The aim of this paper is to explore the popular perception of men in family roles. In a broader perspective, it explores the effects of social changes under state-socialism on men’s identities and the perception of gender difference. I focus on popular understandings of masculinity, taking advantage of massive ego-documents (contest memoirs). I argue that in the 1960s and the 1970s, people in Poland negotiated gender roles in marriage, questioned traditional masculinity, and shaped new understandings of men’s roles based on ideas of companionship and partnership. These new understandings directed men towards assuming selected female tasks and rejecting some features of traditional masculinity. Major changes were occurring within the role and identity of the father, whereas household duties were still considered “unmanly.” State socialism encouraged these changes through ideology and policies (industrialization, low wages, and reform of family law).
X lat Towarzystwa Świadomego Macierzyństwa: 1957–1967[10 Years of the Activity of the Society for Conscious Motherhood]. 1967. Warszawa: PZWL.
2.
AboimSofia. 2010. Plural Masculinities: The Remaking of the Self in Private Life. Farnham: Ashgate.
3.
AdamsMicheleColtraneScott. 2005. “Boys and Men in Families. The Domestic Production of Gender, Power and Privilege.” In Handbook of Studies on Men & Masculinitie, edited by KimmelMichaelHearnJeffConnellR. W.. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
4.
BellJohnny. 2013. “Putting Dad in the Picture: Fatherhood in the Popular Women’s Magazines of 1950s Australia.” Women’s History Review22, issue 6.
5.
BeaupréJadwiga. 1965. Seksualne ABC mężczyzny: Książka dla przyszłych mężów. Warszawa: Państwowy Zakład Wydawnictw Lekarskich.
6.
BrandesHolger. 2007. “Hegemonic Masculinities in East and West Germany (German Democratic Republic and Federal Republic of Germany).” Men and Masculinities10 (2), 178–196.
7.
BucurMariaGavrilovaRaynaGoldmanWendyHealyMaureenLebowKatePittawayMark. 2009. “Six Historians in Search of Alltagsgeschichte” Aspasia3 (1), 189–212.
8.
ChernovaZhanna. 2012. “The Model of “Soviet” Fatherhood.” Russian Studies in History51 (2), 35–62.
9.
ChumińskiJędrzej. 1999. Ruch zawodowy w Polsce w warunkach kształtującego się systemu totalitarnego 1944–1956. Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Akademii Ekonomicznej im. Oskara Langego.
10.
ClementsB.FriedmanR.HealeyD., eds. 2002. Russian Masculinities in History and Culture. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
11.
DekkerRudolf. 2002. “Introduction.” In Egodocuments and History: Autobiographical Writing in Its Social Context Since the Middle Ages, Edted by DekkerRudolf. Hilversum, Netherlands: Uitgeverij Verloren.
12.
DrozdekZygmuntPreiss-ZajdowaAnna. 1962. Stosunek kobiet do pracy zawodowej[Women’s Attitude towards Professional Work], Warszawa1962.
13.
FidelisMalgorzata. 2009. ‘Are You A Modern Girl? Consumer Culture and Young Women in 1960s Poland’ In Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist Eastern and Central Europe, edited by MassinoJillPennShana. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 171–184.
14.
FidelisMalgorzata. 2010. Women, Communism, and Industrialization in Postwar Poland. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
15.
FodorEva. 2002. “Smiling Women and Fighting Men. The Gender of the Communist Subject in State Socialist Hungary.” Gender and Society16 (2), 240–263.
16.
DziadekAdam, ed. 2018. Formy męskości. Vol 1–3. Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich.
17.
FuszaraMałgorzata.2008. Nowi mężczyźni?: Zmieniające się modele męskości we współczesnej Polsce[New Men? Changing Models of Manhood in Contemporary Poland]. Edited by Małgorzata Fuszara. Warszawa: Trio.
18.
HarschDonna. 2007. Revenge of the Domestic: Women, the Family, and Communism in the German Democratic Republic. Princeton, NY: Princeton University Press.
19.
HaynesJohn. 2003. New Soviet Man: Gender and Masculinity in Stalinist Soviet Cinema. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
20.
IgnaciukAgata. 2019. “No Man’s Land? Gender and Popularization of Contraception in State-socialist Poland (1950s–1980s).” Social History of Medicine (3).
21.
ImielińskiKazimierz. 1965. Życie seksualne. Psychohigiena. Warsaw: PZWL.
22.
ImreAnikó. 2016. TV Socialism. Durham, NC: Duke University Press Books.
23.
JarskaNatalia2019. “Modern Marriage and the Culture of Sexuality: Experts between the State and the Church in Poland, 1956–1970.”European History Quarterly49 (3), 467–490.
24.
KimmelMichael S.2008. The Gendered Society, 3rd ed. New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press.
25.
KingLaura. 2015. Family Men: Fatherhood and Masculinity in Britain, 1914-1960. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
26.
Klich-KluczewskaBarbara. 2015. Rodzina, tabu i komunizm w Polsce 1956–1989 [The Family, Taboo, and Communism in Poland 1956–1989]. Kraków.
27.
Klich-KluczewskaBarbara. 2017. “Biopolitics and Non-modernity. Population Micro—Policy, Expert Knowledge and Family in Late-Communist Poland.” Acta Polonia Historica115, 151–174.
28.
KohliMartin. (1981) 2012. “Biografia: relacja, tekst, Metoda.” In Metoda biograficzna w socjologii[Biographical Method in Sociology], edited by KaźmierskaKaja. Nomos: Kraków. [Polish transl. of “Biography: Account, Text, Method.” In Biography and Society. The Life History Approach in the Social Sciences, edited by BertauxDaniel. Beverly Hills, CA: SAGE, 1981]
29.
KościańskaAgnieszka. 2016. “Sex on Equal Terms? Polish Sexology on Women’s Emancipation and ‘Good Sex’ from the 1970s to the Present.” Sexualities19 (1/2), 236–256.
30.
KozakiewiczMikołaj.1974. “Kryteria doboru małżeńskiego.” In Poradnik młodej pary[Young Couple’s Advice Book], edited by CzeczerdaWanda. Warszawa: Watra.
31.
LebowKatherine. 2014. “Autobiography as Complaint: Polish Social Memoir Between the Two World Wars.” Laboratorium: Russian Review of Social Research6 (3) 13–26.
32.
LorentzenJørgen. 2013. The History of Fatherhood in Norway, 1850–2012. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
33.
ŁopuskiJanusz. 1957. Co chce wiedzieć każdy chłopiec?[What Does Every Boy Want to Know?]. Warszawa: PZWL.
34.
MajleTadeusz. 1959. Co każde małżeństwo wiedzieć powinno[What Every Marriage Should Know]. Warszawa: Państwowy Zakład Wydawnictw Lekarskich.
35.
MassinoJill. 2010. “Something Old, Something New. Marital Roles and Relations in State Socialist Romania.” Journal of Women’s History22 (1), 34–60.
MazierskaEwa. 2008. Masculinities in Polish, Czech and Slovak Cinema. Black Peters and Men of Marble. New York/Oxford: Berghan Books.
38.
McLellanJosie. 2011. Love in the Time of Communism. Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR. Cambridge, MA/New York: Cambridge University Press.
39.
MusiałowaAlicjaParzyńskaMirosławaCelmerZuzanna. 1976. Współczesny mężczyzna jako mąż i ojciec [Contemporary Man as Husband and Father]. Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza.
40.
ParzyńskaMirosławaHorodeckaJoanna, eds. 1966. Młodzi po ślubie. Warszawa: Iskry.
PenceKatherineBettsPaul, eds. 2008. Socialist Modern: East German Everyday Culture and Politics (Social History, Popular Culture, And Politics In Germany). Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.
43.
PerkowskiPiotr2008a. “Kulturowe wzorce przeżywania miłości u polskich mężczyzn po drugiej wojnie światowej.” In Miłość mężczyzny: Społeczno-kulturowe mechanizmy kreowania emocji, Vol. 2, edited by Płonka-SyrokaBożenaStacherzakJustyna. Wrocław: Arboretum.
44.
PerkowskiPiotr. 2008b. ‘Męskość w PRL. Rekonesans’ [Masculinity in the People’s Republic of Poland]. In Męskość w kulturze współczesnej, edited by RadomskiAndrzejTruchlińskaBogumiła. Lublin: Wydawnictwo UMCS, 101–111.
45.
PerkowskiPiotr. 2010. “Ojcostwo w Polsce Ludowej [Fatherhood in People’s Poland].” In Mężczyzna w rodzinie i społeczeństwie—Ewolucja ról w kulturze polskiej i europejskiej, Vol. 2, edited by Głowacka-SobiechEdytaGulczyńskaJustyna, Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskie.
46.
RandallAmy. 2011. “‘Abortion Will Deprive You of Happiness!’: Soviet Reproductive Politics in the Post-Stalin Era.” Journal of Women’s History23 (3), 13–38.
47.
RandallAmy. 2012. “Soviet Masculinities.” Russian Studies in History51 (2), 3–12.
48.
RusterholzCaroline. 2015. “Fathers in 1960s Switzerland: A Silent Revolution?” Gender & History27 (3), 828–843.
49.
Stańczak-WiśliczKatarzyna. 2010. “Ojcowie nieobecni, ojcowie słabi i przegrani, czyli polska prasa kobieca drugiej połowy lat 40-tych na temat funkcjonowania mężczyzn w rodzinie.” In Męskość jako kategoria kulturowa. Praktyki męskości, edited by DąbrowskaMagdalenaRadomskiAndrzej. Lublin: Wydawnictwo Portalu Wiedza i Edukacja.
50.
SuwadaKatarzyna. 2014. ‘On Fatherhood, Masculinities, and Family Policies in Poland and Sweden—A Comparative Study’. Polish Sociological Review4 (188), 509–524.
51.
SzalaiAlexander, ed. 1972. The Use of Time. Daily Activities of Urban and Suburban Populations in Twelve Countries. Paris: Mouton De Gruyter.
52.
SzpakowskaMałgorzata, 2003. Chcieć i mieć: Samowiedza obyczajowa w Polsce czasu przemian [To Want and to Have. Self-knowledge in Poland of the Time of Change]. Seria z Wagą. Warszawa: W.A.B.
53.
ŚmiejaWojciech. 2016. Hegemonia i trauma. Literatura wobec dominujących fikcji męskości. Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich.
54.
VenkenMachteld. 2015. “Child Forced Labour: An Analysis of Ego Documents Throughout Time.” European Review of History: Revue Européenne D’histoire22 (2), 368–388
55.
WojnickaKatarzyna. 2011. ‘(Re)Constructing Masculinity a la Polonaise’. In Men and Masculinities around the World: Transforming Men’s Practices, edited by RuspiniElisabettaHearnJeffPeaseBobPringleKeith. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
56.
ZarembaZ.1963. “Kobieta w opołeczeństwie i rodzinie (Wyniki ankiety przeprowadzonej w Polsce)” [Woman in Society and Family (Results of a Survey Carried out in Poland). Studia Demograficzne[Demographic Studies]117 (2).
57.
ZawadzkaAnna. 2018. “Zanikanie komunizmu w PRL-u. Przypadek dyskursu o inteligencji.” In Komunizm. Idee i praktyki w Polsce1944–1989. Edited by Chmielewska, Katarzyna Mrozik, Agnieszka and Żukowski, Tomasz. Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich.
58.
ZdravomyslovaElenaAnnaTemkina. 2013. “The Crisis of Masculinity in Late Soviet Discourse.” Russian Social Science Review54 (1): 40–61.
