1994. This concept is used to describe men who have style consciousness and who like self-care. For that concept, Simpson showed men like Brad Pitt and David Beckham as an example.
Retrosexual
After the emergence of the metrosexual concept, some men continued protecting traditional masculinity perception as a reaction. As a result, the retrosexual concept appeared. A Retrosexual man is a person who is both well-groomed and carries on the traditional man image. The difference between metrosexual and retrosexual is that the retrosexual concept is more sexual whereas the retrosexual concept better fits in traditional masculinity concept. In that sense, we can say that in our country retrosexual concept is more common.
Ghettosexual
Ghettosexual concept is the change of the masculinity perception in rural or provincial areas. After the metrosexual concept arose in 1994 the men living in provincials were also influenced by that. Pervade of mass media is one of the greatest factors in the spreading of these currencies.
Sapiosexual
Today that concept is used as a concept in which intelligence comes into prominence. Sapiosexual people are interested in the intelligence of the people whom they love rather than physical appearance. When they meet someone, they see that person’s talking style, the books that they read, the movies that they watched, and their intelligence and power as sexy.