Making Modern Men: The Scopes Trial, Masculinity and Progress in the 1920s United States

The Scopes trial, a 1925 test case of a Tennessee ban on teaching evolution, raised broader concerns about the role of men - particularly white men - in fostering progress within the modern world. Defenders of both evolutionary and scriptural accounts of human origins shared broad assumptions about...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Gender & history 2007-04, Vol.19 (1), p.122-142
Main Author: Nolan, Andrew
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
American history
Cultural history
Cultural studies
Evolution
Evolutionary biology
Gender identity
Gender studies
Human origins
Males
Masculinity
Men
Modernity
Sex Role Identity
Social Change
Social history
Social order
State court decisions
U.S.A
United States of America
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The Scopes trial, a 1925 test case of a Tennessee ban on teaching evolution, raised broader concerns about the role of men - particularly white men - in fostering progress within the modern world. Defenders of both evolutionary and scriptural accounts of human origins shared broad assumptions about 'natural' masculine dominance within familial, racial and social orders, but these groups struggled at the trial to gain cultural authority for either 'scientific models of masculinity' or 'masculine virtue'. This essay uses several lesser-known tales from the Scopes trial to evoke the ongoing struggles to define modern masculinity. [PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]
ISSN:0953-5233
1468-0424
DOI:10.1111/j.1468-0424.2007.00467.x