Keith Edwards
Then there’s this other process of becoming, which I find really interesting, probably because it’s closest to my own current experience, which is sort of I think about becoming is the function of identity exploration, and practicing integrity. And I would have thought, because I’m a very, very linear thinker, socialized as a man and socialized in white culture, right? So I think terms of linearity that you would figure out, who am I? Once you have that task accomplished, then you would go about trying to be that person and work on integrity. And the participants said, no, these things are in conversation all the time. I think this is who I am and who I aspire to be. And then I’m trying to do it. And it turns out, I don’t do that. Right. I think I’m a good listener. And then turns out I get feedback that I’m not. So maybe I need to be a better listener, right, which is the practicing integrity. Or maybe I need to change my self perception as a good listener, right? So they’re in conversation.

Heather Shea
Hello, welcome to Student Affairs NOW the online learning community for Student Affairs educators. I am your host Heather Shea. I am so thrilled today to have with me Dr. Keith Edwards, the author of a new book, Unmasking Toward Authentic Masculinity, and also someone you know quite well as the other founder and my co host on the podcast, we’re going to talk about the book in greater detail today, and learn all about how it came to fruition and what Keith’s hopes and dreams are for it as it is released out into the public. Before we get to Keith, I’m gonna give you a little bit of information about the podcast which you already probably know. Student Affairs NOW is the premier podcast and learning community for 1000s of us who work in alongside or adjacent to the field of higher education and student affairs. We hope you’ll find these conversations make a contribution to the field and are restorative to the profession. We release new episodes every week on Wednesdays Find us at Student Affairs now.com on YouTube, or anywhere you listen to podcasts. Today’s episode is sponsored by Symplicity. A true partner Symplicity supports all aspects of student life with technology platforms that empower institutions to make data driven decisions. Stay tuned to the end of the podcast for more information about the sponsor. As I mentioned, I’m your host for today’s episode Heather Shea, my pronouns are she her and hers and I am broadcasting from the ancestral traditional and contemporary lands of the Anishinabeg three fires confederacy of a Odawa and Potawatomi peoples otherwise known as East Lansing, Michigan, home of Michigan State University where I work. The university resides on land seeded in the 1819 Treaty of Saginaw. Alright, Keith, let’s introduce you to our to our guests who already know you quite well. Welcome so excited to be able to have this conversation with you today. For folks who haven’t ever listened to the podcast before, tell us a little bit about you. What do you do?

Keith Edwards
Let’s see if I can do it without a script in front of me. My name is Dr. Keith Edwards, my pronouns are he him his speaker, consultant and coach. And you can find out more about me at keithedwards.com. And I’m coming to you from Minneapolis, Minnesota at the intersections of the ancestral homeland of the Dakota in the Ojibwe peoples. I’ve said that so many times that I can do it without looking at it.

Heather Shea
Awesome. Awesome. Well, we are excited to be able to have a conversation today to talk about your new book. I know that this has been in the works for a long, long, long time. And I know you have read it, you have edited it. But for those of us who who might be watching today who didn’t even know that Keith Edwards wrote a book tell us in in a quick summary. What is the Book about and and then we’ll get into other questions.

Keith Edwards
Yeah. So the book is you mentioned is unmasking or authentic masculinity. And this is the book I’ve been not writing for the past 15 years since I finished my dissertation research on men’s identity. And several folks who I really respected a lot said, Oh, this would be a great book, this great book, you should read a book. And I was like, Yeah, I’ll get to that. And then I interviewed 10 men, for my dissertation research about College men’s identity. And then I continued to interview them every five years, since and so we’ve continued to have a conversation. They’re now about 40, early 40s ish. And we keep having these conversations. And so to be able to share what they have taught me and continue to teach me has been really great. What’s maybe a little different from some of the books that we’ve had on the podcast before is that I very intentionally wrote this for a non academic audience. So I’m doing a hybrid publisher, not an academic publisher, very intentionally, to reach a mainstream audience with this. And so that was, to my surprise, a bit challenging to have my editor say, I don’t know what that means. And to think about, one of the people I thought about writing this book for was my, my kids kindergarten teacher, who I assume has 15 ish boys join her classroom every year and who I’m sure she loves and cares about in her own very appropriate way. But who also was concerned about what they’re bringing in to that kindergarten year and then what did they leave off and do and so I kind of was thinking what would be as helpful to her and she was a great kindergarten teacher to my two daughters, and I wanted to be helpful to her in my imagination, which is very different from writing to some of our guests as to what they might say and what they might think what faculty might say, or other researchers might say. So it really pushed me to push me to not rely on academic jargon to say what you mean, but actually have to say what you mean. And that was a pretty eye opening part of this particular process.

Heather Shea
So beyond the kindergarten teacher, you say mass audience, like, Who do you want to read this book? And how do you want them to use it?

Keith Edwards
Yeah, I say I wrote it for men, and those of us with men in our lives. So I wrote it for men who are trying to figure out their experiences of men. I thought a lot about my experience as a man, the participants had to they taught me about it, we stayed in conversation, we continue to learn, they now email me when they see a dumb commercial on TV with bad messages. they email me now when they’re about to propose to their partner, they email me now with I have two kids, but I’m having my first girl and what does that mean? And so we’ve kind of been on this journey together, they talk about it, like it’s their book, they’re like, when is our book coming out? What is our book, which is awesome, it couldn’t, couldn’t be better. And that ongoing conversation, so it’s been good to bring that. So for men and boys, I wrote it for fathers and sons. For boys, for college men for high school men, who are trying to figure out what this experience is, and maybe they’ll see themselves in my story my a lot of embarrassing stories about key, and the participant stories, who share really, honestly, their their brilliance and their wonderful moments, but also some real difficult things and, and some not great moments of their lives, and I think, normalizing their experience and some guidance, but then also to help those of us with men in our lives, who are parents of boys, kindergarten teachers, of boys, therapists or coach of boys and men, including those of us who are men, I mean, I have men in my life, and to be helpful for them, navigating it. And I will say, so far, we’ve kind of talked about gender in a very binary way. But I’m talking about the gendered experience of a lived experience of a social construct or gender, not the physical, physical construct. And so the book is about the gendered experience of men, including cisgender. And transgender men, there’s a trans man in the study, and, and we unpack that and how his experience is a little different, but remarkably similar to how the other men, he’s quarter of literally proving as men, they were figuratively proving the manhood but how they were proving their manhood was remarkably similar and unsettling. For all of them, when they sort of learned there, there’s similarities. Yeah.

Heather Shea
So as a researcher, and somebody who also wrote a dissertation with a group of participants, I am, I’ll start with the question about how did you decide this was going to be your dissertation topic? How did you find these participants? You know, talk a little bit about the process that that evolved into now what we have as the book but you know, you talk about that at the beginning. It was it was sounds like it was a such a fascinating kind of evolution from what you did with your dissertation work. So start there.

Keith Edwards
I mean, one of the things I say is, I’ve been a man my whole life, I’ve had this gender experience my whole life. And so I can go back as far back as we want to go with that. But in my doctoral program, I am a super nerd. As many folks know, I came to my doctoral program with five possible dissertation topics, which is too many, with the intention of narrowing it. And it sort of narrowed down until I had an opportunity to do a directed reading with Tracy Davis, around college men and masculinities. And even though Tracy was not at the University of Maryland, where I was, he was, was and still is at Western Illinois, he graciously agreed to lead me on that journey. I read a ton. We talked a little bit, and at the end, I just was like, This is what I want to do my dissertation on, but what exactly, and he was like, well, men’s identity is waiting to be done. And you’re at Maryland, where lots of people explore that in lots of different ways. That just seems like what you should do. And I was like, Awesome, let’s do that. That’s great. And off we went. And then Susan Jones, then came to Maryland, sort of near the end of my impact to Maryland near the end of my time there and that was a great fit. She had done research on women’s identity and grounded theory and was just sort of really a great person to sort of guide me through that process. But the participants were nominated as men who had thought about what it means to be a man.

Keith Edwards
What they thought didn’t matter what they had said, just just had thought about what it means to be a man. And I got 134 nominations. I can’t believe I know these numbers, 15 years 134 nominations, I emailed all of them and asked them for basic demographic information. I got like 52 said, yes, I’d be interested. And then I had 34, who sort of qualified. And then from those, I started picking men and interviewing them. And then I would interview one man and say, well, well, I heard his story who would who do I think would tell me a really different story. So who’s got a different social identities and experiences? Alright, now that I’ve seen her, these two who do, I think would tell me a very different story. And just kept doing that until I had interviewed 10 Very different men, both in terms of their identities, but also their college experience. So there’s trans man, for men of color, two fraternity men, sexual violence prevention advocates, leading the black student organization on campus, not super diverse in terms of age, because they were all traditionally college age men. more homogenous as a religion and ability, but pretty diverse in terms of racial and ethnic background, socioeconomic status, and sexual orientation,

Heather Shea
and involvement on campus, which is also really interesting.

Keith Edwards
Yeah, scholarship, football player, activist leaders, self described frat guys, kind of all over the place.

Heather Shea
Yeah. Wow. As I think about the ways that we appreciate, you know, our participants, I mean, I’m sure that that ongoing relationship has been something that’s really affected not only where this book has gone, but talk a little bit about how engaging with those men ended up because you talked about this in the book, it ended up being a formative experience for them, you know, like they had this opportunity to participate in your study in college. What did that do? Down the road? And we’re kind of going down the research.

Keith Edwards
Yeah, I think this is something that was an unexpected outcome. But the more now that I’m aware of it, I sort of hear it and I see it, I talked about it with other qualitative researchers, particularly those who very few of them do ongoing longitudinal. I think a lot of that is how the tenure promotion process sort of incentivizes moving away from that. But some of them don’t even do follow up studies, but they stay in contact, right. And I think I’ve talked about this with Derek van and who’s done similar things. But just the interview process itself was transformative. So in my study, there was no intervention, there was no therapy, there was no watch this video, there was no program before, there was none of that. It was just listening to their experiences of men, over three different conversations. And then I did a follow up, interview with them five years later. And then 10 years later, and then 15 years later, and particularly in the five year follow up, several of the participants said, you know, these three conversations we had were the most are one of the most powerful experiences of my entire college experience. And I was really flabbergasted by that, because again, no intervention, no education, no programming, no therapy, no coaching note, no, nothing, just like simple questions, and then listening. And what that has taught me is the power of listening, because my questions were not brilliant or genius in any way they were so simple questions, we can come back to that if you want to. But it wasn’t the quality of the questions, it was the quality of the listening, that really was powerful for them. And that continues to teach me just how transformative just listening to someone can be. And I think, folks, whether they’ve researchers not or been an academic advisor, or been in a conduct hearing, or an admissions counselor know just how powerful really listening to someone can be, and also how really unheard most of us feel in our lives just to have someone treat us like we’re brilliant, which was my job, about our own experience can really elicit a lot.

Heather Shea
You know, and I, this is an aside, but I think as I listened to your episode on the podcast, the one thing I always say is, oh my gosh, his response there was like, clearly you just I just heard you say this, and then you go on this entire thing. So I do think that that is a skill set that you have honed and developed over time.

Keith Edwards
Well, as I mentioned in the book, I got a lot of not great feedback about my listening skills and listen to that and took it seriously and I really worked much better listener and so thank you for that.

Heather Shea
I love it. I love it. So, I also want to say when I was in my doctoral program and student development theory, you know, all of a sudden one day I was assigned this article, this 2009 article by Edwards and Jones and I was like, article, I think, I don’t know if I snapped a picture and send it to you, or just like told everybody in my class that I knew you. But your your thinking has really evolved. Right? So that article and then there was another article that came out. And now this book, maybe you could talk a little bit about that trajectory over time, like, how is your thinking about men and masculinity and authentic masculinity in particular, kind of evolved?

Keith Edwards
Yeah, I think there are three processes. So I’ll think about the three processes, masking, unmasking, and then becoming, and the masking really came from the interviews when they were college men. The unmasking is a little bit more ambiguous, I can talk about that. And then the becoming is really emerged from the more recent interviews, probably in their early 30s to 40s. So the masking is, the basic secret is that they all knew what society expected of them as men, they’re very clear about that. Lot of unanimity amongst them. And then they would all tell me the secret and they would like, look around, it was we were alone, and they would look around, it’d be like, I know, this comes naturally for everybody else. It’s just not me. And I’d be like, yeah, yeah. And then they’d be like, so here’s the thing. Here’s the weird thing that I do, don’t tell anybody, but I pretend I pretend I drink that much. I pretend I like this. I pretend to like these bands. I pretend I hook up with these people I put on this performance to use Judith Butler’s language. And Erving Goffman or their language, it was a mask mask, right putting on a mask. And they wear the mask to cover up who they were who they were afraid you wouldn’t see as man enough. And they wear the mask to portray an image you wouldn’t see as man enough. So those are two separate things going on at the same time. And so earlier conversations were really about masking when they mask how they mask the consequences of that. And that was really interesting. The later conversations was this process of unmasking, which was a little I think about unmasking is sort of a temporal in a moment, in particular situations. I could take my mask off with my English teacher, I could totally be myself. And you know, in, in this relationship or with these two friends, I can take the mask off or in this situation, or if you’re really comfortable with someone, I can do that. But it’s momentary, and it’s like the mask slides off. And I can tell you who I am. But then as soon as I feel insecure since and maybe feel judged. Or you maybe give me a funny look, and I feel insecure about my man. And it’s like it’s attached with elastic cord and it just snaps back into place. So unmasking, I think this sort of this in the moment here in there in some situations kind of thing. Then there’s this other process of becoming, which I find really interesting, probably because it’s closest to my own current experience, which is sort of I think about becoming is the function of identity exploration, and practicing integrity. And I would have thought, because I’m a very, very linear thinker, socialized as a man and socialized in white culture, right? So I think terms of linearity that you would figure out, who am I? Once you have that task accomplished, then you would go about trying to be that person and work on integrity. And the participants said, no, these things are in conversation all the time. I think this is who I am and who I aspire to be. And then I’m trying to do it. And it turns out, I don’t do that. Right. I think I’m a good listener. And then turns out I get feedback that I’m not. So maybe I need to be a better listener, right, which is the practicing integrity. Or maybe I need to change my self perception as a good listener, right? So they’re in conversation. And it can be good and bad. Sometimes people would say, you know, I just don’t feel like people trust me. Right? And then, but I’m having a lot of people who really do trust me, so maybe I need to think better of myself. So sometimes it was scaling back. And sometimes it was scaling up but these were in constant conversation with each other. And so I love the image of these two parts of them, who am I and who do I aspire to be? And then who am I being who am I doing being in conversation? And then those I think merged together over time after you do a lot of learning about who you are and who you aspire to be. And a lot of practicing and being integrity and falling short and being held accountable and trying to do better. There gets to be this place where there’s less knowing and doing and more just being, where you’re more comfortable with who you are and who you aspire to be open to that changing and shifting, but you kind of understand that. And also more comfortable with what you do and how you do that, again, open to feedback, but it’s less effortful. And I think that’s, that’s a place of integration. So, identity and integrity sort of together toward this sort of very aspirational place of integration that then we fall out of, and then go back to work, and then maybe, maybe land in that for a little while. And that integration is where things just being yourself, just feels easy, and effortless, and it flows, right. And we’ve maybe had that experience where it’s so easy to do that. And then other moments where it’s like, so hard, and so much, so much thought or so much self monitoring. Right? Versus that and other times, it’s just flows out.

Heather Shea
Yeah, I want to go back to the the topic of unmasking for a minute, partially because so as you know, I’m a parent, I have a 15 year old son, who you know, as a parent, I’m really interested in kind of like, what, in what ways is my son kind of posturing masculinity, and then you see, every once in a while this little slip of vulnerability, right. But then also, in addition to being a parent, I also work at Michigan State with women and gender equity initiatives, and kind of thinking about men and masculinity within the context of gender equity. And college men are at this, like, you know, kind of a unique stage to be able to, you know, pull, you know, them, pull them, thanking them engaging with each other. And the one vignette, I’m thinking about the story from the book is where, you know, they’d been drinking these two guys, the end of the night, they’re playing violent video game, they’d had all this alcohol, and like, they’re sitting next to each other, they’re not even looking at each other sitting next to each other what playing this video game, and then they start, like disclosing some stuff like, I, my parents are getting divorce, I’m worried about my going home, you know, this week? So like, how do we, how do we encourage that? You know, and I’m not a man, right? So like, I don’t why, both within the work that I do, as well as with my kid kind of encouraged that vulnerability. And, and, and also, you know, recognizing that that takes a lot of a lot of courage.

Keith Edwards
I have like six things I want to say, I know, how can you help me hold me back here? So I think one is, I think often think about colleges, this time, where people are really experimenting, exploring, and I think for so many people, that’s the case, it wasn’t for my participants around gender around being a man like, they knew what the world expected of them. It was unequivocal. They didn’t measure up, they were trying to do that. around some other identities, I think there was more exploration and what does this mean? And how am I going to do this, but around this sort of dominant culture version of masculinity, and then also cultural expectations of masculinity, black masculinity, latino masculinity, rural masculinity, all of these things. There wasn’t a lot of exploring, that actually came after college later, okay. It came a little bit after college, when they were trying different jobs and careers, living away from home or not different relationships. That was their time of who am I? And let’s figure this out. And let’s try this. Nope, that’s not it. And this, the that and that kind of came a little bit later. I think, with your son, I think it reminds me of the challenge is how do we interact with boys and men? How do we interact with the man behind the mask, which becomes really challenging when all they want to show us is the mask? Yeah, it requires a little bit of hope, a little bit of faith, a little bit of taking the leap. I think that’s a little bit easier when you’re the parent and you remember them in previous stages, and you can kind of, I still see you in there. But if you just meet a 15 year old boy, or if you just meet a 19 year old college man, and all he’s gonna do is give you this mask then and you might know like, I don’t think this what I’m getting is real, but how do you make the leap and interact? I think you just gotta make the leap. Just speculate. I’m not sure that I really believe what I’m hearing you saying. I think there’s a lot more going on behind there. And they’re wearing the mask is exhausting. And so there’s this constant like so effortful to do that. Yeah, those are three of the six things that I want to say what else would you what do you want to return back to.

Heather Shea
I mean, so. So when I think about gender equity initiatives, and I think that I think those two things are overlapping and interrelated, right. And it’s that the process of authentic and we’ll get into the next question I want to ask you is the difference between healthy and authentic masculinity and toxic masculinity? Because we hear about that a lot, but working with college men, if if our goal is to create a campus where there’s equity, you know, across gender, which isn’t just in the binary, but across gender, like, how do we, how do we do that? I mean, you work, you go to a lot of college campuses, you speak, you facilitate engaging conversations around masculinity, like, how, how do you go beyond listening? Like, how would any of us kind of get men to start exploring this deeper level?

Keith Edwards
I want to talk about the why. And then the how, so the why is some people say, Well, men are in the dominant, they’d have all this privilege, they have all the power, the whole world was made up to organize men. So why are we spending all this time paying attention to men? Yeah, I get that. And if we really want gender equity, we have to understand what is going on with men and we have to understand their gender experience. And Tracy Davis and Jason Laker were the first ones to put it this way to me, as they explained that if we just treat men as not having a gender, we reify their dominance and their privilege. Yeah, we have to make their gender explicit, so we can illuminate their privilege so we can illuminate patriarchy and how its functioning, and understand it. So treating men as though they don’t have a gender or ignoring their gender, or actually reifies the dominant patriarchal norms. Then you go further and say men do have all these privileges. Yes, they do. And they’re also hurting deeply. And that’s hard if we have the zero sum game of, well, if men gain and women and trans people lose, and if but again, the men have to lose what are men willing to give up. And that’s just not how it works, because it’s not for men and trans folks versus men. It’s all of us against the patriarchy, like patriarchy, gender ism, these systems and structures are leading to oppression, but they’re also ruining men’s lives. And Harry Brode really opened that up for me when he explained that despite the concrete and real privileges men get, they would be better off without them. Yeah, that we would be better off without all the things that get that because our, we would have to give up making more money for the same work, we’d have to give up all these safety and bodily things, we’d have to give up all these very real things that we’re not ignoring or dismissing. But we would get back relationship, we would get back connection, we would get back better societal well being. I mean, economically, I would do a lot better if sexism didn’t exist, because of everyone flourishing and all of those things. And men’s well being is dramatically damaged by living in a patriarchal system. Mine is my humanity, my authenticity, but also men as a group. We despite all the privileges and advantages, and most of medical and scientific history being done, for us, and by us, we still die younger, we have four times the rate of suicide, men are going to college going persisting, graduating at much lower rates, particularly at the intersections of racism and classism, mental health issues, physical health issues, there’s so many things that are going on that affect men deeply, but also affect all of us in terms of men’s sexual violence in terms of men’s and gun violence in terms of the violence and bullying that men experience at much higher rates at the hands of other men. So right, if we can stop making this, us versus them and addressing this, equity, gender equity is better for every single one of us. And I think when when men understand that, we show up really differently, I would say more consistently, more effectively and more sustainably, because now it’s not about what do I have to give up to make your life better, which is going to lead to burnout and pushback. But wow, this is a group project we can work on together so that we can do we can all be more free. Like that’s, that’s super exciting. So I think that’s a bit of the why so I think, how do we help everyone understand that gender equity is in everyone’s best interest? And I’ve got lots of examples of that. So the how, so, four steps. So this is the four steps to engaging men that I learned. I first learned it through listening to the stories of a group called mixer which used to be men can stop rape which does organizations and colleges and lots of other places. But they really started with men’s groups in high schools in Washington, DC, unsuccessfully. They were pull men together, say, Who wants to be a part of these men can stop rape groups, and very, very little to no turnout. And what they learned really quickly was that approach didn’t really engage. And then I heard their approach and sort of thought about the dozens of campuses I worked with to start men’s groups around sexual violence prevention and things like that your offices or student organizations, and I’ve just never found that approach works. If you pursue that, then you get very small groups of men, like three or four men who are deeply committed have been for five or six years, they’ll do anything, but they’re not really bringing people in. So what I’ve learned sort of merging what I learned from men can stop rape and my work is this four step process. So the first meeting is, what’s it like to be a man? And they’ll say, Oh, it’s fine. It’s hard. Okay. I don’t know. And it was kind of difficult these ways, and a lot of pressure and this sort of explore that. Okay, great.

Heather Shea
I can cry, emotion kind of thing.

Keith Edwards
Yeah, there’s all this stuff. I was bullied in high school by other boys, you know, things like that. And then the second meeting is what’s at the roots of that social media or socialization or other things? We’ve learned movies and TV shows all of the stuff says barrage of all these things. Okay. The third meeting is, what’s the effect on people of other genders? Oh, the things that women have to deal with is not even close. I mean, it’s, it’s totally outrageous. And trans folks, I mean, we barely even mentioned and so many folks I know are trans and the way that they struggling, it’s not even close, right? There’s they’re really, right. So there’s a difference between how men are hurt and oppression. Those are, right, because they’re doing things right. And then the fourth meaning is, what do you want to do about it? Well, let’s change everything. Let’s stop the patriarchy maybe use that word. But yeah, let’s let’s create better ways and different ways of being a man. And that benefits everybody. And then pretty soon you have a violence prevention, anti sexism group, but they didn’t come in with that. But you start with connection and empathy with their experience, get them to explore it, the broader implications, and then what do you want to do about that? And now they’re super committed, and super engaged around that. So that’s a little bit of the why and then very practical kind of house around that.

Heather Shea
So okay, so I’ve spent a cup, a couple years, maybe more than I care to say exactly. In women’s center work, right. And in my previous campus, you know, students were like, well, where’s the men center? And the common refrain that my staff would say was, well, that’s the rest of the campus right? In my current role, I’m like, I don’t think we can do this work as a women center only. Right? Like this has to be a more expansive conversation. But what do you what do you say to the women’s center directors out there? that are like, don’t want to talk about men, you know, like this. This is this is outside of the scope versus, versus those who are really thinking about, like, how does a conversation about authentic masculinity align with our mission?

Keith Edwards
Right? Yeah, my experience is I don’t find a lot of women’s center directors who don’t want to have the conversation, I find a lot of women’s centers, directors don’t have the capacity to do as well, in addition to all the things that they’re doing, they’re usually overworked as it is, and then adding, you know, another 40% of the campus community. I find women’s center directors really understand intuitively that the ways that men are hurting is hurting everyone, everyone. Yeah. And if we can tend to the ways that men are hurting, and that benefits the men, but it also benefits that would cut down and alcohol abuse that would cut down on sexual violence that would that would increase retention, that would increase mental health and well being, which then who tends to men’s mental health and well being issues when they’re untreated as oftentimes women on campus, and women, staff members and things like that. But I think it’s a really different if people are saying, well, there’s a women’s center, we men need one, too. That’s very different than there are issues that are facing women and trans folks. And that’s great. And we’re facing some issues, too. We could use some assistance as well. I think that’s a very different perspective. And so I think that’s one of the places where, where I’ve tried to really use my voice is really engaging men who’s who come in with a what about us, sort of retaliatory approach, because I spent most of my high school and early college life in that mindset. So I get it, I understand it. I relate to it. I totally disagree with it now, but that’s growth. So I can say, Yeah, I Yeah. And you feel this way. Yeah, you feel this way. Yeah. And then I can say, I remember feeling that way. I get that. I understand that. But then I thought about how I don’t walk around campus worrying if I’m going to get raped today. And they go, oh, yeah, I know. If they’re honest, if they’re not being honest, they’re being disingenuous, they’ll, they’ll throw some things at you. But really engaging with them. And I think coming back to what do you want to do? Like, what do you really want to change? And getting some of them out of that zero sum game to and I’m, I just find it so obvious when you just really look at what’s going on? That it is patriarchy, and systemic sexism and gender ism, that’s really ruining all of our lives. And if we can do that together and do that in different ways, and then how do we partner because I think there’s often women, or trans folks running Women’s and Gender Equity centers, and then how do they partner with men on campus who are like minded and has similar goals, but will engage with men or be heard and listened and perceived by men? Maybe in different ways? How do you work collaboratively to do that? And let’s be honest, there’s been a lot of men who have come together over the history of time over the history of college campuses, and gotten it really wrong. And so I always find it best to do this in collaboration and coalition. Paul kibel, a great advocate of great doing men’s work and anti semitic work and racial justice work before it had even those names. once asked me, how do you how do you hold yourself systemically accountable to those who aspire to be an ally with without placing the burden of your accountability on that? And I freaked out and spent a week trying to find a good answer. And I didn’t find one. And I went back and I just said, I have no idea. How How would you? Yeah, it’s a great question. How would you how do you hold yourself systemically accountable to those who aspire to be an ally with without placing the burden of your accountability on them? How do you do that? And he said, Oh, I have no idea. But I think it’s a really great question we should. And I think about that question, probably weekly. Whether you’re talking about gender work or racial justice work, how do you hold yourself accountable to those communities systemically not ask them for feedback when you want it and not when you don’t? Like when you’ve messed up systemically accountable without then it’s your job to hold us accountable? Right, but just another way that oppression functions? I don’t know that I have great answers to that. But I think if we’re always wrestling with that question, that’s when we do things with in coalition and collaboration and I’ll do this and you can do that and you want to how do you feel about going in this direction and some of that.

Heather Shea
So, I want to go back to the topic I said we come back to which is the difference between healthy masculinity, authentic masculinity and then the thing that most, I think these conversations begin with this toxic masculinity. We’ve heard a lot about we’ve heard a lot about that. So why is authentic masculinity where we’re where we’re hoping to head towards versus healthy and? Yeah,

Keith Edwards
Well, let’s start with it. So toxic masculinity. I say that activists and educators and bloggers call out toxic masculinity. scholars call it traditional hegemonic masculinity. It’s whatever the dominant culture says. So if you’ve ever done the man in the box activity, it’s that right? Not super complicated. And there’s some very smart people now who say we shouldn’t say toxic because then men feel like they’re toxic. And that’s a fundamental misunderstanding. No one who talks about toxic masculinity thinks men are toxic. They’re talking about the messages, we send men the way we socialize, men are toxic, and then that leads to men doing things that are toxic for them, and everybody else. So it’s not no one thinks men are not no one. But people who are talking about toxic masculine don’t think men are toxic. They think the way we socialize men is deeply troubling for everyone. So lots of great folks want to get away from that mess version of masculinity and create healthy masculinity. And there are great organizations that I have tremendous respect for, work collaboratively with and donate to like mcsr, formerly men can stop rape, a call to men is another great organization. But I do wonder for promoting healthy masculinity, I think there’s a real place for that. And the idea is rather than drink beer, don’t drink wine, drive trucks, eat meat, don’t wear pink, don’t cry, don’t have emotions, be in power be violent. How about we create a healthy masculinity around respect, around honesty, around vulnerability, about being true to yourself? And I think that’s great. But that’s not the project that I’m working on. The project I’m working on is not what is healthy masculinity, and how do I conform to it, because that’s still a mask. It’s maybe a better mask, but it’s still a mask. And particularly given my privileged identities, I really worry about people in dominant groups defining what healthy is and then applying it to people who aren’t in those groups. So I see the place for moving from toxic masculinity, healthy masculine, what I’m interested in what the participants are really directing me toward, is then we move on from that to authentic masculinity, where each person who identifies as a man, trans men and cisgender men says, As a man, this is what it means to me. And that continue and change and evolve. And there are some things about toxic masculinity that really do apply to me, I think really are are a great fit and a bunch of it, that’s not and then things that I want to create. And this is where I think we can follow women and feminist movements model of breaking some of those expectations and creating more room and more spaciousness. And the beautiful way that most many trans folks in particular, non binary and gender non conforming trans folks are just leading the way we’re saying you don’t have to play by any of these rules. Like we don’t even have to play this game at all. You can just forge completely your own path. Fucked and Right, right. There’s this such an expansiveness to us some some friends of ours language, or as you just said that the participants just said, Fuck gender. Like, that’s where I want to live. Right? Some of them. Yeah. And I think how do we, I think about that a lot. The trans folks in my life, how are they just like completely disregarding these categories? And how can that be a model for me to say, Oh, I don’t have to either order this, I can just go in a completely different direction and the expansiveness and possibility and authenticity that’s available there. So toxic, masculine is bad, healthy, masculine is better, but still externally imposed an authentic masculinity, each man gets to figure out that for himself, and every man will, will do a version of that that is really different for them. And each of my participants has a really different definition of what that is for them. There’s some similarities, but they’re very different humans, people roles, lives, cultures, experiences, backgrounds, intersections of different identities, so much different going on.

Heather Shea
So I know we could have started with this question. But I have two questions that I want to kind of end with. In your book, you talk about yourself as the 11th. Participant. And I know as researcher, right, like, we can’t turn off our own lenses and the ways in which we’re interpreting data and all of that. But what I want to know is, how have you changed as a man as an individual as a partner, as a father, as a result of this? Really now? decades long? Pursuit, right, and you talk about in the beginning, kind of like pushing back against some of those things that you were learning as a college student? How have you changed and become the better version of yourself?

Keith Edwards
Um, well. So I’ll tell you, sir, my granddad, I was in between my first and second years of graduate school student development theory nerd taken all the classes and my granddad says, I don’t understand what’s this best was GRI, right? The classic Student Affairs question, what is that you’re doing? And I was like, I have an answer. I am helping college students figure out who they are. And I was like, He’s gonna be so impressed. And he was just like, I think I’m still trying to figure out who I am. And the 75 year old man just being like, you think college students are gonna get there like, I I’m figuring that out. And I remember being just deflated, because I wanted to think, as a 23 year old, I was finished and done and polished.

Heather Shea
And that you are going to have that same impact on college students over the short period of time.

Keith Edwards
I polish them and finish them and they’d be done. But the participants would tell you their works in progress, and that that mantra of never being finished, I talked about Tracy Davis, and in his professional bio, with, you know, all these accomplishments, all these books, all these things, and is wildly unfinished. And that I think, is a really powerful mantra of becoming becoming is not like you’re done, always becoming, I’ve, you know, people often say, to this question, I think that there’s sort of this expectation that I’m a better man that I’ve got to figure it out that I’m on the other side of this, what I will tell you is this research, 15 plus years, almost 20 years of research, it’s just made me more aware of how I wear the mask. We talked about it as mass consciousness, I could probably with a little bit of moments of self reflection, I could probably point to you 10 to 15 times today, where I thought about that. Chose the shirts and the jacket, for the episode that’s going to be on video based on some sort of version of that. What is how they’re gonna think what’s the audience gonna think who what is professional mean, right? There’s that it’s all caught up how I talk, who I talk to what I share what I don’t share all of those things. And so I don’t, I certainly have not done with masks. I think what the gift has been for me is greater mass consciousness, more awareness of how I do that. And then I got to be the parent of two little girls. So far. And I that’s I mean, it early. You can think you are an anti sexist, post patriarchal person and just have kids and I remember my partner, I walk around the house, like Bell Hooks would be so sad, like you believe. What are we doing? I thought we were we mess up all the time. And, you know, now they’re 11 and 13. And now they’re our teachers. Because they understand gender in a completely different way. Yeah. Not just the than we did when we were teenagers, but they’re really challenging some of the notions of gender that we have. And it’s really wonderful. And it’s great. And so wildly unfinished. Yeah, we’re aware more conscious. Yeah.

Heather Shea
Yeah, just to echo I mean, I have learned so much about gender from both of my kids, you know, one who identifies as trans the other one is a man, a boy becoming a man, but really like, and the way they interact with each other the way that yeah, it’s, it is so incredible, being a parent and and also, you know, you know, you’re probably doing things that in saying things that you’re like, ah, if I would have just thought about that through the lens a little bit, didn’t develop.

Keith Edwards
also the greatest, you know, the greatest consequences are manageable, the impact on these two beings you love with more than you ever thought you had capacity for? Yeah. And we’re all just doing our best and learning along the way. And so are they, which is good to remind when they’re moody or grumpy, or doing their best to?

Heather Shea
They are. So I want to end with the topic that your last episode featured, which is critical hope. Because I think the key to all of this work is a belief that we are moving towards something you know, that maybe we won’t experience in our lifetime, but like we acknowledge that things are not where we want them to be. And yet like I personally can’t help but remain hopeful. Talk a little bit about, you know, what you’ve learned from your participants about hope, how you hope this work? And then what are the things that you want to kind of leave? And you know, you have to use a Cornel West quote in here, though.

Keith Edwards
Yeah, I wrote about hope, particularly in chapter about social change. Yeah. And then if we’re going to be effective at Hope we have to believe that change is possible. And I wrote that chapter. I love that chapter. And then you and others started talking with me about that. And then I read Dr. Greene’s book critical hope. And then I had the conversation with with Carter green, and Jeffrey Duncan Andrade, which has just been awesome. And so now I’m thinking about that even more deeply. And for me hope, hope is a belief that things can be better. And I have a role to play. That comes from Shane Lopez, who wrote making change, happen, belief that things can be better, and I can contribute in some way. Not that it’s all on me. But and then critical help is this blending of critical analysis with that. And the way I wrote about critical hope in the book is a little different from others, but informed by theirs, which is critical hope equals an equity lens loss possibility, plus responsibility. And I think that possibility plus of responsibility, we might think of agency that there’s something new that is possible. And what responsibility can I take on it to get it there? Not all of the responsibility but so for me, I want my kids to live in a gender ly better world a racially Better World enables them better world a better world in terms of so many things in our culture right now. Which wears on my hope. And I believe that’s possible, but it’s not just going to magically happen, right? That’s that’s a wish. That’s not right. And, and I love some of the writing around this from Maria Popova, who does the marginalia and which used to be brain pickings. She talks about any fatalism that things will just work out, or it’s all going to burn down is just an absence of responsibility and agency. It’s just an entity. And then cynicism being just a really highfalutin way to cop out.

Heather Shea
Yeah, and I am out,

Keith Edwards
I have all this, all this deep analysis, and I’ve done which is just a way to absolve ourselves of responsibility. And I think, too many of us have an allergy to responsibility. We usually don’t think we do, but we see people around us. And so I think that critical hope being there is something better that is possible. And then what’s the role I can play in making that more likely to happen? What’s the role in my apparent in my work, and the conversations and who we have here, who I interact with what I post on social media, how I interact, who I vote for, who I donate to companies I support, there’s so many things and I think we get caught up in a culture change is so big, so broad, so huge. What could I do? I remember flying in airplanes where people smoked. Yeah, me too. Yeah, like the culture changes. I talked with folks in the Obama White House who are working on a lot on sexual violence, addressing sexual violence. And I said, Well, what’s, you know, political operatives always have a model that are really building off of the Kennedy campaign or the Bush campaign, even if they don’t like those people to have a model. And he said, the model is smoking, and gay equality. Those are two cultural changes that we see as being effective. And the thing was, it wasn’t policies, it wasn’t Surgeon General’s warnings. And it wasn’t a Supreme Court case that made those changes. It was those cigarettes became gross. And everyone had a gay teacher, or uncle or brother or son, that these were people in our lives, and the emotional component of those shifts, where I think we sometimes feel like until Congress does this, right, so there’s so much more that we can do to bring about the hope and in the lives that we lead in small and subtle ways, or just make the current circumstances better or a little bit less hard for folks along the way.

Heather Shea
Well, Keith, my hope is that this book is part of that larger story. And I I am, I am truly grateful for our both our conversation today as well as the gift of having an advanced copy of the book so I could read it.

Keith Edwards
Well, full disclosure, Heather did the graphics for the book. So thank you for that contribution and helping out with your gifts in that way. So I really appreciate it.

Heather Shea
Well, it has really been awesome watching it come together and then also hearing all of the behind the scenes. I’ve read it 12 times and you know me so great. But it’s my hope I mean I really do feel like with without people who are who are actively working to address and to think about and help other people think about. So the gift that you’ve given us is this is this book. And I’m excited to be able to release this episode and, and have the book available for folks. So tell folks where they can pick it up.

Keith Edwards
Yeah, you can find it on Amazon, you can find it in all the places that you get books. It’ll be out as an ebook initially, and then a paperback a few weeks after that, and you should be able to go look it up and get it now and get it right away. It’s just Unmasking Toward Authentic Masculinity. If folks want to find out more about me, keithedwards.com, you can go there. And if folks want to follow a little bit more closely or connect with me, I’d love it. If you subscribe to my newsletter, which is Sharing Fire, which is totally free, no pitches, no sales, no achiness. But just every once a month, I share what I’m learning what I’m doing and what I’m finding inspiring. So that would be a great way to connect.

Heather Shea
I love it. Thank you for your time. Thank you to Nat our behind the scenes editor who makes us look and sound good, he will do a little editing on today’s episode. And for those of you who are listening today who haven’t watched or listened to an episode, and maybe you’re not already receiving our weekly newsletter, please go to our website, student affairs now.com. And you can add your name to our newsletter list. And while you’re there, check out our archives. Follow us on wherever you receive your podcast, whether it’s Apple podcasts, or Spotify if you follow or like or share. Those are all things that would benefit us. Thanks also to the sponsor of today’s episode, Symplicity is the global leader in student services technology platforms with state of the art technology that empowers institutions to make data driven decisions, specific to their goals. A true partner to the institution, Symplicity supports all aspects of student life, including but not limited to Career Services and Development, Student Conduct and wellbeing, student success and accessibility services. And you can learn more at symplicity.com or connect with them on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn. And if you’ll just take a moment to visit our website and click on the sponsors link to learn more or learn how you can become a sponsor of the podcast. That would be great. Again, I am Heather Shea, thank you so much, Keith. Thank you to all of our listeners and viewers. And I hope everybody makes it a great week.

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