Managing masculinities: doctors, men, and men's partners facing male infertility in France and french-speaking Switzerland (c. 1890–1970)

This article explores the involvement of doctors, men, and men's partners in the clinical setting of male infertility in France and French-speaking Switzerland from the 1890s to the 1970s. Drawing from medical literature, press articles, media archives, and patient records, this paper questions the gendered construction of medical and patient work. It argues that in medical encounters, doctors, men, and men's partners did not only engage with infertility but also with patients' masculinities. The association between fertility and masculinity meant that men, but also doctors, were sometimes reluctant to explore the male factor of reproduction. Therefore, physicians elaborated specific strategies – such as referring to traits stereotypically associated with masculinity, attenuating fertility diagnoses or delegating information to men's partners – to either include or dismiss men from the clinical setting, and to avoid harming their feelings of masculinity. In the meantime, women were made responsible for men's reproductive health, reproducing a gendered division of reproductive work. This paper highlights partners' work, such as consulting first, persuading their partners to undergo fertility exams, and mediating the relationship with physicians