Michael Kimmel's Guylands

In his work Guyland, Michael Kimmel presents a thorough investigation into the world of young American men between the ages of sixteen and twenty-six years old. Kimmel focuses his research on the given age group of young men because this general age range is when maturation is supposed to occur, independence is supposed to be achieved, and adulthood is expected to be mastered. In today’s American society, from high school cliques to liberal college campuses and life after a degree, young men cope with many everyday influences that will inevitably shape and form their development and perceptions of culture. Some of the major topics covered by Kimmel include the high school experience, alcoholism and the American fraternity system, pornography, sex, and the power …show more content…
While “Guyland” surveys were predominantly conducted on Caucasian, college-educated men, many different classes of people from many different races and cultures were also informants in Kimmel’s surveys. Kimmel addresses the imbalance of white, college-educated men surveyed in Guyland by explaining that the plurality of Guyland’s inhabitants tend to be white and have some degree of college education. Kimmel is also careful to highlight that his findings about the world “in which boys become men” are not always applicable or directed at young men personally, but more so focuses on the general truths of the sociological world which they inhabit. Even if young men are not the ones that are creating the culture of Guyland, they inevitably will experience the effects of the cultural developments around them. Kimmel specifies that although the vast majority of young men are not culprits to society, it is nevertheless essential to understand the dark corners of a young adult world in order to understand those experiencing