306 p., Investigates the shifts in gender constructions currently taking place in Jamaica, a peripheral nation-state, during a period which is characterized by hegemonic dissolution in the world-system. These shifts are defined by class- and gender-based conflicts over the norms, values and aesthetics associated with the traditional bourgeois classes. The fulcrum for investigation is Jamaica's Dancehall culture, which currently exhibits changes in the field of masculinity, in which clashes over the body occur constantly. These conflicts center around dress, gendered dancing styles and adornment.
200 p., An interdisciplinary project that combines cultural studies, film, gender, and postcolonial studies to investigate Afro-Caribbean models of masculinity in film and literature. The project details the ways in which imperialist phallocentric masculinity is valorized within African American cinema and exported to the Caribbean where it is mimicked and valorized. Secondly, it introduces Afro-Caribbean masculinity into the scholarly discussion of African American masculinities started by several African American cultural critics such as Mark Anthony Neal and bell hooks. Both of these prominent scholars in African American studies criticize the construction of African American masculinity as presented in African American culture. They, and others, call for a more progressive Black masculinity, one that supports Black feminism and fights homophobia. Much of their critique also applies to Afro-Caribbean culture, which has been strongly influenced by African American culture in regard to the traumatizing transition between boyhood and manhood which has great influence on Black males perspectives on feminism and homophobia. hook's critique in particular challenges the passive acceptance of "soul murder" or, in other words, silent acceptance of trauma as rites of passage into manhood for African American men.