“Giving Up Maleness”: Abraham Maslow, Masculinity, and the Boundaries of Psychology
In a paper in History of Psychology, Nicholson (2001) examines Abraham Maslow’s attempt to reconstruct the boundaries of psychology. This paper focuses on Maslow’s struggle to find a way to “soften” scientific psychology without completely undermining what he believed was its essentially male nature. Nicholson argues that Maslow’s attempt to broaden what it meant to […]
In a paper in History of Psychology, Nicholson (2001) examines Abraham Maslow’s attempt to reconstruct the boundaries of psychology. This paper focuses on Maslow’s struggle to find a way to “soften” scientific psychology without completely undermining what he believed was its essentially male nature. Nicholson argues that Maslow’s attempt to broaden what it meant to be a psychologist was intimately linked to the question of what it meant to be a man, and that Maslow’s struggle to come to terms with his masculinity should stand as a testament to the power of gender assumptions in psychology and in American professional life as a whole. According to Nicholson, Maslow stands as a dramatic demonstration of how significant the search for a powerful masculinity can be for the seemingly unrelated task of developing a powerful discipline.
