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This article is about the changing identities of young male recruits in the British army. The data is based on 60 in-depth, semi-structured, interviews that formed part of a major three-year longitudinal study (2008-11). The great majority of the recruits, were aged between 16-19 years old, and were in the infantry or other combat related units. The article explores the characteristics of the peer group culture, discusses the important function of role models, and considers the career point at which the trainees begin to regard themselves as being a "real" soldier. The idealised and hegemonic form of masculinity that the recruits aspired to was based on physicality and toughness and was encapsulated in the action image of the "warrior hero". However, although the culture was highly competitive, the data shows there to be a more nuanced form of hegemonic military masculinity, which was also inclusive and egalitarian, and contained a number of more feminised associated qualities such as of collaboration and caring.
Keywords: identity, masculinity, hegemonic, army, military
This article is about the changing identities of young male recruits in the British army during the first three years of their basic training, and concerns issues around the construction, negotiation and performance of military masculinities. It uses testimony from 60 semi-structured interviews that formed a small part of a major three-year longitudinal study (2008-11), which set out to investigate (i) the relationship between basics skills provision and trainees' operational effectiveness, and (ii) the professional and personal development of service personnel across the three armed forces.1 This article concentrates on the second of these two main research questions and concerns young trainees in the army.
There has been little empirical research into the construction of masculinities in the early years of young male trainees' military careers, either in the British armed forces, or in other armed services in other parts of the world, particularly set within a socio-cultural framework (Hale, 2012). My main focus is the examination of how young recruits' masculine identities are constituted and produced during the transition period from civilian to soldier, and from adolescent to adult. The great majority of the recruits came from the infantry and other combat support arms, and although the idealised form of masculinity was based around the...