The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 38, No. 2 & Volume 39, No. 1 - 169

Living-Learning Communities and Men’s Identity Construction

in addition to enabling the men to identify and interact with like-minded peers, the environments afforded several of them the opportunity to imagine a less rigid career path. roy explained, Being in [the arts community] has taken me out of my original mindset of “i have to get a job that will get me money, so i need to have this major to do that thing.” now, it’s more like, “yeah, i can do that,” but along the way i don’t have to suffer. i can actually do things that make me happy, like theater. i can direct a play, i can act in a play. . . . it actually helped me reduce my overall level of anxiety. if i had never found [the arts community], i don’t know where i would be right now . . . i don’t know whether i would have just moved back home and tried to find a job there.

clear from the interview that peer interactions helped him to reimagine his future. the final way in which the men described their communities as affording them the space to be themselves was in their behavior in the llc as compared to their behavior elsewhere on campus. Jack explained how living in the arts community made him a more responsible person. He joked that if he had lived in one of the traditional residence halls, he would “probably have liver failure by now” because of his perception that the environment promoted drinking. lance, who lived on an honors floor, echoed this sentiment, explaining that while he and his peers have a good time in their residence hall, “most people are considerate, and if [people] are studying, you are not going to have brouhaha in the middle of the hall and ruin other people’s lives.” John recounted with disdain a story of one of his non-llc friends spending an entire day playing a video game in John’s room. He described the behavior as “lazy” and “lame” and expressed appreciation that llc members found better ways to spend their time.

Our discussions with men in LLCs provided a stark contrast to the portrait of the disengaged male that is depicted in much of the literature about men’s engagement .

Alternative to the Portrait of the Disengaged Male
Our discussions with men in llcs provided a stark contrast to the portrait of the disengaged male that is depicted in much of the literature about men’s engagement (Hu & Kuh, 2001; Pike et al., 2003). Virtually all the men discussed how their communities promoted cocurricular involvement in everything from social activities to community service. several men mentioned that a lack of involvement during their first year in college caused them to seek out an llc to foster their involvement

John also discussed rethinking his plans. He had always planned on attending medical school, but as a result of his interactions with floor mates in the social justice community who had “taken time out already and . . . worked on political campaigns or went and taught underprivileged children” he was “thinking more that i might want to serve some sort of underprivileged or rural community.” it was

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The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 38, No. 2 & Volume 39, No. 1

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Journal of College and University Student Housing - Volume 38, No. 2 & Volume 39, No. 1