Masculinities and sexual violence

Abstract

This entry explores the relationship between masculinities and sexual violence from a sociological and historically situated perspective. It discusses how sexual violence has long been explained through biological and naturalizing approaches, before feminist and constructionist perspectives brought attention to its social, cultural and political dimensions. Drawing on gender and masculinity studies, the entry considers sexual violence as one of the practices through which specific forms of masculinity can be constructed and reinforced. This process is examined across different contexts, including intimate relationships, group violence, corrective rape, prisons and armed conflicts. In these different settings, sexual violence emerges as closely connected to gender norms, power, domination and control, showing how masculinities are socially produced.