Examples Of Masculinity In The Kite Runner

How does one define masculinity? Masculinity, in the past, has been used as a way to define how men traditionally responded to tense situations with anger or intimidation, as well as bottling their feelings so as to not let them show during situations where they deem emotions as “too feminine” or in delicate situations. However, it should not be used as a term to define a man anymore because there is a wide variety of what can make a person, whether a man or woman. Nonetheless, an example of original masculinity is shown throughout the novel, The Kite Runner. The author, Khaled Hosseini, developed the theme of traditional masculinity by showing the world through the eyes of a boy named Amir who grew up in an overtly masculine environment,

Because Amir was raised in an environment where being masculine was looked up to and the ideal, his father indirectly taught him, through his actions and words, what is right and what is wrong. Later on in Amir’s life, he experiences several losses close together, and he sees how his father reacts. During the time when Hassan and Ali were leaving because Hassan allegedly stole Amir’s watch, Amir watched his father go through a series of emotions that he was not used to and he expresses this to the reader. Amir describes the situation and he states that he saw, “...Baba do something I had never seen him do before: He cried” (Hosseini 107). As Amir states, he had never seen his father cry before, and he never typically saw any shows of vulnerable emotion from his father before. He goes on to say that it frightened him because, “Fathers weren’t supposed to cry” (Hosseini 107). This helps to prove that several of the beliefs and values that his father instilled in him regarding his masculinity have taken hold and he sees them as true. He directly states how bizarre it was for his father to cry, which alludes to the fact that his father chose to bottle up emotions, and it appears like Amir does the same, since he did not cry either during the departure of Hassan and Ali, but his father did. This establishes that the values of masculinity can

During his return in Afghanistan, Amir goes through so many situations where he recognizes his own vulnerability and all of the mistakes he has made in his life. For example, when he is fighting with Assef, he finally feels at peace, and rather than doing the “masculine” thing of fighting back, he somewhat just takes it, but he takes it while laughing. Nonetheless, even with the minor growth he displays during the fight, he still has moments, even in his adulthood that help to prove the established values of masculinity from his father. When Amir was looking to take Sohrab back to America with him, he meets a man, who is quite rude to him and very curt. Amir chooses to look upon the man with mild disdain, and as a person who lacked any sense of sympathy. This is somewhat what traditional men are expected to act with, and Amir just assumed that was the man and his personality. Yet, when he informs the secretary of her boss’s behavior, she states that he hadn’t been the same since his daughter’s death by suicide. So, in this situation, the man was choosing to bottle his emotions, which Amir recognized, however, he did not assume that anything was wrong, which reflects back to the original teachings of his father, that men do not show