Myths of Masculinity and American Film examines ideologies of white American manhood that permeated U.S. culture between 1974 and 2016—the period in which the boys of Generation X grew into adulthood.

Stephen R. Duncan argues that the mass media of movies and television, along with some popular novels, music, and certain newsworthy events, can help reveal these ideologies—for good and for ill—as they dramatically changed in the wake of the social movements of the 1960s and early 1970s. Tracing how ‘presidential patriarchy’ and cinematic representations of white manhood evolved in these decades, the book explores the resulting reinforced ethos of masculine individualism that underpinned popular support for Trumpism by 2016. It demonstrates that the key that unlocks the connections between culture and politics is a discourse around patriarchy that is shared both by films of this period and popular perceptions of presidents, from Nixon, Carter, and Reagan, to Bush, Clinton, and Obama.

This book will be of interest to students and scholars of U.S. media and cultural history, American Studies, and gender studies.