Being Tough and Belonging: Technologies of Masculinity among Martial Arts Students in China

Abstract

Literary masculinity has dominated Chinese society for thousands of years. Even in today's academic schools, boys with good academic performance have a higher status than those who are seen as ‘aggressive’ or ‘tough’. In this article I examine how students reconstruct the hierarchy of literary/martial masculinity in Shaolin martial arts schools, an alternative form of education in China. Rather than being disciplined into socially useful subjects, as expected by parents and school authorities, I show how martial arts students have reconstructed the symbolic meanings of masculinity and shaped a new space of belonging. Through displays of violence and cultivating toughness, students deploy technologies of martial masculinity to fit in with their peers and reproduce the masculine ethos of martial arts schools.