Risking publicity: masculinities and the racialization of public neighborhood space

Abstract

In this paper I examine the relationship between masculinities, public space and race in the context of Duisburg-Marxloh, an immigrant neighborhood in Germany. I propose that young Turkish and Kurdish men enact masculinities in relation to young Turkish women, Turkish and Kurdish political groups, and German residents, which shapes public neighborhood space in ways that can be characterized as masculine and exclusionary. These masculinist public spaces are frequently racialized as ‘Turkish’ by local German residents, politicians, and the media. I argue that these portrayals of ‘Turkish’ space read gendered spatial practices as racial practices. I conclude that it is necessary to carefully unpack the ways that Kurdish and Turkish men's masculinities are articulated with race, public space, and non-migrants' masculinities in order to better understand the spatial politics of difference in immigrant-receiving societies.