Performing the Norm: Men in the Performing Arts and the Materialization of White, Heteronormative Masculinity

There is a relatively robust body of scholarship examining popular cultural representations of masculinity, yet there is comparatively little research on the men who take up and perform these representations. Based on interviews with 12 men in the performing arts, including dance, theater, film, and television, we examine the everyday lived experiences of men in the arts, with a specific focus on the complex and dynamic processes by which normative masculine performances are materialized. Using Judith Butler’s theory of performativity, we argue that performances of normative masculinity in the arts are not nearly as stable and certain as we might imagine. Rather, normative masculinity is continuously formed and re-formed within an assemblage of discursive and nondiscursive relations that performatively materialize the seemingly stable white, heteronormative masculine subject.