Bodyhood and Fatherhood

Abstract

In a project concerned with how adolescents construct their self-identities, a group of 13- to 14-year-old boys living in suburban and rural communities in Sweden wrote about a future family life and about themselves as fathers. The narratives are seen as reflecting the boys' ways of exploring a male identity through their main character. In the stories analysed here the boys' writing connects to fellowship, equality and the transmitting of knowledge. The boys' taking on a fatherhood in their narratives gives them access to possibilities that are not theirs in their capacity as child, but at the same time they retain their freedom in being a child. We can say that they combine the advantages of boyhood and fatherhood.

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