Competing Masculinities in the British Netflix Series 'Sex Education'

Seminar paper from the year 2020 in the subject Gender Studies, grade: 2,0, University of Dortmund (Institut für Anglistik und Amerikanistik), course: British Proseminar, language: English, abstract: This paper deals with the competing masculinities in the British Netflix series 'Sex Education'. Especially the characters Otis Milburn, Adam Groff and Eric Effiong are taken into consideration. Otis is the typical lovable goof, whereas Adam is more likely to fulfill the stereotype of being a 'real man', because of his tendency of being violent. It turns out that Adam's aggression is caused by him being insecure. Eric is also especially interesting to look at, since he serves several contrary stereotypes. He is a black, homosexual young male that is raised as a second generation immigrant in a traditionally catholic household and is often confronted with homophobia and racism. Eric turns out to be a modern gentleman. Each character's typical behavior patterns will be described and clarified by examples and interpreted in the context of masculinities.