Masculinity at war

Did gender matter in the Soviet army

Bibliographic Data

ID12914955
AuthorsCatherine Merridale (corresponding author)
Year2012
Volume5
Issue3
Pages307-320
Publication date2012-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of War and Culture Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1752-6272 • E-ISSN: 1752-6280
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1386/jwcs.5.3.307_1
OpenAlexW2053198954
LanguageEN
Citations received4
References cited10

Of all the forces that took to the field in World War II, the Soviet army must surely be the one whose reputation for toughness, endurance and near-suicidal determination marks it out as a model of masculine virtue. Soviet propaganda images of soldiers at the front certainly used gender-specific images. Square-jawed and fit, the young white male stands firm in almost every photograph, and to press the point still further Soviet reporting also featured his pretty wife and mother and the children whom he fought to save. In this article, I shall argue that, nonetheless, gender was less important in the Soviet case than may at first appear. I shall also suggest that policies that aimed to emphasize the masculine were ultimately damaging to the men who survived. In particular, the notion of the ideal Soviet male may well have made post-war adaptation harder in the longer term for almost everyone

Front (military · Ideal (ethics · Masculinity · Political science · Reputation · Sociology · Spanish Civil War · Virtue · White (mutation · Wife · World War II · Engineering · European history and politics · Gender Studies · Gender, Security, and Conflict · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · History · Law

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