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This chapter focuses on class-based features of grandfathering in the context of a Nordic welfare state. Based on interviews with 17 middle- and working-class Finnish grandfathers, the chapter shows that while men’s grandparenting practices are not limited to auxiliary roles to assist grandmothers, grandchildren’s age has an effect on how grandfathers spend time with their grandchildren. School-aged children received most attention, and working-class grandfathers tended to provide their grandchildren with practical skills, whereas middle-class were focused more on increasing their grandchildren’s social capital. Working-class grandfathering practices emphasised creating continuity between men’s generations and transferring masculine knowledge. In the middle-class, active grandfather role was explained by the pressures of working life among the middle generation. Day care services, provided by the welfare state, are not flexible enough to meet the needs of middle-class families whose work demands are set by global enterprises, and who thus need support from grandparents.
The number of people living alone is increasing in Finland (OSF, 2020a; 2020b), in Europe (Eurostat, 2020a) and globally. Individualisation is growing, and many public institutions are adjusting to the rising number of single clientele. At the same time, the couple norm persists, and monogamous partnering is still often seen as the most appropriate way to organise intimate adult life. In this study, we analysed the written stories of 19 single men aged 29–64 and found that the couple norm was predominant in their stories. Internalisation of the norm caused feelings of inadequacy, a lack of self-appreciation and uncertainty about the future. Many men attributed their singlehood to events in their past and felt a lack of agency at present.
This chapter introduces the broader field of gender, masculinities and ageing studies that forms the theoretical backdrop to this edited collection’s prime focus on social relations across diverse groups of older men. Key debates in studies of ageing, masculinities and social life are identified and critical gerontological scholarship on ageing, gender and social relations are foregrounded. Contemporary discourses on ageing, including notions of active ageing, successful ageing and precarity in later life, are introduced and discussed in the context of how these impact the social connections of men in later life. The chapter concludes by introducing contributors’ work across the two parts of the collection.
This concluding chapter presents critical reflections on three key themes identified across authors’ contributions that speak to the diversity and complexity of men’s social relations in later life. These are: (1) how individual transitions and wider social changes shape men’s expression and performance of masculinities in later life; (2) the ways age-relations and ageism impact men’s social relations with intimate partners, family, friends and wider community connections; and (3) critical issues of intersectionality, more specifically the way in which the intersection between ageing and masculinities, in conjunction with other social axes, enhances or diminishes men’s social wellbeing and sources of social support in old age. In concluding, this chapter identifies future directions for research and scholarship in this area of social gerontology.
This new edited collection advances critical debates and themes on ageing, masculinities and gender relations. While there has been a gradual increase in scholarship on men, ageing and masculinities, little attention has been paid to the social relations of men in later life and the implications for enhancing their social wellbeing. Bringing together scholars in social gerontology and the social sciences from across Global North and South nations, this collection centres on older men’s social experiences and provides new perspectives across the intersections of old age, ethnicities, class and sexual identity. In this volume contributors critically examine the ways in which shifting gendered expectations attached to men in older age (historical and contemporary) configure social connections with significant others, including intimate partners, biological family and friends. This international volume brings to the fore the ways in which critical transitions associated with ill-health (physical and mental), bereavement and loss, and changes to social participation and mobility intersect with changing expectations about being a man in later life and ‘doing’ masculinity in old age in an increasingly ageing society. In particular, contributions centre on the social relationships of older men from seldom heard or marginalised groups and make visible how older men experience ageing and changes to social relationships across diverse social, cultural and national settings.
This new edited collection advances critical debates and themes on ageing, masculinities and gender relations. While there has been a gradual increase in scholarship on men, ageing and masculinities, little attention has been paid to the social relations of men in later life and the implications for enhancing their social wellbeing. Bringing together scholars in social gerontology and the social sciences from across Global North and South nations, this collection centres on older men’s social experiences and provides new perspectives across the intersections of old age, ethnicities, class and sexual identity. In this volume contributors critically examine the ways in which shifting gendered expectations attached to men in older age (historical and contemporary) configure social connections with significant others, including intimate partners, biological family and friends. This international volume brings to the fore the ways in which critical transitions associated with ill-health (physical and mental), bereavement and loss, and changes to social participation and mobility intersect with changing expectations about being a man in later life and ‘doing’ masculinity in old age in an increasingly ageing society. In particular, contributions centre on the social relationships of older men from seldom heard or marginalised groups and make visible how older men experience ageing and changes to social relationships across diverse social, cultural and national settings.
While there has been a gradual increase in scholarship on men, ageing and masculinities, little attention has been paid to the social relations of men in later life and the implications for enhancing their social wellbeing and counteracting ageist discourse.
Bringing together scholars in social gerontology and the social sciences from across Global North and South nations, this collection fills the gaps in key texts by foregrounding older men’s experiences.
It provides new perspectives across the intersections of old age, ethnicities, class and sexual and gender identity, paying particular attention to older men from seldom heard or marginalised groups.