Bushfires are “men's business”: The importance of gender and rural hegemonic masculinity

This paper offers a critical review of the international literature on gender, disaster and rural masculinities. Empirical reference is made to bushfires in Australia, offering new evidence from the State of Victoria. Bushfires loom large in the Australian imagination and there is an increasing amount of research now being conducted in relation to bushfire events. A significant gap remains, however, with regard to the issue of gender. Despite increasing evidence that gender plays a significant role with reference to disaster risk assessment, preparation and response, a gendered analysis of bushfire preparation and response has not been a sustained research priority. Building on the writing of others, a critical assessment is provided of the concept of a specifically Australian, rural hegemonic masculinity as a possible way of better understanding the social dimensions of gender, and bushfire preparation and response in the Australian context. This conceptual consideration is extended to draw attention to the process whereby alternative conceptions of masculinities may emerge. This recognition provides a basis for further research on gender and disaster internationally.

► There is a substantial lack of research on gender and bushfire in Australia.
► We analyse the gendered context to bushfire preparedness and response.
► We examine residents' experiences of bushfire preparedness in Victoria, Australia.
► Gendered norms play an important role in cultural understandings of bushfire.
► Hegemonic masculinity is a particularly useful way of analysing gender and bushfire.