Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to explore how street boys and young men are constructing and reconstructing their masculinities in Maputo, Mozambique. It focuses on the relationship between the body and masculinity performances.

Paper long abstract:

This paper is about issues of body and performance among a group of young men who make the market of Xipamanine in Maputo a place of sustenance and/or their home. The material presented here constitutes fragments of ethnographic research that aims to understand the relationship between the body and identity. What are the strategies used to acquire power and esteem among the peer group and the broader social context?

In the performance of masculinity, the body takes a lead position. One sees the body not only as a biological unit, not only as a place inscribed by culture, but also as a place of construction and negotiation of identities. How are young people using their bodies in the performance of their masculinities? The constructions of masculinities in urban African contexts, an issue that only recently has emerged as a topic of social research, is crucial in understanding the present social tensions and transformations in contemporary Africa.

In Maputo, as in many other places, young people seem to be marked by the increasing difficulties of effecting the transition to adult roles and status. Faced with their social and economic marginalization on the one hand, and new consumer goods and desires triggered largely by the media on the other, the boys seek self-fulfillment in their fantasies, with their bodies as the primary available resource. Power is concentrated on the body as they create alternative modes of expression, as we will see with tattoos and dancing. These performances underline how the bodies of young people can be considered resources for their identity negotiations.