Masculinities in male administrative staff at the University of Malta

Abstract

Through the use of a qualitative approach, this study attempts to establish the different kinds of masculinity that are experienced and exhibited by the University of Malta’s male administrative staff, with particular focus on the lower three grades, being those of Administrator I, Administrator II and Administrative Specialist. The method chosen was that of face to face interviews with 15 staff members who opted in, either through being invited via the University’s Communication Department which acted as a gatekeeper, or via snowballing.

The main themes that were identified in this study were those of masculinity stereotypes that were perceived by the participants, their personal expressions of masculintiy, encounters with exhibitions of toxic masculinity, the exhibition of submissive masculinty and the institution’s perceived masculinity. Each theme was observed to be interlinked with the others with the main theme of masculinity stereotypes being the yardstick by which every other expression of masculinity was observed to be affected.

The study found that since the University of Malta has a high female administrative population, it tends to be perceived as a female dominated environment. The participants also identified problems concerning the University’s administration which appear to reinforce a hegemonic system that rewards staff members who display dominant forms of masculinity, all the while suppressing or tokenistically aiding those who have been identified as displaying submissive masculinities. While these remain only as observations from the point of view of the interviewees, the common occurrence of these observations suggest that there is ground for further investigation into this matter by future researchers.