Cultural Styles
My very manly neighbor just walked out of his house wearing a flowery scarf. It's in browns. Brown flowers.
It made me think if a scene in The Poisonwood Bible, where one of the American girls describes how the African men wear "womens" clothing. She muses that if they don't know it's for women, then does that make it for men? And how does she even know it's for women?
And even between America and Italy there is a big chasm between what is manly and what is not. Recently I saw 5 Italian men cramped into a tiny hot-tub. They were so close their legs had to touch each other. I was recounting the story to an American man who commented that he would not get in a hot-tub with even one other man. "Creepy."
The scarf caught me by surprise... but those Italian men in the hot-tub, they didn't think anything was less masculine about their hot-tub time... and my neighbor probably doesn't think "My Grandmother had a scarf like this" when he wears it. And if he does... well, who's to say that men can't wear brown flowers too.
It made me think if a scene in The Poisonwood Bible, where one of the American girls describes how the African men wear "womens" clothing. She muses that if they don't know it's for women, then does that make it for men? And how does she even know it's for women?
And even between America and Italy there is a big chasm between what is manly and what is not. Recently I saw 5 Italian men cramped into a tiny hot-tub. They were so close their legs had to touch each other. I was recounting the story to an American man who commented that he would not get in a hot-tub with even one other man. "Creepy."
The scarf caught me by surprise... but those Italian men in the hot-tub, they didn't think anything was less masculine about their hot-tub time... and my neighbor probably doesn't think "My Grandmother had a scarf like this" when he wears it. And if he does... well, who's to say that men can't wear brown flowers too.
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