hair:y_less masculinities is a sub-project of “Iran and Beyond – Breaking the Ground for Sustainable Scholarly Collaboration (IRSSC, 2019-2022)”. It is led by one of the Co-PIs of the IRSSC project, Dr. Melike Şahinol. Research project team members are Burak Taşdizen and Dr. Gülşah Başkavak.
The growing cultural enthusiasm for cosmetic surgery and the techno-medical modification of the body have long since reached men’s world, and thus, medicalized masculinities. Among the top five cosmetic procedures most frequently chosen by men are laser hair removal in the category of cosmetic minimally invasive procedures and hair transplantations in the category of cosmetic surgical procedures. Turkey and Iran, the two countries emerging as world’s health tourism destinations around the globe, have not remained indifferent to the increasing interest in cosmetic surgery in particular for hair transplant procedures tailored towards men. Considering its location, Turkey’s health tourism appeals to men medical tourists from both the West and the Middle East. Iran, following Turkey, emerges to have the second largest market share in the Middle East.
With a special emphasis on the somatechnics of male hair removal and transplantation practices, this project analyses men’s hair care by drawing a cartography of male body hair removal and hair transplantation norms and practices in the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Turkey. The comparative perspective between these practices in Iran and Turkey is therefore important in order to work out country-specific socio-cultural differences and influences coming from different currents thus also empowerment strategies despite cultural proximity and habits in the field of beauty, body care and (medicalized) masculinities.
Related publications
Book
Şahinol, M., Taşdizen, B., & Başkavak, G. (2022). Hair:y_less Masculinities. A Cartography. Bonn: Şahinol, Melike (in cooperation with perspectivia.net). https://doi.org/10.25360/01-2022-00000
Article
Şahinol, M. & Taşdizen, B. (2021). “Medicalised Masculinities in Turkey and Iran: The Eigensinn of Hair in Hair Transplantation.” Somatechnics 11(1). https://doi.org/10.3366/soma.2021.0339
Book chapter
*Şahinol, M., & Taşdizen, B. (2022). İnsan Sonrası Erkek(lik): Saç Ekimi Örneği. In S. Buran & P. Kumbet (Eds.), Çokludisiplinlerde Posthümanizm (pp. 421-435). London, UK: Transnational Press London.
Related presentations
Şahinol, M., Taşdizen, B., & Başkavak, G. (2021). Cinsiyetlendirilmiş Hijyen: Erkeklerde Saç ve Kıl Bakım Pratikleri, STS TURKEY 2021: Bir Disiplin Olarak Kimlik İnşası, 22-24 Kasım 2021, online.
Şahinol, M. & Taşdizen, B. (2021). Entangled Empowerment: Connecting Shared Hair Transplantation Practices for Men in Turkey and Iran, Connecting Themes: Contested Knowledge in a Connected World Conference, 16-17 September 2021, Berlin, (Germany).
Şahinol, M. & Taşdizen, B. (2021). Colonizing Men’s Bodies: Natureculture Metaphors around Hair Transplantation, I U A E S: The Re-invention of Traditions in the Middle East, 7-9 August 2021, online.
Şahinol, M. & Taşdizen, B. (2020). Everyday Cyborgs: Men with Implanted/Transplanted Hair and its Eigensinn, EASST + 4S Joint Conference: Locating and Timing Matters: Significance and Agency of STS in Emerging Worlds, 18-21 August 2020, online.
Şahinol, M. & Taşdizen, B. (2020): Cartography of Hair:y_less Masculinities: An Introduction, Orient-Institut Istanbul Research Colloquium, 1 April 2020, online.
Taşdizen, B. (2020). Posthuman Feminist Theory: Body Modification and Empowerment, Technology and the Body: Care, Empowerment and the Fluidity of Bodies, 21 January 2020, Istanbul (Turkey).
Related events
10.01.2022: Panel “Perform_Factur_ing /Healthy/ Wo_Man: Iran, Turkey and Beyond” at the internal IRSSC closing conference, Orient-Institut Istanbul (online).
20.01.2022-22.01.2022: Film Forum “Iran at the Crossways” and Panel “Modified (Hu)Man: Gelenekler, Kırılganlıklar ve Olası Gelecekler,” at the Film Forum “Documentaries and Dialogues on a Society in Transition”, INSTITUT FRANÇAIS de Turquie à Istanbul-Taksim, Istanbul.
12.11.2021-13.11.2021: Film Forum “Iran at the Crossways” and Panel “Modified (Hu)Man: Traditions, Vulnerabilities and Possible Futures” at the Film Forum “Documentaries and Dialogues on a Society in Transition”, Orient-Institut Istanbul, Hamburg (online).
20.08.2020: Medicalized Masculinities Workshop (in collaboration with Medicine Man, Southern University of Denmark), Orient-Institut Istanbul (workshop report: https://hairyless.hypotheses.org/335).
21.1.2020: Technology and the Body: Care, Empowerment and the Fluidity of Bodies, Orient-Institut Istanbul (workshop report: https://wissen.hypotheses.org/2051).
hair:y_less masculinities is a sub-project of “Iran and Beyond – Breaking the Ground for Sustainable Scholarly Collaboration (IRSSC)”, which is part of Max Weber Foundation’s Knowledge Unbound, and is funded by German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF).
You can find more information on our project website: https://hairyless.hypotheses.org
