The Street’s Embrace: Masculinity and Caring in the Shadows of Crime and Marginalization

This article investigates masculinity as a flexible and often contradictory performance, based on eight months of ethnographic fieldwork with 40 young men embedded in a hypermasculine street culture in Oslo, Norway. By examining three distinct forms of caring practices that address tangible, emotional and social needs, the study reveals how violence and toughness coexist alongside meaningful acts of care that strengthen group solidarity. The article calls for a more nuanced understanding of masculinity – one that moves beyond fixed or ideal-type models to recognize masculinity as context-dependent, fluid and internally complex. In doing so, it offers important contributions to both criminological and broader sociological discussions about masculine identity performances.