Self-Made Man
Inspired by Jamie’s entry on gender and conversation I thought I’d share some thoughts on a book I recently read called Self-Made Man: One Woman’s Journey into Manhood and Back.
Norah Vincent, the book’s author and a journalist for the L.A. Times, spends 18 months as a man and writes about her experience. To disguise herself she has help from a professional makeup artist, a voice coach, and a trainer. After perfecting her alter ego Ned, she takes on various roles in the community and engages in participatory observation.
Out of all of the situations she places herself in, one of my favorites is in the first chapter where she joins a men’s bowling league. Even though she was a terrible bowler and the men gave her a hard time, it was always in good fun and they were actually quite encouraging. The conversations she has with these men were mostly standard guy bullshit (some of it pretty funny), but there were the occasional guy heart-to-hearts that seldom happen in the company of women.
What I particularly liked about the book was Norah’s attention to the details. At one point she describes her first handshake as a man introducing himself to another.
Our palms met with a soft pop, and I squeezed assertively the way I’d seen men do at parties when they gathered in someone’s living room to watch a football game. From the outside, this ritual had always seemed overdone to me. Why all the macho ceremony? But from the inside it was completely different. There was something so warm and bonded in this handshake. Receiving it was a rush, an instant inclusion in a camaraderie that felt very old and practiced.
I have obviously experienced many handshakes as she describes, but never have I thought about the ritual itself in such detail. It also makes me wonder; do all women think it’s ridiculous and exaggerated?
I also found it interesting that she felt compelled to tell the people she met the truth about her experiment and book. I was actually a bit surprised more people were not angry or upset.
In the end the book was fun to read and insightful. Norah seems to learn a lot about herself and manages to shed light on the complex gender differences people deal with everyday.
January 24th, 2007 at 10:16 am
Ohmigosh you finally posted this! I saw it in my RSS feed months ago, haha.
January 24th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
haha. I actually thought I had posted it 6 months ago, but it wasn’t until today when I was looking through spam that I noticed this post was set to “private”.
I had been seeing it the whole time since I was logged in… doh.