Men's association

A male bonding is a sworn community of men who have a certain common goal. Coexistence in a men's society is determined by certain fixed rituals and rules , often there is a hierarchical order. Membership in the men's society is often indicated by external identifying features (e.g. symbols , certain clothing, hairstyle, tattoos ). Women are generally excluded from male associations. In addition, men's associations were thought to be socially preserving. You should play an important role within the elite and at least be part of it yourself.

term

The term men's association was coined in 1902 by the folklorist Heinrich Schurtz to describe the initiation rituals in East Africa. In Wilhelmine Germany, this term was taken up by numerous representatives of the youth movement and filled with new content (especially by Hans Blüher ). In general, however, groups that referred to themselves as a male association, referring to Blüher and Schurtz, only appeared in Germany and Austria for a long time.

history

In history there have been countless groups that Schurtz and his successors referred to as men's associations. Most of the priesthoods and warrior groups (e.g. Drushina , Jomswikinger , Templars and other knightly orders ) were male unions. Most student associations such as fraternities and corps are also included. Often dealerships (e.g. Hanseatic League ) were organized as male groups. However, the question is asked whether these groups are really male groups in the sense of Schurtz's ethnological theory, or homosocial groups.

Examples of historical men's societies

India

In ancient India, male societies or brotherhoods existed among the Aryans , which were known as Vratya and possibly go back to ancient Indo-European traditions.

Sparta

The institution of the Krypteia was a ritual hunt for the helots and played a role in the initiation of the male Spartan full citizens. It could have developed from a male union that was widespread among many Indo-European peoples. (See also phratry , hetairie .)

Italy

The men’s associations in pre-Roman Italy include the “Sacrani” or “Sacrati” who were born in a “Holy Spring” ( ver sacrum ) and consecrated to the god of war and who were expelled from their people as young adults. They founded new peoples, superimposed on the older ones, and conquered almost all Greek colonies in southern Italy up to the Roman occupation. Best known are the Lucanians (Pliny the Elder: "... Lucani Samnitibus orti duce Lucio") and the Mamertines, who conquered Messana (now Messina) and triggered the first Punic War.

Germanic peoples

The Germanist Otto Höfler , who was close to National Socialism , assumed in his investigation of the myths about the wild hunt that the Germanic peoples also knew male societies, to which he attributed a state-building force. They are said to have excelled in fighting witches . Höfler's theory is controversial in specialist circles. The Varangians were also made up of groups of men who traded or plundered in Rus .

Men's unions in Christianity

The first religious orders of knights that arose during the Crusades and from which numerous successor organizations developed were also purely male orders. The Knights Templar is best known . At the same time, Freemasonry later developed as a global organization.

According to the Ancient Duties , women are excluded from membership in a regular Masonic Lodge. In the constitution book of the Grand Lodge of England published in 1723 , the membership of women in lodges was forbidden.

Men's associations in Islam

Sir Richard Francis Burton stated that the dervish order within Sufism ( see also: dervish ) is "the eastern parent of Freemasonry". The today no longer existing Futuwwa leagues can be seen as a link to the dervish orders. The word 'fituw (w) a' (known since the 9th century) is derived from 'fityan' (Sing. 'Fata'; in Islam e.g. applied to the young Abraham ), which in the pre-Islamic Arab world derives from Term for young men who, regardless of their social or religious affiliation, embodied male virtues such as piety, self-discipline, generosity, generosity, hospitality. An-Nasir also, this mystical Futuwwa movement also came, like many other princes in, and helped them to gain more prestige to Baghdad by the Mongols -Khan Hülegü was conquered and burned. The so-called Hiram legend , which also appears in the third degree of Freemasonry, is documented historically in the Futuwwa leagues . Instead of Hiram's Ali, "the caliph" appears, who was slain by some Kharijites , and which is a reflection of a historical event and the key point of the Ismaili brotherhood rituals .

The oldest verifiable branch of the Islamic men's associations is the 'al-Banna', the order of the builders . The founder of the 'al-Banna' order, which arose around the Sunnis , was Maaruf Karkhi († 815), who was venerated as King Solomon by his relatives . Maulana Karkhi was a student of Maulana Daud (David) Ibn Tai († 781), who in turn was a student of Abu Hanifa an-Nu'man ibn Thabit (699-767), who was the founder of the Hanifi legal school of Sunni Islam. The 'al-Banna' order is derived from the covenant of the 'forty-five' from the holy city of Mecca , who took an oath of brotherhood and loyalty in 632 . Already under the caliph Abu Bakr (632-634) and Alī ibn Abī Tālib (656-661) training meetings were held, and in 657 the order received the first constitution under Uways. In Syria , the first buildings of the movement were erected in the 8th century. The ideology of 'futuwwa' was philosophically underpinned by 'Ikhwan as-safe wahullan al-Wafa', the 'brothers of purity and friends of loyalty'. This covenant, founded in Basra in 961/62 AD, is also known as the ' Louder Brothers of Basra '. a. had a strong influence on Abū l-ʿAlāʾ al-Maʿarrī or Al-Ghazali . Later, the upper levels of the developed guilds (. Arabic, 'sinf) lied similar and the artisans - corporations emerged in a climate of neo-Platonic was marked academies after Alfonso VI. 1085 Toledo , the "Jerusalem of the West" had conquered.

National Socialism

National Socialist groups such as the SS also resorted to this idea with reference to ancient Indo-European or Aryan men's associations (e.g. the Vratyas in ancient India). One of the best-known philosophers during the Nazi era , Alfred Baeumler , wrote the men's association and science in 1934 .

Meaning in feminism and state theory

Since the 1970s, feminism has been using the term male association or male association to describe structures in which men, through indirect exclusion processes, deny women access to positions and power. This term is closely related to the description of society as patriarchy . Eva Kreisky (cf. 1994, 1995) coined the term as a useful, if not unproblematic, analysis category in political science state theory . In this way she works out the “masculinity as a system” historically inscribed in the state apparatus, which should not be understood as a conspiratorial community, but as the discursively codified hegemony of (structural) masculinity .

literature

Helmut Blazek: Men's associations, a story of fascination and power. Links, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-86153-177-1 ; Structure of paperback 8062, Berlin, 2001, ISBN 3-7466-8062-X .

Ulrike Brunotte: Between Eros and War. Men's society and ritual in the modern age (= Small Library of Cultural Studies , Volume 70). Wagenbach, Berlin 2004, ISBN 978-3-8031-5170-4 .

Claudia Bruns: Politics of Eros: the men's association in science, politics and youth culture (1880-1934). Böhlau, Cologne / Weimar / Vienna, 2008, ISBN 978-3-412-14806-5 (dissertation Universität Hamburg 2004, 546 pages).

Doris Doppler: Men's Association Management. Gender inequality as reflected in sociobiological, psychological, sociological and ethnological concepts . Hampp, München / Mering 2005, ISBN 978-3-87988-942-6 (dissertation University Innsbruck 2005, 326 pages).

Georges Dumézil : Aspects of the warrior function among the Indo-Europeans. Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt 1964.

David Gilmore: The Myth of Man. How men are made. Roles, rituals, models. With a foreword by Maya Nadig. dtv, Munich 1993, ISBN 3-423-30354-9 (original title: Manhood in the Making , translated by Eva Gärtner).

Dietrich Heither : Allied men . PapyRossa, Cologne 2000.

Kris Kershaw : Odin - The one-eyed god and the Indo-European male societies. Uhlstädt-Kirchhasel, Arun 2004, ISBN 3-935581-38-6 (original title: The one-eyed God Odin and the indogermanistic Männerbünde , translated by Baal Müller ).

Hans G. Kippenberg : The discovery of the history of religion . Religious Studies and Modernity. Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-406-42882-7 .

Eva Kreisky : The eternal men's alliance? On the standard form of state and politics. In: Claus Leggewie (Ed.): Why Political Science? About the new in politics. Scientific Book Society, Darmstadt, 1994, ISBN 3-534-12075-2 .

Jürgen Reulecke : "I want to become one like them ...". Men's societies in the 20th century. Frankfurt am Main / New York, NY 2001.

Bernfried Schlerath : Georges Dumézil and the reconstruction of the Indo-European culture. In: Kratylos. 40, 1996, pp. 1-48 and -41, 1996, pp. 1-67.

Heinrich Schurtz : Age groups and men's associations . 1902.

Klaus Theweleit : Male fantasies. 2 volumes, Stroemfeld 1977 and 1978 (new edition. Piper Verlag, 2000).

Christopher Treiblmayr: Men's Associations and the Gay Movement in the 20th Century. In: European History Online . Published by the Institute for European History (Mainz) , 2011, accessed on November 28, 2011.

G. Vögler, Karin von Welck (Hrsg.): Männerbande, Männerbünde: On the role of men in a cultural comparison. Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum, Cologne. Volume 1 and 2.

Individual evidence

↑ Pierre Vidal-Naquet: The black hunter. Forms of thought and societies in ancient Greece. Frankfurt am Main 1989.

↑ Otto Höfler: Cultic secret societies of the Germanic peoples. Diesterweg, Frankfurt 1934 - only volume 1 published. (Habilitation thesis at the University of Vienna from 1931 with the title Totenheer - Kultbund - Fastnachtsspiel.)

↑ Eugen Lennhoff, Oskar Posner, Dieter A. Binder: Internationales Freemaurerlexikon. Revised and expanded new edition of the 1932 edition, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-7766-2161-3 , pp. 304–306.

↑ Idris Shah : The Sufis. Message of the dervishes, wisdom of the magicians (= Diederichs yellow row). 11th edition. Hugendubel, Kreuzlingen / Munich 2000.

↑ Muhammad S. Abdullah: Masonic Traces in Islam. In: Quatuor Coronati. Yearbook 1980, No. 17, pp. 117-135.

↑ Stig Wikander: The Aryan Men's Association . (1938)

↑ Birgit Sauer : State, Democracy and Gender - Current Debates. In: gender… politics…. 2003 Archived copy ( Memento of the original from May 25, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2

Footnotes

↑ The Arabic term for bricklayer is also banna .