Abstract:
This paper will use ethnographic data from the UK and published (especially auto/biographical) material from South Africa to develop an account of the role of homophobia and ethnicities in the construction of masculinities within educational settings. In particular, it will suggest that recent moral panics around the 'underachievement' of boys are related to the bullying of 'sissies' and 'swots' through the use of homophobic abuse in schools. It will be concerned, too, to trace the ways in which racialized/ethnicized masculine identities shape and are shaped by gender and on the contrasted ways in which notions of 'traditional culture' and 'traditional masculinities' play a part in resistances to racism in the UK and in post-apartheid South Africa.