Moving masculinities: Polish migrants in Norway navigating transnational gender hierarchies

ABSTRACT

This article is based upon a study of 10, primarily younger (ages 22–35) unmarried Polish men in Norway and explores the role that gender plays in their migration and how these men navigate between different gender ideals in Norway and Poland. By using an intersectional approach and transnational lens, this article draws attention to how Polish men in Norway negotiate their gendered identities between the social fields they exist within. The research on Polish migrant masculinities has mainly taken place in the UK and focused on men in family situations. This article contributes to this growing field by drawing attention to a less studied demographic in a country like Norway which has similar and different gender hierarchies as the UK. I draw attention to the plurality of masculinities that exist among Polish migrants, and the welcome changes/tensions that emerge as they encounter different gendered expectations in Norway. This article also highlights how the participants see stereotypes about Polish men as both beneficial in situations in Norway, and also serve as a source of marginalization, and the different ways these men then respond to this perceived marginalization.

KEYWORDS:

• Masculinity
• Polish migration
• Norway
• intersectionality
• gender

Introduction

This paper considers the role that gender plays in young unmarried Polish men’s migration in Norway as they navigate between different gender ideals in Norway and Poland. As men migrate, they encounter new gender hierarchies and this paper utilizes an intersectional approach to explore how these new hierarchies are navigated within a transnational context. Many researchers have made arguments about the importance of gender in understanding migration (Christou & Kofman, 2022; Mahler & Pessar, 2001). However, gendered analyses of migration often have focused on women, with men’s migration being overlooked or essentialized as being driven by breadwinning ideals (Wojnicka, 2019). As the field of men and masculinities research has grown in the last 20 years, so has research looking at the intersection of migration and masculinities, including a special edition dedicated to the topic in this journal (Wojnicka & Pustułka, 2019). Researchers from around the world have shown the dynamic role that gender plays in men’s migration experiences, from negotiating their own gendered identity to experiences of discrimination (Hibbins & Pease, 2009). Despite this growing interest, there are many topics which have been little explored when it comes to the intersection of migration and masculinity.

Polish male migrants have increasingly become the subject of research as they are a highly mobile group, and in a number of European countries are one of the largest migrant groups (Wojnicka, 2019). The majority of these studies have focused on fathers and how family dynamics are impacted as these men encounter new gendered expectations (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021). This research has provided important insights about the role gender plays in men’s migration, and how these men may find encountering new gender hierarchies as either positive or challenging and which may result in changes in gender practice (Bell & Pustułka, 2017). However, little of this research has focused on men in different life phases, including those who are single and without families, resulting in gaps on the role that gender plays in other Polish men’s migration.

To address this gap I focus on a less studied demographic, young (22–35) and unmarried men, contributing further knowledge to the growing field of masculinities and migration research (Fiałkowska, 2019). Based on 10 in-depth semi-structured interviews carried out in Oslo in 2020, this article brings forward further understandings of Polish migrant masculinities within Europe. The guiding question of this article is to examine the way in which intersectionality and transnational dynamics impact Polish men’s navigation of different gender ideals between Poland and Norway. I draw attention to the complex middle ground that Polish migrants find themselves in within Europe, as they often are seen as more similar to the host population than other migrants since they are from Europe, but are also different for being from ‘Eastern’ Europe (Bell & Pustułka, 2017). Much of the research on Polish migrant masculinities has been carried out in the UK, and this paper presents the case of Norway, which has many similarities, and also key differences when it comes to dominant ideals of masculinity in comparison to the UK (Christensen & Jensen, 2014).

The following section outlines theoretical understandings of masculinities, intersectionality, and transnationalism and how these concepts are utilized in this article. Following this I provide a brief overview of research on masculinities and migration, and set the scene for understanding the case of Polish migrants in Norway. I then present the methodological approach taken in this paper. My findings are presented in three different arenas in which masculinities, intersectionality, and transnationalism appear to be playing a role in their migration: encountering a new society; perceived experiences of marginalization; and navigations of marginalization. These sections are also presented in the order in which we discussed their migration process, beginning with how they made sense of living in a new place before discussing what challenges they have faced and how they have navigated this. I then discuss the roles that gender, intersectionality, and transnationalism play in my participants’ navigations of new gender ideals in Norway. In the conclusion I outline further areas of development for the field of masculinities and migration.

Masculinities between here and there – insights from intersectionality and transnationalism

Masculinities are both ideals and actual social practices which influence and shape men’s lives, and which are socially constructed within specific geographical, historical, and cultural contexts of gender relations (Messerschmidt, 2016). The concept ‘Hegemonic masculinity’ (Connell, 1995) has been key in the theoretical advancement of masculinities, but has also faced a number of critiques (Christensen & Jensen, 2014), and in light of this, I draw upon Messerschmidt’s (2016) complementary framework of dominant, dominating, and hegemonic masculinities. Dominant masculinities refer to ‘the most widespread types in the sense of being the most celebrated, common, or current forms of masculinity in a specific social setting’ (Messerschmidt, 2016, p. 33). Dominating masculinities refer to those masculinities which are used to exercise ‘power and control over people and events’ (Messerschmidt, 2016, p. 33), which can be based around physical strength or other sources of power and control. What is important to emphasize from this framework is that a form of masculinity can be dominant, or dominating, but not necessarily be hegemonic ‘if they fail culturally to legitimate patriarchal relations’ (Messerschmidt, 2016, p. 33). Specifically, this framework helps to unravel these different forms of masculinity from one another, and also to help researchers identify nonhegemonic forms of masculinity which do not contribute to patriarchal relations. It also helps to unpack how some of these nonhegemonic forms of masculinity can become dominant, or how dominating masculinities can be marginalized.

Intersectionality is relevant for the study of migration and masculinities because it demonstrates that not all men are entitled to the same privileges based solely on their gender and highlights the need to analyze how different social categories interact with their social positioning in society (Wojnicka, 2019). As Christensen and Jensen (2014) highlight, intersectionality and hegemonic masculinity pair well together as it helps to understand different hierarchies between groups of men (p. 68). While intersectionality was originally coined by Kimberle Crenshaw (1989) to explore the discrimination that black women faced in the US, it has flourished since in its use and is now used by scholars globally (Christou & Kofman, 2022). However, it is a concept that has been critiqued for different reasons including how open-ended its use is (Choo & Ferree, 2010).

In light of these critiques, I draw upon the recommendations and typology of uses of intersectionality that Choo and Ferree (2010) outline. I use intersectionality in two ways, where first it is used to understand the intersecting social identities of my participants (Choo & Ferree, 2010, p. 132; Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021, p. 5), and also to look at how social categories my participants are seen as belonging to interact, resulting in marginalization. These two uses of intersectionality are helpful for this study to understand how factors such as class, where class is something that can be both financial and social (Bourdieu, 1984; Pawlak, 2015), shape different experiences amongst my participants, but also how different aspects of their identity such as nationality and gender dynamically interact to result in unique processes of marginalization.

While intersectionality helps us to understand the way in which class, gender, and other social categories intersect and play a role in the migration experience, it does not take into account the role of a migrant’s connection to home or their transnational ties during migration. Transnationalism is a broad concept and theory often used in migration studies to analyze and understand the way in which migrants situate themselves within multiple social locations which extend beyond a nation’s borders (Levitt & Schiller, 2004). A transnational lens is used to understand the transnational ‘social field’ (Levitt & Schiller, 2004, p. 1006) my participants exist within and how they navigate between different regional hierarchies of gender and masculinities (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005) in Poland versus Norway. Certain gender practices in one context might contribute to power and status in one place, and marginalization in another, and a transnational lens helps to understand the way in which challenges unfold as individuals negotiate and navigate between these different gender hierarchies (Fiałkowska, 2019, p. 115). The concept, ‘self-valorizing masculinity’, which is employed by men who ‘seek to rewrite, on their own terms, masculine expectations and norms by self-valorizing their masculine selves’ (Kukreja, 2021, p. 15), is used to further understand how migrant men who experience discrimination navigate these transnational gender hierarchies.

While other researchers have utilized hegemonic masculinity, intersectionality, and transnationalism, I would argue there is a need for more nuanced understandings of masculinities and processes of hierarchies than hegemonic masculinity allows for. Therefore, in this article I explore the interplay between dominant, dominating, and hegemonic masculinity (Messerschmidt, 2016), and how intersecting aspects of identity and transnational positioning contribute to my participants’ navigations of encountering a new society and gender hierarchies. As Norway presents a unique case in which the dominant idea of masculinity may not be one which is built around uneven gender relations, utilizing this complimentary masculinities framework provides insights into different masculine hierarchies that may be developing between groups of men, but which are not built around inequalities between men and women.

Setting the scene: Polish migrant masculinities in Norway and Europe

Historically, migration research has been dominated by economic theories of migration (Castles & Miller, 2003), which resulted in both women’s migration being overlooked (Wojnicka, 2019), and also men’s migration being essentialized and seen as economically driven (Bell & Pustułka, 2017). As women’s migration has come into focus, so has a gendered analysis of their migration experiences (Christou & Kofman, 2022). Meanwhile, men and their gendered migration experiences have been less explored, resulting in a development where, when using a gendered analysis, ‘the male migrant as study subject … [is] ignored almost to the same degree as the female migrant had previously’ (Hibbins & Pease, 2009, p. 5). While the topic of masculinity and migration has grown in recent years, much of the research has focused on nonwhite migrant masculinities in predominantly white societies (Fisher, 2021), with the recent emergence of Polish migrants as a subject of interest (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021). However, there remain a number of research gaps when it comes to Polish male migrants, including analyzing this migration in a country such as Norway which can be seen as having different gender roles and hierarchies.

Due to a number of different factors, there have developed and exist more distinct gender roles and differences between men and women in Poland. This includes historical developments during socialist rule in Poland and in the transition after the collapse of the socialist regime in 1989 which helped to establish masculinism as ‘the primary characteristic of gender relations’ (Watson, 1993, p. 71). Also, due to the prominent role that the Catholic church plays, this has further played into a dynamic of a society based upon gender differences. This has resulted in developments in which researchers argue that the hegemonic masculinity that exists within Poland is based around men being providers, and also based upon dominance, aggression, and physical strength (Fiałkowska, 2019). By contrast, in Norway, emphasis on a dual-earner income model and generous paternity leave policies (Cederström, 2019) have contributed to the development of what researchers term ‘caring’ or ‘new masculinities’ (Lund, Meriläinen, & Tienari, 2019) being the dominant masculinity (Messerschmidt, 2016) within Norway. These new masculinities are based more around gender practices which rely less on dominance, but instead more caring traits and engaged fathering practices within the family. It is important to highlight that there exist a variety of masculine ideals within Poland, as well as evidence of Norwegian men’s ambivalence to more equality-oriented gender relation models and questioning of how wide-spread these new masculinities are (Lund et al., 2019). However, those I interviewed often reflected upon what one might argue are these two different dominant and stereotypical masculinities and their ideals within Poland and Norway and the perceived differences between them as they navigated the migration process.

In the context of Norway, researchers have highlighted the ways in which Polish fathers have to navigate and negotiate ideas of fatherhood from Poland in Norway (Pustułka, Struzik, & Ślusarczyk, 2015). Men from Poland might be more familiar with common fathering practices in Poland based around a patriarchal role of providing for the family, which they feel is out of place in Norway (Pustułka et al., 2015, p. 126). While there are some fathers who do not change their style, others demonstrate new fathering habits and become more engaged with their children’s lives than they would have back in Poland (Pustułka et al., 2015, p. 131).

Research from the UK has shown the dynamic way in which class, ethnicity, and gender intersect and impact how these Polish men experience a new place and social hierarchies. This includes how some Polish men may feel marginalized due to classed and gendered assumptions that exist about Polish men in the UK (Fiałkowska, 2019). These findings from the UK and similar findings from elsewhere in Europe (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021) draw attention to the way in which these Polish migrants engage with complex hierarchies and the way in which gender is central to this placement and navigation of these hierarchies.

Methodology

This paper is based upon research carried out in Oslo where I conducted semi-structured interviews with 10 Polish migrant men living in Norway. I utilized purposive sampling (Punch, 2014) where most participants were young (roughly between ages 20–35), and unmarried. However, two who were older and married were included to counterbalance and explore the similarities and differences in experiences. Several participants could be seen as belonging to higher social class (Bourdieu, 1984; Pawlak, 2015), which in this article is interpreted as education level/occupation. Younger men were chosen for several reasons. Initial waves of Polish migrants to Norway after EU accession were often older and married men with children (Friberg, 2013), and today there is evidence that more recently Polish migrants have been younger, better educated, and without children (Huang, Krzaklewska, & Pustułka, 2016). Additionally, research that has taken into consideration gender among Polish men in Norway has primarily focused on married men through transnational family dynamics (Pustułka et al., 2015), resulting in an under-researched topic among other groups of Polish men in Norway.

The interviews took place in Oslo, and I recruited my participants in a variety of ways including posting in local facebook groups, through previously established connections within the Polish community, as well as recruiting from a bar that is popular among Polish migrants in Oslo. Through these initial contacts, I then used ‘snowballing’ (Cloke et al., 2004) to find further individuals to include. My participants, aside from sharing the characteristic of being young and unmarried, represented a variety of backgrounds. Some had never finished high school while others had received MA degrees, and they worked in a variety of sectors in Norway including the service industry, IT, construction, and flight attendants.

All of the interviews were held in English, which impacted who I was able to speak with, and also influenced how I carried out my interviews. This includes having a Polish friend of mine look at the questions beforehand, and also beginning each interview by stating that if they wanted to express an answer in Polish they were welcome to do so, and I would then translate it later. This was also an important reminder and example of the positionality I had as a researcher within the insider/outsider spectrum and the ‘third position’ (Carling, Erdal, & Ezzati, 2014) I held. Being ‘reflexive’ I utilized this position to my advantage to ask them to explain aspects of Polish culture which they otherwise might not have done with someone who was Polish. Additionally, as I wanted to explore how these men felt they were viewed or marginalized in Norway, being an American at times then provided a point of comparison to highlight how they felt like they were treated differently.

Most interviews lasted between 90 min to two hours, which in the end left me with about 20 h of audio to transcribe and analyze. I employed a narrative analysis, and specifically a dialogical narrative analysis, which has its focus on ‘what is told in the story and how, and what stories do – what happens as a result of telling that story (its effects)’ (Smith, 2016, p. 208). This type of analysis allowed me to explore how these participants viewed themselves and interpreted their process of migrating through a gendered lens. This method has been utilized by a number of researchers looking at migration and masculinities (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021).

New place, new gendered expectations, and relations

Those who I spoke with reflected on the differences they felt existed between Poland and Norway when it came to dominant ideas of manhood and gender relations. As highlighted earlier, due to different social developments, Norway has a generous paternity leave system, contributing to a dominant masculinity which is less based around being the main breadwinner. Jan, who was 24, and had recently completed a bachelor’s in engineering and had moved to Norway 6 months before to start an internship reflected on the differences he felt existed between Poland and Norway when it came to fathering practices.

Jan: Okay, my opinion in Poland was a bit different than it is here. Typical order in Polish family, is like man is earning more money to keep running family and to give possibility for woman to just take care about kids, and yeah it is too often in Poland men then forget to care about kids at the same time. They are about earning money or something and they are missing something about education of their kids, and what I like here in the system, is that when you have the child and then you have some period where you can take some time off and it can be divided between the woman and man and they have to decide who is taking this. This is supporting this and better I think, like father should care more about kids. In Poland I thought maybe I should earn a lot of money or something to be independent, I still think the same, but it’s not about, it’s not like., mm it is not my honor to be doing this.

As Jan points out, key to this difference is the role that paternity leave plays in facilitating this difference between fathering practices, a theme found by other research about Polish families in Norway (Erdal & Pawlak, 2018). Additionally, he comments upon how his own interaction with these new gender ideals in Norway has also changed how he thinks about his role as a man.

As my participants were primarily younger and single, several of them had been dating while in Oslo. This provided another arena in which they reflected upon differences between Poland and Norway when it came to gender relations between men and women and what they felt like a man’s role in a relationship was. For some, this perceived difference in gender relations and gender roles was confusing. Oskar, who was 25 and had been in Norway for about a year, never went to University but had taught himself programming and worked in the IT field, reflected on differences in gender roles in Norway.

Oskar: I think those rules, like men, women, in Norway are much more, I don’t want to say blended, but they are much more confusing. In Poland, it’s changing, but it is still more traditional. And it has its pros and cons, in Poland the pressure is higher, but at the same time it is more clear what you as a man you should do, and what is expected for you.

This confusion and uncertainty about more blended roles would also play a role in how Oskar navigated the dating scene.

Oskar: At least from my part, I don’t really know how to approach girls in Norway. I recall being kind of afraid, because in Poland it is quite clear, you just ask a girl on a date, and it’s kind of old schoolish usually, flowers, and some gifts. You basically know what you are doing. And in Norway I actually have no idea. I just start the game, but I don’t know the rules or how it works. And I have a feeling that everything I know from Poland that would work would be perceived as like patriarchy and lack of respect in Norway. Just simply opening the door for her, it is something that is obvious in Poland and it’s like basic respect, but in Norway everything has to be equal, so it can be offensive but you actually don’t know if she would consider it offensive.

These comments from Oskar were different from how Michal felt about the different gender roles in Norway when it came to approaching girls or having girls approach you. Michal was 31 and had been in Norway for around six years. Although he had received a law degree in Poland, he was working in the service industry as a cook. He commented on differences about speaking with Norwegian and Polish girls:

Michal: You go to a bar and some girl is talking with you, because this is actually a nice thing about Norway that women are active and they approach you. In Poland it doesn’t happen, you have to be active, if you want to meet somebody you have to start talking.

Oskar’s confusion was reflective of the fact that he is more comfortable with having an unequal dynamic between himself and his partner, which he spoke more about later in the interview. Oskar was a unique interview, because unlike everyone else who I spoke with, he was at the time not living in Norway. We got in contact about one week after he had moved from Norway, and when we spoke he had been back and living in Poland for two weeks. Despite having been back in Poland for only two weeks, he had started dating someone already upon his return. The relationship he had back in Poland, he reflects, was more representative of the type of relationship he was more familiar with, and he also preferred:

Oskar: So, yeah as I think about it now, I think I have replicated it (laughs) in my life, this more traditional model after coming back to Poland. Because right now, my girlfriend she cooks, and she cleans up a lot. We kind of split this, and she is quite happy with it. That I am just sitting and making money. What is significant is actually she expects me to act like that as well. She often refers to other men as being like, not like faggots, but pussies. That they are weak, and that they don’t act enough like a man. That they don’t take, enough responsibilities, or that they cannot really take care of their own girlfriends. And I actually find myself better in this relationship than in other ones that I have had. Because other ones were more partnerish, but that also made me more confused because I didn’t really know how to act, and here I already have this role prepared in a way.

Oskar makes several interesting points, including the role of his partner in supporting his masculine identity (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005), as well as the way that he tries to boost his own masculine identity in relation to Norwegian men’s. These are themes which are further unpacked in the discussion, but these comments would be in contrast to how Michal felt about the type of relationship dynamics he likes:

Michal: A lot of Norwegian girls are like independent and I really appreciate it. Like no guy in Poland wants, basically to finance a girl who cannot support herself, like you know what I mean. It is really nice that we share expenses. Everything is shared, women are strong, and they don’t allow you to put them in a subservient position.

Here we can see contrasting views about the role of men when it comes to providing or not providing for their partner and girlfriend between Oskar and Michal. Both of them perceive that in Norway there is more of an equal dynamic between men and women, which for Michal is a positive thing, and for Oskar a source of challenge. What this reveals about their own views of what it means to be a man and other intersecting aspects of their identity, and how it influences their navigations of different gender ideals in transnational ‘social spaces’ (Fiałkowska, 2019, p. 115) is returned to in the discussion.

Perceptions of and responses to marginalization

The migration process leads to changes in social standing and status, which often includes downward movement for migrant men (Hibbins & Pease, 2009). However, as researchers have highlighted, Polish migrants often fall into a dynamic middle ground of inclusion and exclusion in Western Europe as they are seen as more culturally similar than migrants from other parts of the world such as the Middle-east, but are still viewed differently as they are from ‘Eastern Europe’ (Bell & Pustułka, 2017). My participants’ comments reflected their experiences of this middle ground. In addition to this middle-ground status, many of my participants reflected on how the dominant stereotype about male Polish migrants in Norway was that they all work in construction. As Oskar shared:

Oskar: When I am in Norway and I say I am Polish, they mostly assume that I work in construction, so it is somehow hard for them to comprehend that there are Polish people working not only in construction.

In 2021, about 39% of all Polish male migrants in Norway were employed in construction (Fisher, 2021), which shows that there were a number of Polish migrants working in construction, but also other sectors, such as Oskar, who worked in IT. Along with this reputation as construction workers, several participants highlighted how Polish migrants have a reputation for being hard workers, especially when it comes to manual labor, and that this even has advantages when it comes to being hired for these types of jobs. Stefan was 34 and had been living in Norway for three years. While he had received an MA back in Poland in the social sciences, he was working in construction in Norway and shared this experience he once had while working.

Stefan: We had a project to put some solar panels on the roof in Oslo, and they said like straight, the bosses, the head from the company, they said they want to have Polish do it.

Others would highlight how they felt that stereotypical ideas about Polish migrants in Norway also come with negative assumptions. Mateusz, who was 31 and had been in Norway for around 5 years, had received an MA in Anthropology in Poland, and had been working as a bar tender in Norway, shared an experience in which his landlord commented that he and his friends were different from the typical Polish migrants because they were more from the punk scene. He reflected on what his landlord probably meant about the typical Polish worker.

Mateusz: the construction worker, like a big tough guy, who smokes a lot, who says kurwa [Polish swear word] a lot, and drinks a lot when he has time off, lives with 7 other people in one room. I think that’s like the most popular stereotype. There was a TV show here called ‘Fight for Survival’, which was a comedy, but was a big deal in Poland because they were making fun of Polish people, and yeah, it was a bit stereotypical.

As Mateusz’ reflections show, the stereotype of the Polish construction worker is also one that is connected to a number of other characteristics such as someone who drinks and smokes a lot, lives with many others in one apartment, and other factors that can be seen as backwards or inappropriate behaviors. Importantly, he also highlights a TV show, fight for survival as contributing to this stereotype, which was a show that aired in Norway in 2015 and was critiqued by the Polish ambassador to Norway for portraying Polish migrants in a negative manner (Fisher, 2021). Jan would also express that this was a stereotype he felt existed in Norway as well, but would also in some ways agree was realistic as he shared his experiences of interacting with other Polish migrants in Norway.

Jan: They are drinking a lot, it is affecting their life, that is what I don’t like definitely, and people, like Norwegians, can notice this behaviors, and they are talking loud in the bus, and swearing, and everything. I really notice it on public transit. l don’t like it, because it is not nice, and every person like this is representing his country, and I am trying to show others that I am normal, I am behaving somehow, and I am representing my country this way, and why are others destroying this?

Jan’s comments reflect both how he feels as though there is some truth to these stereotypes, but also at the same time making it clear that he sees himself as different and works to distance himself from those who he sees as engaging in this embarrassing behavior. This story reflects an important argument that many migration researchers have made, which is the importance of recognizing the heterogeneity amongst migrant groups (Pawlak, 2015).

When asked if negative stereotypes about Polish migrants had an impact on how they were treated, most felt this had little impact on their lives. Interestingly, several shared it most had an impact when it came to dating life. Antoni, who was 26, had never gone to university, and had worked in a variety of jobs. At the time we spoke he had been in Norway for about 6 months, and had initially worked as a construction worker, but was now working remotely for an IT company in Poland. He shared this about dating in Norway:

Antoni: The interesting thing is that I have never had so many problems with girls on Tinder as I have here in Norway.

K: Really?

Antoni: Yeah, really. When it comes to Norwegian girls and Polish guys, I think if I asked someone, they would say it’s not a problem, but statistically, I mean I have never had so many problems with meeting girls. I see how some Polish girls treat some people from Ukraine in Poland, because Ukrainians are cheap labour in Poland now. So this is a funny thing to observe.

Others would share that when they were speaking with Norwegian women at the bar they felt as though things were going well until the girl learned they were Polish.

Oskar: I would approach a girl in a club and we speak Norwegian and then obviously they would ask me where I am from because that is what they do a lot. Like Germans and Austrians they didn’t really care. In Norway, if you speak Norwegian, but with a foreign accent, they would just ask you straight away where I’m from. Especially if you have strong accent, and yeah we tend to have strong accents with Anglo-Saxon languages, so she would just instantly become more distant.

Michal would share a similar story, and when asked why he felt like this happened, he replied:

Michal: It is the same association. Blue-collar workers, and that straight up makes you less desirable. It [being Polish] has an anchoring point for all other assumptions that you can make. Many times it is correct.

Similar to Antoni, Michal feels that there are stereotypes about male Polish migrants which are connected to being cheap labor and seen as lower class, and this then makes them undesirable to Norwegian women. As I return to in the discussion, an intersectional perspective is helpful in understanding how different factors such as nationality, class, and masculinity intersect here resulting in marginalization (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021).

In response to this perceived marginalization, two of my participants would try and position themselves positively by critiquing Norwegian men. This came up with Oskar when I asked him what traits are important for men to have, and he quickly began to critique Norwegian men:

Oskar: I think yeah, taking some responsibility, I found Norwegians to be a bit, childish in many areas, and I feel like they kind of grow up slowly.

At first Oskar says it is important that men should take responsibility, which by calling Norwegians childish, he emphasizes they do not. Antoni, when describing Norwegian men, would make similar comments.

Antoni: Like, they are concentrated on fun, and not responsible, many things that people said, they have had too easy life to handle problems, so it is kind of true, that they have very easy life.

Both highlight how they see Norwegian men as not responsible enough, and this would come up again in a story that Antoni would share.

Antoni: I heard a story from this girl, the one from Netherland, and she was with another Dutch girl in the mountains, and she needed help, and there were a few guys and girls. And she asked for help, and in Poland, everyone would be like YEAH (said with enthusiasm) you poor girl with the twisted ankle, and instead the girl helped her, and they [the men] were big, and I kind of like these traditional roles. Obviously guys are physically stronger, this is fact, on average, and it also gives them some more power to help someone, and I think they were concentrated more on themselves, and I hear that girls are disappointed because they heard like Vikings or something, and they told me that they are pussies,

Antoni here is recounting a story told to him by his current girlfriend who is Dutch, where his girlfriend was with a friend who injured herself in the mountains. While there were both Norwegian men and Norwegian women around who could have helped, none of the men did anything and instead it was the women who helped the injured girl. As both Antoni and Oskar highlight, Norwegian men aren’t responsible enough, or are too passive to take action in certain situations. What this says about their own notions of masculinity I now turn to in the discussion.

Discussion

These findings highlight the way in which my participants felt as though they were living in a society with different gender ideals, and also how they encountered new social hierarchies as Polish migrants in Norway. Intersectional and transnational perspectives can help to better understand how they navigated these experiences in Norway.

When it came to encountering new gender ideals between Poland and Norway, the comments from Jan, Michal and Oskar highlight how these differences can either be welcome or challenging. Here an intersectional perspective can be helpful in understanding some of these different responses to navigations of these ideals, and in particular the role of class. As researchers have pointed out, class can be something that is both financial based, but also based upon more subjective and relational notions connected to social class (Lund et al., 2019). Both Jan and Michal have attained higher education, where Jan has found a relevant internship as an engineer for himself in Oslo, and while Michal was working in the service industry, he had received a law degree and considered himself a member of the artistic community and was hoping to attend film school. These factors I would argue contribute to both of them seeing themselves as having cultural and social capital and higher social class standing (Bourdieu, 1984; Pawlak, 2015). Research on which groups of men are more likely to embrace new and caring ideas of masculinity which are less about hierarchy have found that those with higher education and social capital are also more likely to embrace these ideas of masculinity (Christensen & Jensen, 2014).

In contrast to Michal and Jan, Oskar found new gender ideals in Norway more confusing, and here a transnational lens can be useful. As researchers have highlighted, there exists a widespread hegemonic masculine ideal of being a provider in Poland (Bell & Pustułka, 2017). In Oskar’s interview excerpts we can see he is influenced by this ideal, and draws upon it for his own masculine practice. As he reflects on differences between Norway and Poland, he states the fact that everything has to be ‘equal’ in Norway, and that this creates tension for how he feels about his own gender practice and ideals he draws upon. Oskar, in his negotiations of masculinities when it comes to dating, demonstrates the ways in which he struggles to navigate ‘gendered geographies of power’ (Mahler & Pessar, 2001, p. 447). This struggle comes from the fact that he feels caught in between gender ideals that exist in Poland and Norway, which are based around different hierarchies of power between men and women. I would argue that his confusion around the more ‘blended’ roles in Norway comes from his internalization of gender roles that exist in Poland, creating challenges for how he adapts and tries to fit in within Norwegian society (Trąbka & Wojnicka, 2017).

An intersectional analysis is also necessary for understanding the ways in which the participants felt as though Polish migrants were looked down upon and marginalized within Norwegian society. Many of those I spoke with felt as though the dominant stereotype about Polish migrants in Norway is that they are all construction workers. However, their comments also revealed how they felt this stereotype of the construction worker was also connected to ideas of Polish migrants as culturally backwards and belonging to a lower social class (Fiałkowska, 2019). This association of being lower class results in my participants, especially those who felt rejected by Norwegian women, feeling as though that by being Polish and the class markers that go with it, they are seen as embodying a marginalized masculinity and placed lower in the Norwegian social hierarchy (Christensen & Jensen, 2014). Interestingly, Jan comments himself on Polish migrants in Norway who live up to these stereotypes and thus reenforces them, which further underscores how he identifies as having higher social class. These findings are similar to those from other research about how certain Polish migrants try to distance themselves from other Polish migrants for reasons relating to class (Pawlak, 2015). While Jan’s comments can be seen as a possible response to these discriminating stereotypes by distancing himself from them, Antoni and Oskar, I would argue, use the strategy of self-valorizing their masculinity (Kukreja, 2021).

While both of them felt they had been looked down upon and rejected by Norwegian women due to intersecting factors of their identity as Polish men in Norway, they both comment on how they see Norwegian men as not responsible enough or too passive. From a transnational perspective, we see how they appear to be drawing upon and influenced by hegemonic ideals of what it means to be a man in Poland (Bell & Pustułka, 2017), and draw upon this as they self-valorize their masculinity (Kukreja, 2021) as they encounter a society which has a dominant masculinity that is different from their own (Messerschmidt, 2016). Importantly, Antoni and Oskar both only had received high school degrees in comparison to the others I spoke with who had either completed bachelor or master’s programs. That they may feel they have lesser social or cultural capital as a result of this, and then embrace unequal gender relations may be a strategy of maintaining status and power (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005). The role of women in affirming these men’s notions of what it is to be a man is important to highlight. Both of them comment on how they feel as though women are either disappointed by Norwegian men and more approving of their own masculine identity which is based around unequal relations, a topic that other researchers have highlighted is in need of attention when analyzing masculinities (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005). This strategy of self-valorization provides a dynamic example of how these men navigate between dominant, dominating, and hegemonic masculine ideals between two countries with different sets of ideals, and how they try to situate their own gendered identity in a transnational context (Fiałkowska, 2019).

Conclusion

This article brings forward new findings to the intersection of research focusing on masculinities and migration research. As highlighted in the article, little research focusing on Polish migrants and masculinities has included younger and unmarried men, and much of the research has been carried out in the UK. Norway provides an interesting case for understanding how men navigate a new society with different gender ideals as many of the participants felt as though they were quite different from Poland. Understanding these navigations requires an intersectional approach, as different aspects of their identity contribute to how they view their own masculine identity and then interact with these new gender ideals. Additionally, as a number of them felt that there existed negative stereotypes about Polish migrants, which intersected with different factors such as class, nationality, and masculinity, an intersectional approach helps to unpack these marginalizing processes which play a role in their navigation of a new society. A transnational lens I have highlighted is also important as it brings forward how although they live in a new country, they still feel as though they exist between Poland and Norway. Gender is then one of the factors they feel they are navigating and plays a role in how they encounter a society with new gender ideals.

To conclude, this article highlights several areas for the development of future research on masculinities and migration research. The first is more research on men who are single and may attempt to navigate dating in a new country. As Bell and Pustułka (2017) observed, focusing on men in family situations allows for opportunities to better understand shifting masculinities as you can also speak with family members (p. 139). However, I would argue that my article shows that speaking with single men provides its own merits for theoretical understanding as dating life appears to play a dynamic role in how men feel they are perceived by the host society, which can play a role in how they navigate these new gender ideals, and is a topic that requires more research. Finally, this article has brought more attention to the types of discrimination and marginalization Polish men face. While research on migrant masculinities in Europe has normally been concerned with nonwhite migrants, my findings highlight that my participants also experience new social hierarchies, and further research could focus on how these hierarchies develop and impact Polish migrants and other migrant groups who fall in this middle-ground of belonging and exclusion (Wojnicka & Nowicka, 2021).

Acknowledgements

Thank you to my MA thesis supervisors Thomas Michael Walle and Marta Bivand Erdal for their incredible support during my thesis, and which the findings for this article are adapted from. Additionally, I would like to thank Kamila Fiałkowska and her colleagues at the Centre for Migration Research for providing useful comments during my thesis. Finally, thank you Katarzyna Wojnicka and the reviewers for their insightful comments on this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kelly Fisher

Kelly Fisher is an advisor at Reform – Resource Centre for Men, which is an NGO based in Oslo working with men and boys on topics connected to masculinity and gender equality. His research interests include intersectional perspectives about men and boys, men and masculinities in an international context, and masculinities and childhood.