(Un)changing Masculinities: Mineworker Men’s Everyday Lives after Retirement

Date

2024-09-09

Author

Barutçu, Atilla
Beşpınar Akgüner, Fatma Umut

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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This presentation explores the construction of retiredmineworkers’ masculinities, focusing on the dynamicsthat evolve during increased free time post-retirementand daily life practices. The masculinities of the workingclass in mining cities have undergone changes throughtwo processes since the 1980s: privatizations and early retirements.Mineworker masculinities in Zonguldak, one ofTurkey’s significant mining cities, are no exception. Despitethe deindustrialization process, Zonguldak maintains itsidentity as a “mining city”, and the impact of mining masculinitypersists. The study investigates how the extendedfree time post-retirement influences the gender identitiesand performances of mineworkers, who have shaped theirmasculinity through years of demanding work. In-depth interviewswith 15 retired mineworkers in Zonguldak revealthat retirement brings both opportunities and crises. Opportunitiesinclude specialization in other fields or applyingmining skills elsewhere at early ages. However, crises arisefrom the perception of a labor-intensive skill becomingidle, leading to a sense of uselessness in a still active life.Overall, daily life after retirement is imbued with meaningderived from the mining profession and identity, with aneffort to maintain a heroic masculinity that endures beyondretirement.

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https://www.europeansociology.org/publications/esa-conference-abstract-books
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/117902

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Department of Sociology, Conference / Seminar