Bodies in Transition: Geographies and Experiences of Men Living with Chronic Physical Illness

Abstract

Culturally valued norms of masculinity are shaped by what disability scholars conceptualize as compulsory able-bodiedness/able-mindedness (McRuer, 2006; Kafer, 2013). For those living with disabilities and chronic illness, negotiating these cultural norms can be difficult. On one hand, there is pressure to approximate these norms in the pursuit of a valued social identity. On the other, bodily and mental constraints can make such a performance unsustainable, necessitating other approaches to the presentation of the self. Drawing from post-structural feminist geography and critical men’s studies, my research contributes to the growing literature on the geographies of disabled masculinities. I seek to shed light on the practice of gender by men living with chronic illness, drawing from in-depth interviews with eleven respondents diagnosed with either Multiple Sclerosis or Fibromyalgia. Of these eleven participants, ten also engaged in a visual arts activity focused on illustrating their lived experiences. The men’s stories reveal interconnected and evolving landscapes as their identities are called into question. Through strategic patterns of practice in the face of shifting and uncertain circumstances, the intersection of illness thus requires the men to craft (and recraft) a workable sense of self as they engage within and across spaces like the home, workplace, and social encounters. As such, my research highlights the embodied and relational nature of masculinity within a geographic context. Moreover, it demonstrates how alternate masculinities emerge alongside the contestation and reformulation of dominant, socially recognized forms, as men navigate their everyday lives as gendered individuals in a social world.