Middle-Class Manhood

Self-Made Manhood and the Producer Ethic in the Nineteenth Century

Middle-class manhood first emerged as a distinct social and cultural concept in the early decades of the nineteenth century, a product of industrial capitalism and the emerging middle class. Changes in the scale and mode of production during this period radically altered the economic and demographic landscape, as new technologies and broadening markets created new forms of labor concentrated in rapidly growing urban centers. In the previous century the economic status of the native-born white man had been secured through either land ownership or a skilled trade, and authority was vested in him as the head of a household and an active member in the social and political life of a close-knit community. By the early decades of the nineteenth century, however, small agrarian communities began to splinter under the pressures of industrialization and urbanization. Young men, no longer sure of inheriting their father's land or trade, were increasingly forced into the urban world of business to seek their independent fortunes. Unlike their forefathers, whose identities were tied to relatively stable positions within families and communities, these young men operated in a terrain of social and spatial mobility. Economic success in the marketplace came to define a new conception of manhood, one associated with this class of aspiring urban dwellers.

At the heart of this new model of manhood was the ideology of the “self-made man.” According to the principles of self-made manhood, a man's worth was proven and maintained through the economic success he achieved through his own efforts; the inability to succeed economically was understood as a gender, as well as a class, failure. The hallmarks of the self-made man included industry, frugality, hard work, and, above all, self-control. The advice literature of the period called upon men of (or aspiring to) middle-class status to adhere strictly to the principles of restraint, particularly in relation to issues of bodily health.

Rooted in an emergent industrial capitalism, middle-class manhood involved the belief that the male body, like the American capitalist economy itself, had finite resources and required careful management and avoidance of excessive expenditure if it was to be maintained in good health. Men were warned against succumbing to sensual impulses, and sexual activity was of particular concern. Sexual potency was imagined as a force to be conserved rather than recklessly spent, and masturbation was condemned as wasteful, unproductive, and unmanly. Men who indulged their sensual appetites courted both physical and financial ruin, and those who squandered their vital energies were stigmatized as emasculated failures.

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