The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Remaking the male body: masculinity and the uses of physical culture in interwar and Vichy France

Remaking the male body: masculinity and the uses of physical culture in interwar and Vichy France
Remaking the male body: masculinity and the uses of physical culture in interwar and Vichy France
Remaking the male body treats interwar physical culture as a set of popular practices and as a field of ideas. Its central subject is the imagined failure of French manhood mapped out in this realm by physical culturist ‘experts’, often physicians. Their diagnosis of intertwined crises in masculine virility and national vitality was surprisingly widely shared across popular and political culture. And the vision of physical exercise and national strength that underpinned it was a hygienist and sometimes overtly eugenicist one, suggesting the persistence of fin-de-siècle pre-occupations with biological degeneration and regeneration well beyond the First World War. Joan Tumblety traces these patterns of thinking about the male body across a seemingly disparate set of voices, all of whom argued that the physical training of men offered a salve to France’s real and imagined woes. By interrogating a range of sources, from get-fit manuals and the popular press, to the mobilising campaigns of popular politics on left and right and official debates about physical education, this book delineates the way male physical culture was imagined as an instrument of social hygiene and provided a locus for political struggle. Understanding the influence of these concerns on French culture in the interwar years ultimately illuminates the origins of Vichy’s project for masculine renewal after the military defeat of 1940.
978-0-19-969557-7
Oxford University Press
Tumblety, Joan
8742e0ca-a9c0-4d16-832f-b3ef643efd7b
Tumblety, Joan
8742e0ca-a9c0-4d16-832f-b3ef643efd7b

Tumblety, Joan (2012) Remaking the male body: masculinity and the uses of physical culture in interwar and Vichy France , Oxford, GB. Oxford University Press, 257pp.

Record type: Book

Abstract

Remaking the male body treats interwar physical culture as a set of popular practices and as a field of ideas. Its central subject is the imagined failure of French manhood mapped out in this realm by physical culturist ‘experts’, often physicians. Their diagnosis of intertwined crises in masculine virility and national vitality was surprisingly widely shared across popular and political culture. And the vision of physical exercise and national strength that underpinned it was a hygienist and sometimes overtly eugenicist one, suggesting the persistence of fin-de-siècle pre-occupations with biological degeneration and regeneration well beyond the First World War. Joan Tumblety traces these patterns of thinking about the male body across a seemingly disparate set of voices, all of whom argued that the physical training of men offered a salve to France’s real and imagined woes. By interrogating a range of sources, from get-fit manuals and the popular press, to the mobilising campaigns of popular politics on left and right and official debates about physical education, this book delineates the way male physical culture was imagined as an instrument of social hygiene and provided a locus for political struggle. Understanding the influence of these concerns on French culture in the interwar years ultimately illuminates the origins of Vichy’s project for masculine renewal after the military defeat of 1940.

This record has no associated files available for download.

More information

Published date: October 2012
Organisations: History

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 204249
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/204249
ISBN: 978-0-19-969557-7
PURE UUID: f1c78bc8-fa3d-4fd6-bf0c-3b19968211c2

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 29 Nov 2011 10:53
Last modified: 12 Sep 2024 17:01

Export record

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×