Producing Place-Based Masculine Subjectivities: Aspirations for Recognition and Status among Socially Mobile Vietnamese-Australian Young Men

This article presents a longitudinal case study of five second-generation Vietnamese-Australian males experiencing the transition from boyhood to manhood. The participants reside in the same peri-urban region in Australia and come from families working in factories and restaurants or on farms and all aspire to pursue more middle-class forms of employment. Our investigation compels us to reflect on gendered identities as intercultural where place-based experiences open up opportunities for young men to gain recognition and status. Central to the analysis is how masculine subjectivities are embodied and performed as these young men navigate through different places. We draw on Bourdieu’s concepts (habitus, capital and field) to decipher how their experiences with place shape their sense of who they are as well as who they want to become. This case study complements scholarship which addresses intra-group differences in Vietnamese-Australian cultures, and how these differences are deeply influenced by access to and operationalisation of capital through sustained contact with various fields.