The construction of masculinity in the Turkish novel of The Republican Era

With the studies carried out in the field of Social Sciences after 1980, masculinity has developed into a discipline that gradually expanded, and in the gender literature, it occupies an important place as a performance-based phenomenon that takes its source from biological sex, and that is constantly redefined and shaped by social conditions and cultural codes. The path to understanding what masculinity is takes shape through determining the boundaries of the perception of biological sex. In the study, within the process extending from biological sex to gender, the starting points of the concepts of biological sex and gender, the transformations they underwent, their histories, and the criticisms directed at them were explained. Thus, by clarifying the relationship of masculinity theory—developed with the contribution of feminist studies—with women's studies and its process of becoming an independent discipline, a chronological evaluation was carried out. The theoretical findings obtained were analyzed within the theoretical framework formed by the views articulated by Raewyn Connell and her followers, through a literature review method, focusing on representations of masculinity in Turkish Literature, in the novels Kırık Hayatlar (1924), Kuyucaklı Yusuf (1937), Mahur Beste (1975 -ilk tefrika 1944-), Saatleri Ayarlama Enstitüsü (1961 ilk tefrika 1954), Aylak Adam (1959), Yorgun Savaşçı (1965), Tersine Dünya (1986 -ilk tefrika 1968-), Tehlikeli Oyunlar (1973), Anayurt Oteli (1973), Destan Gönüller (1973), Yağmur Beklerken (1981), Kılavuz (1990), Bizim Büyük Çaresizliğimiz (2004) Hiçbiryer (2004), Masumiyet Müzesi (2008), Sinek Isırıklarının Müellifi (2011), Güzel (2014), Müptezeller (2016), Kuşlar Yasına Gider (2016) ve Yalnızlar İçin Çok Özel Bir Hizmet (2016). Attention was drawn to the importance of benefiting from the multiple perspectives that literature offers to masculinity studies, both in terms of following the intellectual panorama of the period in which the texts were written and in contributing to the gender literature by observing the historical transformation of masculinity constructs. In the light of these data, masculinity in Turkish literature was evaluated, through the texts analyzed in the study, in terms of its effects on micro and macro structures.