Join the Brown Club of Silicon Valley
to go "Back to Class" with
Matthew Gutmann
Professor of Anthropology, Watson Institute Faculty Fellow and Director, Brown International Advanced Research Institutes (BIARI)
“Are Men Animals?”
Professor Gutmann will join us to discuss his new book Are Men Animals?: How Modern Masculinity Sells Men Short. Gutmann's highly anticipated and timely new work explores the topic of toxic masculinity on a global scale. Through his anthropological research of "maleness" and "masculinity" in various cultures and countries, Gutmann demonstrates the complexity of gender by tackling the prevailing myths such as the role of testosterone and its relation to violence. Gutmann convincingly argues that assessing maleness means looking beyond biology, since biology alone cannot explain these variabilities. "Biological extremism about men and boys is nonsense," he writes, stressing that the expression "boys will be boys" gives males a free pass to engage in bad behavior. The real-world consequences of such thinking, writes the author, include the 2016 election of Donald Trump and the 2018 confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court.
This discussion will give audience members, of any gender, much to ponder—and to argue about.
Plug and Play Tech Center, Sierra Madre Conference Room
6:30 pm Reception and Refreshments
7:00 pm Speaking Program with Q&A
8:00 pm Book Signing
Bio
Matthew Gutmann is Professor of Anthropology, Director of the Brown International Advanced Research Institutes, and Faculty Fellow at the Watson Institute. Most of his ethnographic research has been conducted in Mexico, where he is a visiting professor at Colegio de México, and China, where he is a visiting professor at Nanjing University. He has also conducted collaborative research on United Nations Peacekeepers in Haiti and Lebanon. From 2009 to 2013, he was Vice President for International Affairs at Brown, leading the University’s efforts to build collaborations and exchanges with leading institutions around the world and major programs relevant to internationalization. Gutmann has a Master’s in Public Health, and in 2008 he won the Eileen Basker Memorial Award for the best scholarly study on gender and health. He has also been a visiting professor in China, France, Mexico, and Spain. Gutmann’s undergraduate major was modern and classical Chinese.